From Cage Diving to Skydiving, Cape Cod Has It All

Cape Cod, like most resort, beachy communities, is seen as a place of relaxation. A place to lounge on the seashore, reading the latest James Patterson novel, listening as the waves crash gently against the coast.

Paradise, where the only stress one might encounter is and unflattering sunburn or an ice cream which melts too rapidly. And that’s true, that happens here.

However, let’s just say you happen to be in the market for something just a touch more exciting, something wild to get the blood running and adrenaline flowing, something that you can turn into a story that will impress your friends and colleagues and make you feel alive. We’ve got that kind of stuff too. The activities not to be attempted by the faint of heart, weak of stomach, or high of blood pressure.

Cape Cod Shark Adventures
To begin, ask a vacationer to the Cape or Islands their biggest fear as they frolic through the surf and nine times out of ten they will tell you it’s sharks. “Jaws was filmed around here,” they’ll say, “and those menacing beasts of the sea would kill you as soon as look at them.” But you, you laugh in the face of danger, and we have a day-trip for you.

Cape Cod Shark Adventures operates from June through October and claims to have “perfected the game of finding and interacting with these animals both above and below the water.”

With years of experience and a flawless safety record, they provide novice and experienced divers alike a world class day of adventure on the water. You can take photos to impress the friends back home and get right up close to the Cape’s many species of sharks all from the safety of a cage, which I have been assured has yet to be busted by the razor-sharp teeth of any ocean predator.

Details on Cape Cod Shark Adventures available at: capecodsharkadventures.com

Hang Ten Brah
Surfing. If it’s cool enough for all those angsty teenagers and Hollywood-types on the west coast, it is certainly cool enough for you. We here on the Cape have some of the best surfing in all of New England. If you’re looking for the best waves then the Outer Cape is what you’re after. Places like Marconi Beach in Wellfleet, Coast Guard Beach, Nauset in Eastham, or Pamet Beach in Truro. There are others as well, most with lifeguards, bathhouses, some even have showers and the daily parking fees are reasonable.

If you know what you’re doing, there are plenty of places to rent equipment or touch up some of your own and just hit the waves. If you’re new to the activity and you don’t want a heavy piece of fiberglass falling onto you for hours on end than might I suggest lessons.

There are many surf shops and camps offering lessons and equipment rentals. Programs last anywhere from a few hours to a week or more.

Kitesurfing
For the surfer with a sense of heightened adventure, may I present Kitesurfing or Kiteboarding (depending on who you talk to). Little bit windsurfing, little bit kite flying, little bit terrifying. There are a number of beaches from one end of the Cape to the other which allow it, spots on both island’s too. First Encounter Beach in Eastham, West Dennis Beach and Chapin Beach in Dennis, Joseph Sylvia State Beach in Edgartown, and Kalmus Beach on Ocean Street in Hyannis are the biggies.

For 13 years now, Air Support Cape Cod has been serving the region’s kitesurfing needs, offering both training and equipment rentals. If you don’t know much about it, let me enlighten you. A kitesurfer harnesses the power of the wind with a large “controllable” kite to be propelled across the water on a wakeboard-type contraption, to which one’s feet are adhered via straps.

But that’s crazy, you say, the wind blows pretty strong out there sometimes. Well, that’s sort of the point.

Details on Kitesurfing available at: KiteCod.com

Skydiving
There are actually people in this world interested in the idea of literally jumping out of an airplane while it is in flight and careening toward the Earth at a great rate of speed. If you happen to be one, there are places on Cape where you may indulge this pursuit. Skydive Cape Cod in Chatham and Skydive Barnstable in Marstons Mills will allow you, with mere hours of training and no psychiatric examination, to throw yourself out of their airplane.

I’m told that once you get over the terror of it all and the fact that a stranger is strapped to your back, the fall itself is exhilarating and the sights are spectacular. And what a story to tell the folks back home.

Helpful Hint: Try your very best not to read the details of the legal waiver that they make you sign, it’s the scariest part.

Details on Cape Skydiving available at: SkydiveCapeCod.com and SkydiveBarnstable.com

Row a Little Boat to Europe
It sounds crazy and for good reason… it is. Every few years someone gets the idea to paddle a boat from the shores of Cape Cod to all the way to France, England, Spain, Ireland, or some place equally far away. And every time, the poor adventurer fails and the local Coast Guard has to go out and rescue the adventurer. But who knows, maybe you could be the one to finally pull it off and imagine the glory which would be yours if you did.

But first, Some cautionary tales:

In 2015, British adventurer Sarah Outen attempted to row her boat “Happy Socks” from Chatham to Falmouth, England as part of an around-the-word trip. She perhaps should have rowed to Falmouth, Massachusetts because with less than 1,000 miles left she called it quits.

In 2016 Tabor Academy graduate Cindy Way and her boyfriend James Caple, both of Virginia attempted to row their way to Dingle, Ireland in their 24-foot ocean rowing boat. It, predictably, did not work out and all that is left of this poor couple’s dream is an excruciating YouTube video of their rescue.

This crazy tradition dates back more than half a century in fact. In June of 1966 two British Army paratroopers left the Cape in pursuit of England. Captain John Ridgway and Sergeant Chay Blyth left the Cape with big dreams and a little boat and returned with neither after calling it quits. This sad tradition has repeated itself – brace yourself – more than 140 times.

By CapeCod.com Staff



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