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And if you decide to swap the surf for sub-zero temperatures along powder slopes, snowboarding should satisfy your need for dangerous speed. One of boarding’s benchmark sports, it has developed a global following amongst the hard core and hip set wherever snowfields grace mountain slopes. The lack of snow does not pose an insurmountable problem though, as the burgeoning freestyle skate crowd is proving on pavements and tarmac downhills in urban settings the world over. Or set foot on an all terrain mountain- board (imagine a metre-plus skateboard on Creatine, sporting bad-ass knobblies the size of dinner plates and an attitude to match) and even gnarly , rock strewn tracks are no longer off limits. Finally, if you really feel it is time to up the ante, go sky-surfing. Now a bona fide disciplines at the ESPN Extreme Games, sky-surfing started off reasonably innocently in 1980 when bored parachutists began jumping with boogie-boards, air surfing the free-fall stage while lying down on their rigid foam boards. The genre progressed to the next logical step in 1988, when Frenchman Laurent Bouquet decided to go into stand-up mode a’ la Silver Surfer, using a smaller board with cut-away bindings and its own recovery chute. Sky-surfing spread from Europe to America in the early nineties, with dedicated skyboards (made from light-weight honeycomb aluminium and graphite/kevlar composite) hitting the sky ways. Additional must-have items include a helmet, shoes suited to your board bindings, a jump-suit (with low-drag legs and high-drag upper section) plus a hook knife (just in case the proverbial chute hits the fan). Contact Side Bar 2: SANDBOARDING: Carve up monster dunes for a day of sun, fun and excitement with Downhill Adventures, who are able arrange full-day sandboarding excursions to either the East or West Coast. Expert instructors will show you the ropes, providing transport from Cape Town, all the equipment, a vegetarian lunch plus refreshments. Trips are scheduled for Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays, departing from Cape Town at 10h00 and returning around 17h30, at a cost of R495 per person. Contact Downhill Adventures on (021) 422 0388 for more information or check out www.downhilladventures.co.za. |
