When I was a teen back in the 70's, hang gliding was the extreme sport that captivated my imagination. I wanted to try it so bad. I studied the sport and knew the dangers but still wanted to try it. I tried to sell my parents on the idea and even quoting a statistic that I read about how driving a car was more dangerous than hang gliding. Well silly, driving a car is one of the most dangerous things you can do, statistically speaking. In college, I was the lifeguard at the university pool. Everyday this guy named Larry Tudor would come in and do his laps. I asked him about his dedication to swimming and he said he was a hang glider. Turns out that at the time he held the straight distance record for the sport (at the time his record was over 100 miles and in 1990 he took it to 330 miles in 9 hours). So I asked him to take me out the next time he launched. We headed out to a dry lake bed outside of Las Vegas and man this guy could soar! It was so cool to watch him fly. I never did hang glide or parasail but once in Cabo I did some behind the boat with a parachute. That was fun and a lot less dangerous (I think). The video below is an example of why I am sticking with water sports. Water can sting, but it usually won't break anything.
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