Standing at the Dominical paragliding takeoff we see the white clouds above us, the jungle below, and the waves of the pacific ocean hitting cinnamon-colored beaches along this seemingly endless shoreline. Looking straight ahead, we spot playa Dominicalito, the little sister of Dominical beach which is located a bit further up north.

The wind is coming from the sea, as it does every day. We are getting ready for our first launch after the winter break. With us are a few tandem pilots and a group doing a cross-country flying course. The takeoff is a huge, flat grass strip sharply falling off to the west. We are getting our gear ready, putting on some more clothes, and pulling our gliders up. After handling the gliders for a bit, we accelerate over the edge and are finally airborne again. What a feeling!

After a bit of soaring along the ridge to the south, we are catching our first thermals and go up to the clouds. The cloud base is low, which is quite common here. After exploring the ridge for a while we are heading towards Dominicalito beach and a ridge close to the sea that emerges to the north. There is a small football field surrounded by trees to land on when you can’t reach the ridge or the beach or during high tide. We don’t need either but easily connect to thermals at the ridge.

Following the guiding wings of the local birds, we head up with them again and can cross over to Dominical. With big smiles on our faces, we land on the beach, next to palm trees and sunbathing tourists. To finish up this first day we head to Café Ensueño (recommended by the local paragliding school) to drink some refreshing, homemade frozen lemonade and enjoy a fruit plate. This shall become our go-to place after flying.

Last but not least we had to get back to the place we stayed at. It was a 20-minute walk from the beach and as it turned out, we never made the way back before sunset the 4 days we stayed there. It’s a pretty bumpy dirt road that is only partially illuminated which made it a tough walk. The first day Katy even fell over carrying the huge backpack. Because of an impressive ninja move, she only hurt her elbow which changed colors over the next few days.

We stayed at the River Road Hostel. With just three or four rooms it’s a small and comfy place. The atmosphere was very relaxed and felt more like a shared flat than a hostel. People cooked together, chilled in the hammocks, and enjoyed drinks at the garden table. For most of our stay, it was actually run by two volunteers from the US who made a great job ensuring everyone felt at home.

On the first day, it took us some time to get a lift to the takeoff. There are two companies that are offering tandem flights in Dominical. The first is Zion Paragliding which also has a WhatsApp group to organize rides to the takeoff. The second one is Alex’s Tandem Paraglide Costa Rica. You can ask both for a lift or get a 4×4 taxi from Dominical. Learn more about flying in Domical in our site guide.

Dominical is a surfer village with a picturesque white beach, warm sea, and cool vibes. We barely got in touch with the “normal” Dominical though. We even only went swimming in the sea once. Instead, we went paragliding every day. On day two Katy and I already followed the upper ridge north until it drops into the valley (where our hostel was). Katy stayed at the ridge but I pushed on and was able to fly quite a bit further north.

The views were breathtaking with the coastline to my left and higher mountains to the right. On the way back home I once got quite low, barely 250 meters above the ground. Fortunately, and again with the help of some birds, I’ve managed to climb out. Because I couldn’t get enough and wanted to fly back to the takeoff, I got low a second time just before reaching back, this time over the jungle. That was a very special feeling because the lower I came, the louder I could hear the noise of the jungle. It was honestly quite scary because I knew there was literally nowhere I could land safely. I’ve managed again, though, and happily landed back home at the beach after 3.5 hours and 45 XC kilometers.

On day three the cloud base was again too low for any cross-country flights so we stayed close to takeoff and practiced some wingovers and spirals. Since the thermals were quite strong, we could just fly away from the ridge, do some maneuvers, head back, and go up again. It was great fun! We just needed to be careful to stay below the clouds since they were pulling us up quite quickly and it was easy to lose visibility of the ground.

Do you remember Alex? I mentioned him above as one of the guys offering tandem flights in Dominical. He gave us a lift to the takeoff on day two and convinced us to come with him to his place in the mountains, the cross-country flying paradise Rivas. All about that we will tell you in our next post, though. Until then, take care 🙂

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