Skydiving may not be an activity that your mother or insurance company would endorse you participating in, but how about experiencing the same freedom of flight without plummeting towards the earth at terminal velocity?

If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to be suspended in mid-air – or the sport of body flight as the guys at SkyVenture call it – then SkyVenture New Hampshire in Nashua offers you this opportunity in its state of the art indoor vertical wind tunnel.

There are a few requirements.

You have to be at least 3-years of age and weigh less than 250lbs and meet some other conditions to go in the wind tunnel. Most people will meet the conditions.

I went there a few weeks ago with my son and though I hadn’t anticipated on trying it out but threw caution to the wind and signed up with him.

This is a modern, clean, and safety first place – first class and very professionally managed. You get a 20-minute orientation and kitted out with everything you need to take your flight.

One of the pieces of gear you get is ear plugs. Once you enter the chamber area the wind tunnel noise is high and all communication takes place with hand signals – it’s all covered in the pre-flight class.

There is no sensation of falling just of floating. You don’t have to do any jumping, you just step into the chamber and with the help of your instructor you’ll be floating in a few seconds and under the instructor’s control.

My son took to it like duck to water. My attempts were not quite as graceful and rather than enjoying the moment I was much too inquisitive on everything going on around me so keeping up was a challenge for me.

Be aware this is not an inexpensive experience. You pay by the minute and we did 4-minuets and shared the time. You usually go in for a minute or 90-seconds at a time. They say two minutes is equivalent to 3 skydives at 13,000-feet. I can believe this as with my second flight I was definitely ready to come back to earth after my time was up. So even though 2-minutes don’t seem like a long time, for me, because I had to work at keeping up, I was done at the end.

There is an observation deck where friends and family can watch, or you can see the instructors do acrobatics. They will record on video your whole flight for you, and they will also take photos. The photos can be purchased there or later from their web site.

If you’re looking for something different or want to give an unusual gift – you can purchase gift certificates – consider SkyVenture New Hampshire and give the gift of freefalling without a parachute or jumping out of a plan at 13,000-feet!

SkyVenture New Hampshire is located at 3 Poisson Ave in Nashua, NH behind CVS Pharmacy and Best Buy off Daniel Webster Highway. For more details check out their web site at: http://www.skyventurenh.com

From Boston: Take Route 93 North to Route 128 South.  Follow Route 128 South to Route 3 North.  Follow Route 3N to exit 1, SPIT BROOK ROAD, Nashua, New Hampshire. Turn right on Spit Brook Road. Follow to third stop lights at the bottom of the hill. Turn left onto Daniel Webster Highway North. Turn right at the first stop light onto Poisson Ave.

For more ideas and suggestions on things in the state visit our special New Hampshire Vacations section at our web site.

Another New England post by one of our writers is being prepared right now so be sure to visit again or just subscribe to our RSS Feed here and get notified automatically of events and news.

Cliff Calderwood
Publisher
New England Online Magazine

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