Know where to go and when to go

Visitors often think Cape Town is not often flyable. This is a myth. We have around 50 takeoff sites in and around the greater Cape Town area. From Hermanus in the East, Langebaan in the West, Porterville in the North and Table Mountain National Park in the South – we fly all over. Having this large range of sites usually means its flyable somewhere on any given day

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Guiding for all skill levels

  • Tandem Training
  • Paragliding Porterville
  • Student paragliding flight at Hermanus
  • Paragliding over signal hill

We’re here to take you flying

Knowing where to go and when to go is the challenge. The Cape’s weather is quite complex: it’s influenced heavily by micro-climates caused around our mountains. We can have gale force south-easter winds blowing in Cape Town yet still flying safely in Paarl only 45minutes drive away.

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City Flying Guiding

Our City Flying Guiding is for visiting or newly licensed local pilots to explore the many flying sites in Table Mountain National Park. There are more than a dozen takeoff sites in the Park, also a World Heritage Site. To maintain our relationship between the flying community and the National Park, it is imperative to know the rules and, more importantly, fly in the right conditions so that you can have safe, happy flying.

1 Day Paragliding Guiding

Hire an instructor for the day. We’ll take you to the site that delivers on your desires. We cover everything from dune soaring, small xc, big xc and hike ‘n fly. We’re flexible on transport arrangements and can either provide transport or join yours. Our instructors are also qualified tour guides so you can be assured that we’ll give you more than just a paragliding experience. This booking requires a minimum of 2 persons. If you’re travelling alone contact us and we’ll either try to pair you with another solo pilot or slot you in with our flying plans. We can provide transport (up to 50kms driven free per day) for up to 6 pilots OR you can provide the transport while we provide the guide.

3 Day Paragliding Guiding

Book our 3-day option and we’ll plan the best possible flying for your stay. This booking requires a minimum of 2 persons. If you’re travelling alone contact us and we’ll either try to pair you with another solo pilot or slot you in with our flying plans. We can provide transport (up to 100kms driven free per day) for up to 6 pilots OR you can provide the transport while we provide the guide.

Paragliding Instructor Cape Town

Ria Moothilal

Your Guide

Ria is a Grade B & C Paragliding Instructor. He has close to 20 years of experience in air sports including skydiving, base jumping and paragliding. He’s a former data scientist, has a BSc in Engineering, cycled across Africa and founder of Air School Paragliding

Ria started paragliding specifically to get into xc flying. In a short space of time, he has become a prominent local xc pilot. Flying new routes and hike ‘n fly is his speciality. He’s a qualified tour guide and passionate about spreading awareness about the many positive features of South Africa.

Features

Our pilots and instructors actively fly all over the Cape Town region. Come fly with us

Weather Forecasting

We take the challenge out of interpreting complex weather forecasts and together with our local experience means we have a high strike rate of flying in the right place at the right time. We also share this knowledge with you so you too can understand more about the Cape Town weather

Dune Soaring

After some dune flying action? We love playing on the dune, it’s not only great for the hot weather but an ideal place to learn new skills or just have a chilled flying experience in the middle of summer.

Hike 'n Fly

Our instructors love hike ‘n fly. We know the good spots that can deliver on pleasurable hikes and spectacular flying

XC Flying

Triangles, 100km+ flights, scenic touring… XC flying is the heart of what we do. We do it all from City XC through to big distance flying from world-famous sites like Porterville.

Transport

Transport is the biggest challenge for flying in the Cape. It’s easier for city flying but once we move to sites outside of the city then it’s easy to rack up hundreds of driven kilometres in a day. As such we’re flexible on transport arrangements: we can provide a guide with transport or just the guide.

Learn about South Africa

We’re very pro exposing you to more about South Africa. That’s why we trained as tour guides. There’s to more our beautiful country than just paragliding.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does it cost?

City guiding starts from R299 per hour for a minimum of 2 hours. For an price comparison please check out our Prices page

As long as you want 🙂

Yes, you need a valid international paragliding license as well as SAHPA temporary membership. If you’re a competent but unlicensed pilot, we can still assist by registering you as a temporary student for the day – we will first have to assess your skills though. Contact us for more info

We operate 7 days a week from 8 am to 6 pm.

No, we do not provide any insurance. We are a paragliding school and operate within the framework of SAHPA. SAHPA has site insurance for registered flying sites and 3rd party liability for its members (just another benefit of having SAHPA temp/full membership). It is extremely important to ensure that you have the appropriate medical insurance for your stay here. Our government hospitals are not ideal, most South African pilots have their own private medical insurance enabling them to access private hospitals

Can I get help to pay?

Stay tuned, we’ll soon have credit options for all our services

We accept cancellations up to 24 hours in advance. Simply inform of us of your unavailability and we will reschedule to a time that better suits you

If the weather forecasts look horrible beforehand we’ll let you know and advise on alternative options as well as give you the option to reschedule. If the weather forecast looks good and we go out but find that the weather forecast was wrong, then we’ll provide alternate activities e.g. wine tasting, quad biking, penguin visits, etc.

Cancellations and refunds are accepted up to 24 hours in advance.

We fly all over Cape Town including sites within a 2-hour drive. Everything from Porterville in the north, Table Mountain National Park in the South, Hermanus in the East and Langebaan in the West.

Testimonials

Here’s what our happy pilots had to say about our services:

Air School Paragliding
Air School Paragliding
5.0
Based on 16 reviews
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0,2 Podcast
0,2 Podcast
10:30 19 Apr 22
All around great experience. Would highly recommend for anyone who is visiting Cape Town. Thanks Ria!
Anna-Mart Van Der Merwe
Anna-Mart Van Der Merwe
05:06 02 Nov 21
It was an amazing experience with RiaHe talked walked and flew everything through giving me the safety net I needed to... enjoy my paragliding trip.They come highly recommended by me.Thx so much Ria I enjoyed this so much and now I can tick tis experience on my bucket list.Safe travels in the sky for you!read more
Thys De Wet
Thys De Wet
19:54 14 Jun 21
Ria's patience and dedication with each student ensures that Air School Paragliding graduates has a thourough... understanding of the theory and practical elements involved in the sport of paragliding. The result is pilots who are safe and able to make good decisions on their own whilts having fun all the way. His pation for the sport is contagious and I would highly recommend Air School Paragliding.read more
Stephen Vogts
Stephen Vogts
19:12 14 Jun 21
Air School offers a great service to the paragliding community. With the basic license course giving you a good... foundation from the first ground handling lessons to first flights and aggregating to achieving the license requirements. Then there's the longer term post license progression programs which are hugely beneficial for low airtime pilots to maintain a steep learning curve into the sport. With constant mentoring on all aspects of paragliding and a good introduction to so many great sites, there's a lot of awesome flying to be done. Not to mention all the peers and welcoming community to share your experiences with!read more
Tom Watkeys
Tom Watkeys
15:12 14 Jun 21
Ria is such a helpful guy, always willing to share knowledge and have a laugh in the lighter moments
Kevin Mattison
Kevin Mattison
15:06 14 Jun 21
Ria provided excellent, safe and personalised flight tuition. I thoroughly enjoyed the course.
Jan Daniel Labuschagne
Jan Daniel Labuschagne
14:40 14 Jun 21
The experience of learning to fly with Air School Paragliding was professional and fun. You can expect a high level of... engagement from Ria and the team. You can be sure that the school will teach you to become a proficient pilot. The attention to detail and commitment from the team was astounding, and I can highly recommend the school.read more
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