Nobody really tells you what happens between being clipped in and putting your feet back on the ground. Here it is.
When people picture a tandem flight, they picture an edge, a drop and a leap. On our slope at Aguergour, none of that happens. The pilot brings the wing up behind you; it fills, it pulls, and from then on it is the wing holding you. You keep walking three or four steps because the ground falls away, and then it is gone. Nobody jumped.
The next five seconds are the loudest of the flight: fabric snaps, lines hiss, you can hear the pilot breathing. Then he slides you into the harness, you sit back as if into a deckchair, and the noise drops away all at once. It is that silence people talk about on the way down, more than the view.
A lot of noise, a pull in the shoulders and an urge to look at your feet. Look ahead instead: it is the only instruction that really matters.
The pilot pulls a strap and you tip back into a seated position. That is when hands let go of the risers and the conversation starts.
This is where the view opens up: Lalla Takerkoust lake on one side, the Atlas skyline on the other, and tiny villages below.
The pilot calls it, you put your legs back out, the field comes up more slowly than you would think. You land walking.
The pilot is thirty centimetres behind your head. You talk normally, without shouting. Plenty of passengers ask their questions once airborne, not before.
Even in summer the air up there is noticeably colder than at launch. A thin jacket changes everything, especially for your hands.
Fifteen minutes in the air, but half a day on site all told: the drive, waiting for the right moment, kitting up, packing the wing and driving back up.
One price, no surprises when you arrive: the gear, the pilot, the briefing and the ride up to launch. All you bring is closed shoes and a little nerve.
A short push at launch, then nothing violent at all. In a glide you do not feel speed: the ground is too far away to act as a reference. What strikes people is the silence, and the fact that you are sitting rather than hanging.
Only if you ask, and only if conditions allow. By default the flight is straight and calm. Any steep turns are agreed between the two of you, in the air, never as a surprise.
Three things: keep walking forward without stopping, keep your head up, and do not sit down until the pilot says so. That is the whole briefing, and it takes two minutes on the slope.
Early morning or late afternoon, when the lake breeze is steady. In summer the morning slot is almost always the better one. We confirm your time the day before, once we have read the forecast.
Who is behind you, what connects you to him, and why a two-place wing is not flown like a solo one.
Hundreds of first flights each season at Aguergour. The same worries before, and roughly the same sentences afterwards.
Everything people ask us before booking, answered once and for all. Site, drive, timing, price.
A quarter of an hour like nothing else
Just tell us which day you are in Marrakech and we will handle the rest.
We come back to you with the exact time, by email and on WhatsApp.