Adventure Travel

Ever watched a BASE jumper leap off a cliff and start flying? Sunday evening (8pm EST), the National Geographic channel is showing a piece about Dean Potter. To quote part of the blurb about the show: "He can climb the unclimbable, visualize the invisible and fly through the air with the greatest of speed. As perhaps one of the worlds best BASE jumpers, he set the record for the longest flight in a wing suit. Now, Dean has set his sights on Mount Bute - a 9,000-foot granite launch pad along the British Columbia coastline."

If you want to learn more about this extreme sport and watch BASE jumpers fly off a cliff, visit BASE Jumping Birdmen.

Vail's first Winter Teva Mountain Games start this weekend.  Even if you're not an extreme athlete, there's an event for you - the Seven Wonders of Vail.  This Colorado Mountain town is an adventurer's paradise, summer or winter.

Photo: Jack Affleck, Vail, Colorado

Which boutique, family-owned company puts together luxury African safaris and lodges its guests in many of the properties on Travel + Leisure's "World's Best" list of the top 20 properties in the world? With this company, guests travel in style, and move from location to another in chartered bush planes.

Photo courtesy of Micato Safaris

Wish I had been wearing CrashPads shorts under my pants when I slid into a pile of rocks and did a number on my leg while mountain biking in Scotland.  This protective sports apparel comes in garments designed to help protect bodies playing specific sports, from skiing and snowboarding to mountain biking, soccer and horseback riding.  You can buy off-the-rack choices or have custom garments made at CrashPads.

Photo: CrashPads

Here's the latest "Top 10 Types of Adventures" list. Let me know if you think other types of adventure travel experiences should be added to the list.

Photo: (c) Lois Friedland

So what's an adventure philanthropist?   Roadmonky says it's a traveler who likes to combine adventures with a chance to give back to local communities you're visiting.  On a Roadmonkey trip you'll see how much fun it is to combine adventure and volunteering.

Photo courtesy of Catalyst Foundation and Roaddmonkey

Have you ever tried snowshoeing? It's a low-impact outdoor activity that places you in beautiful settings. Walking through a meadow, or on a trail through the woods you can catch up with friends and chat with your kids (who won't be sending texts to friends at that moment). If you want to go with a group, several organizations around the country, and possibly in your city, offer snowshoe excursions.

Snowshoes are easy to rent at winter resorts, and easily purchased at sporting stores.

Bredeson Outdoor Adventures specializes in snowshoe hikes in the winter and hiking in mountainous locales in Europe in the summertime.

If you want small-group adventure travel trips that range from trekking in the Himalayas to visiting Cambodia, with cultural experiences such as having lunch with an Icelandic family and meeting locals in Peru's Sacred Valley, take a look at Boundless Journeys vacations.

Photo courtesy of Boundless Adventures

Put on your helmet and turn on the miner's light.  It's time to enter the Rio Secreto cave system in Riviera Maya, Mexico.  The journey, part walking and part swimming in the underground river, was a highlight of a recent trip to Mexico. Rio Secreto was formed after an asteroid crashed into the Yucatan Peninsula.  A 2010 study concluded that this is the asteroid that resulted in the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Photo courtesy of Rio Secreto

You can enter any of the 397 national parks in the U.S. for free this weekend and on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. You can walk in Dr. King's footsteps at Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site in Georgia, the Selma to Montgomery National Historic Trail in Alabama, or the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC.

You can also experience cross country skiing or snowshoeing on park trails, photograph buffalo crossing the road in front of you at Yellowstone National Park and experience other winter adventures at the parks where snow blankets the ground. For more information about the free days, Jan. 14-16, visit www.nps.gov.

Photo (c) Lois Friedland