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Cliff diving isn’t for everybody to aim, but it surely certain is enjoyable to look at the professionals do it. The death-defying leaps, flips, and twists from towering clifftops and rock ledges belong to one of many oldest excessive sports activities on the planet. In actual fact, cliff divers are featured in Greek and Etruscan work relationship again to the fifth and sixth centuries B.C.
Quick ahead to the twenty first century: Cliff-diving daredevils, often expert locals skilled in carrying on this athletic legacy, may be discovered performing for vacationers in areas all over the world. In the event you’d prefer to see it for your self, listed below are just a few locations the place you possibly can witness these courageous or loopy (take your decide) athletes dive from nice heights which might be usually quadruple the peak of the Olympic video games’ tallest diving platform, which is 10 meters excessive.
RELATED: High 10 locations for adrenaline junkies
Highest top: 135 toes (41 meters)
Elvis helped to make the La Quebrada Cliff Divers well-known. The jumpers have been featured in his 1963 musical, “Enjoyable in Acapulco,” and vacationers have been flocking to see them ever since. They carry out a number of instances every day, scaling the steep rocks of the La Quebrada cliffs with their naked arms earlier than leaping right into a mere 12 toes of ocean water under at a speeds of as much as 55 miles per hour. There’s an commentary deck to witness this must-see spectacle, and divers usually come to greet guests afterward and obtain ideas. For the very best vantage level, nonetheless, head to La Perla restaurant on the Lodge Mirador Acapulco, which boasts spectacular views.
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Highest top: 92 toes (28 meters)
The fjord on this city on the Amalfi Coast supplies a pure springboard for cliff-diving athletes. Every July, it hosts a Mediterranean high-diving championship—an occasion greatest considered by hiring a ship or becoming a member of a water-based tour. Afterward, you possibly can recount the insane acrobatics over an Italian feast and loads of native limoncello.
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Highest top: 89 toes (27 meters)
Leaping off the Previous Bridge (Stari Most) in Mostar dates again to not less than 1664. That’s when 16-year-old boys have been inspired to leap from the bridge without any consideration of passage into manhood. In the event you didn’t leap, your life was predicted to be a failure. (How’s that for motivation?) At present, members of the Mostar Diving Membership repeatedly leap from the bridge into the freezing waters under. Guests who’re feeling courageous can enroll with the dive college, which is run by dive consultants who’re thought-about the guardians of the bridge. They may educate you how you can make the leap safely, at incrementally larger and better heights. Those that full the very best dive stroll away with a certificates and a loopy story.
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Highest top: 85 toes (26 meters)
This Medieval village is thought for greater than its beautiful alpine surroundings and beautiful hikes. It’s residence to the World Excessive Diving Federation (WHDF), and its cliffs host the WHDF Cliff Diving World Tour every July. You’ll discover a number of the greatest cliff divers on the planet coaching right here.
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Highest top: 50 toes (15 meters)
La Quebrada isn’t the one place in Mexico to seek out expert cliff divers. Mazatlan is residence to a cliff at an oceanside park, also referred to as El Clavadista (translation: “the diver”). The park is an simply accessible space to look at expert locals leap elegantly into the waters under. It’s been a practice because the mid-Nineteen Fifties, and ideas from spectators are appreciated. Although the peak of the Mazatlan cliff is nowhere close to as intimidating as La Quebrada, the self-love of the water definitely is: It’s solely 6 toes. Divers have to carry out with excessive precision to make the leaps right here.
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Highest top: 35 toes (10.5 meters)
With a bit of little bit of liquid braveness, you may be impressed to make the leap with locals. Rick’s Cafe in Negril is a must-visit spot at sundown for just a few drinks and an acrobatic present. Whereas most sun-burned vacationers (fairly hilariously) cannonball dive off the 35-foot cliff upon which this legendary bar is perched, the locals will wow you with extra spectacular acrobatic dives into the Caribbean waters under.
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Highest top: 30 toes (9 meters)
The Sheraton Maui Resort & Spa has maintained a practice since its opening in 1963: the ceremonial cliff dive from Pu’u Keka’a, also referred to as Black Rock. The ritual takes place every night time at sundown, accompanied by stay music and guided historic narration. The dramatic lele kawa (cliff diving) honors the legend of the final chief of Maui, who leapt from sacred Pu’u Keka’a into the Pacific. With Hawaiian chanting and torches lighting the best way, a younger diver retraces the chief’s footsteps to the summit earlier than making a breath-taking dive into the ocean under.
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Highest top: 60 toes (18 meters)
Within the walled metropolis of Dubrovnik, recognizing Recreation of Thrones filming areas isn’t the one thrill guests will discover. Simply exterior the town’s thirteenth century partitions on the ocean aspect, you’ll discover Buza Bar, a preferred outside ingesting institution constructed into the aspect of dramatic cliffs. Beneath the bar is Buza Seaside, which isn’t a lot of a seaside in any respect however fairly a set of cliffs and small platforms the place locals and vacationers alike take a look at their would possibly by leaping about 60 toes into the Adriatic Sea under.
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Go away it to energy-drink model Purple Bull to sponsor the world collection for this high-risk, high-adrenaline excessive sport that makes the Olympic diving platform seem like baby’s play. Competitions are held at cities, cities and villages all over the world annually, dazzling spectators who can solely think about what it’s prefer to dive from such insane heights. Plan to be one among them—one of many spectators, that’s—by checking Purple Bull’s Cliff Diving World Sequence web site for updates on the place competitions can be held. Eire, France, Norway, Azerbaijan—these are simply a number of the international locations which have hosted competitions that usually run from June to October.
Tagged: Caribbean, Europe, Italy, Jamaica, Mexico, Switzerland
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