iFly Indoor Skydiving | The Ultimate Experience Gift the Whole Family Will Enjoy (with video)

With 6 people in our house, we are buried in “stuff.” We are constantly making efforts to remove the stuff and make more memories. We really try to do as many experience gifts as possible, especially around the holidays. After reading this, I’m sure you will be ready to gift some gift certificates to iFly Indoor Skydiving for the Ultimate Experience Gift the Whole Family Will Enjoy. They let you start at age 3! Thank you to iFly for hosting our family for our first family flight. Check our a couple of our videos below.

Why iFly Indoor Skydiving

Finding an activity that works for ages 5-adult can really be a struggle. iFly Indoor Skydiving really is fun for all ages. They well let you fly as early as 3 years old and up. With a family with kids at such varying ages and likes, iFly does fit the bill for all of our kids. It’s amazing to see all of the smiles as they come out of the wind tunnel! You know it was fun for everybody. A joint shared experience really creates extra special memories. 

Before Arriving at iFly

To make life easier, before you arrive at your scheduled time, make sure you’ve filled out waivers for everybody in your party. It will make the check-in process much smoother. Make sure you are dressed properly. Anything that can come off (earrings, necklace, watch, scrunchie) should come off. You’ll want to wear comfortable clothes and shoes that lace up and tie. 

Arriving at iFly

Once you arrive and check everybody in, they will get each person’s weight. Not to worry, it’s not displayed anywhere. You just get on a magic little box and they send that information over to the wind tunnel so you have the proper support to fly. 

Pre-flight preparations

Once you are all checked in, you will get a wristband with your name and flight time. During this time, you are able to watch the previous class or anybody else flying in the wind tunnel. We got to see a group of 4 people practice different techniques and holds. 

When it’s go time, your instructor will find you and take you as a group to a classroom where you will watch a very short introduction and how-to video. You will also meet your instructor. 

Once your video is over, the instructor reviews everything you saw in the video including the visual hand cues they use to help you get your body in just the right form while in the tunnel. Because you can’t hear in there, visual cues and physically moving you is the only way to help get your body just right. 

Each person is also fitted for their flight suit, and helmet or helmet and goggles for those who are too small (B) or those that are claustrophobic (me). They also have those little spongy earplugs for you to wear in the tunnel. The flying suits go on over your clothes and they had free lockers for anything you wanted to put away for safe keeping. 

During this dressing time, Ryan, our flight instructor answered all questions the girls had. Our 11 year old asked how the tunnel works and where the fans were located. Without skipping a beat, Ryan drew a diagram and explained how the wind tunnel works on a post-it. Our 11 year old loved the explanation and grabbed that post-it note to keep the drawing.  

Once everybody was ready to go, we followed our instructor to line up in the order we wanted to fly and then were seated on a bench in the outer part of the wind tunnel. 

Ready to fly at iFly Indoor Skydiving

You are seated on the bench.

The wind tunnel is turned on.

The instructor calls the first person forward, gives their suite, goggles and helmet a check over.

He then then has you lean forward into the wind (like a trust fall) and you take off!

It’s so hard to see the smile on her face, but she was LOVING it! We all high-fived down the line at the end of our turns. 

Each flight is about 1 minute long. Then, you come out of the wind tunnel and take your seat at the end of the bench so the next person can have their flight. Everybody else scoots up the line.

Each person finds their comfortable spot with the assistance of their flight instructor as well as tips from the wind tunnel tech. Even the most reserved of flyers (like E above) felt safe and okay with leaning into the wind tunnel. 

Here you can see Ryan putting a “peace” sign in front of N’s face. This is to remind her to straighten her legs and take them a little further apart. 

The instructor stays with you the entire time making sure to keep you flying right. And, I’m sure it’s quite the workout for him. 

Even the 13 year old was excited to try out indoor skydiving. She mentioned being worried about being uncomfortable with the instructor being close and having to make adjustments, but she told us afterwards that her worries we unfounded and that it wasn’t a big deal at all. 

And yes, even the parents have a great time, too! I couldn’t help but notice the “ok” symbol on Ryan’s hands during my picture. 

Mr. Serious had a good time, too! He said “I’m just going to lean into it and do whatever.” I think he succeeded. He smiled when he came out, too! And enjoyed his high fives!

Once everybody in our group had their turn, we all had a second flight. On this second flight you have the option to purchase a high flight where you go higher up into the tube with the instructor and get to move around a little more with angles. It seems like you are going so fast when you come down, but watching from outside, it’s not that fast. The tunnel really does make it feel like what I imagine actual skydiving feels like. 

Give the gift of iFly Indoor Skydiving

If experiences are what you are looking for, head over to iFly’s website and purchase a gift certificate or two for somebody in your family. This season, they are offering “The Perfect Gift,” a 40% savings, that includes: 4 flights and 2 photos, shareable by 2 people.*

You could get a couple sets of these for a larger family or to cover your whole family, or it’s a great gift for parents who want to have a date night without breaking the bank. Another option is to get a gift for a parent that wants a fun one-on-one moment with their child.

And maybe, if you are lucky, on the way home, this will come up on the radio and everybody will notice and say “take a picture, mommy, this is too appropriate.” (And oh, I wasn’t driving!)

*Valid Sunday-Friday, not valid on Saturday.
Valid at all participating iFLY locations.
Vouchers never expire.
Order online and receive voucher instantly via email.