Crazy travel experiences for thrill-seekers

Name: ______Group: ______

Task 1: Read the following ten crazy travel experiences. Underline all expressions and words you don’t understand. Look them up in a dictionary and write them next to your text.

Task 2: Answer the two short questions after each text.

Task 3: Pick the travel experience that you think is the most dangerous one. Get together in teams of three. Discuss your different choices and decide which would be your pick for your ultimate most dangerous travel experience. You need to find at least three reasons for your choice. Write down some notes.

Task 4: Present your craziest travel experience choice to the rest of the class. Every group member should talk about one minute. Each group’s presentation should therefor last for about three minutes. You discuss how and why you picked your final choice.

1.  Covert operation training in Arizona

The mission of this crazy travel experience is to train for a covert mission in hostile territory. At a not-so secret training base in Arizona Airport, a hand-picked group of contract mercenaries and militaries from the world's toughest special operations will train you. Your program covers high speed evasive driving, combat pistol shooting, unarmed self-defence, using different explosives, learning and practicing espionage techniques, exercising counter-surveillance, and building traps.¸

Question 1: Who will train the covert operation program?

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Question 2: What does this program cover?

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2.  Mount Everest skydiving experience in Nepal

At a cost of $US25,000, British adventure firm High and Wild offers solo skydiving trips over Mount Everest. Tandem skydiving trips cost $US35,000. Skydivers jump out of the plane at around 8,848 metres high. This is also the height of the world’s tallest summit. You will land in a famous base camp at 4,570 meters or on a local airport at 3,761 meters. In addition to your skydiving experience, you will also go trecking for one week and a half in October or November.

Question 3: How much does a tandem skydiving trip cost?

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Question 4: When can you do your skydiving experience?

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3.  KGB torture program in Lithuania

KGB was the Committee for State Security in Soviet Union between 1954 and 1991. This security agency was famous for its brutal and efficient torture programs for foreign spies or internal enemies. In Lithuania, you can now live the best of these torture programs again. Situated in a Soviet Union theme park, located in an old bunker, this program offers tourists the first-hand experience of a KGB interrogation. Visitors pay to be beaten, interrogated and shouted at by tour leaders dressed as agents of the Russian secret police.

Question 5: What is the KGB?

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Question 6: What do visitors of the Soviet Union theme park pay for?

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4.  Mount Huashan hiking trip in the People’s Republic of China

Called “The World’s Most Dangerous Hiking Trail”, the path to the top of Mount Huashan includes a heart-stopping ledge crawl, a tough journey up a rickety metal ladder climb and an extreme staircase vertical ascent.

The most intimidating portion is the Changong Zhandao, a 13-foot-long, 1-foot-wide plank, suspended on the flat rock face. A chain runs along it for you to hang on to, but if you didn’t bring your own safety equipment, that chain is the only thing keeping you from certain death should you misstep. Each year, there are many fatalities on this part of the trail.

Your reward upon reaching the top is a visit to a serene and lonely Taoist temple, nestled at an elevation of around 2,200 meters. Carved from stone at the top of this ancient and perilous hike, the temple and its views are arguably some of the most stunning in the world.

Question 7: What is the Changong Zhandao?

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Question 8: What is the reward upon reaching the top of Mount Huashan?

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5.  Plane wing walking in Washington

On the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington, you can live an energizing experience. You are strapping yourself into a harness and then crawling out on the wing of a prop plane while it’s traveling at 240 kilometers per hour. Wing walking is an adventure anyone can do, provided they have time for a half day of training on the ground and the nerve to actually do it once that plane is up and flying. For an extra thrill, you can even ask the pilot to do loopings, quick descents or other aerobatic maneuvers.

Question9: How fast is the prop plane for the wing walking experience? ______

Question 10: What can you ask for an extra thrill?

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6.  Epic ice run through Russia

The Ice Run comes sends its brave participants through the Siberian wilderness on antique Ural motorbikes with attached sidecars in winter. In teams of two, you hop on a scooter for a 1,500 km race that begins in the birthplace of the Ural – Irbit, Siberia. It ends in the northern town of Salekhard, which is the only town in the world actually located on the Arctic Circle. How you get between these two points is up to you, and thanks to below freezing temperatures, most of your navigation is along ice roads created when the River Ob freezes. These roads made of river mean that maps are frequently wrong, heavy snows can render them impassable, and there’s that pesky problem of ice occasionally cracking and you and your sidecar companion falling into a hypothermia death hole.

Question 11: How long is the epic ice run?

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Question 12: What are the three most important dangers of this experience?

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7.  Cave diving in Florida

Located in one of the most exquisite diving locations in the world, many divers are lured by the beauty of its depths and by its crystal-clear waters. There are three cave dives available to attempt - Little Devil, Devil’s Eye and Devil’s Ear. Each dive holds strong currents and the narrow vortex opening at Devil’s Ear means that divers have to be extremely careful that their equipment doesn’t shift around. If the undercurrents are too strong, even your life is at risk.

Question 13: What are the names of the three caves?

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Question 14: How does this experience could risk your life?

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8.  Shark cage diving in South Africa

Meet some of the most intriguing creatures alive with a shark cage drive in South Africa. You’ll start your fearsome journey at the Kleinbaai Harbour in Gansbaai. You are then taken on an excursion with professional divers to create a magical memory that will last a lifetime. On the dive you’ll be inches away from the magnificent Great White shark. You will have the opportunity to witness their terrifying awesomeness only inches away from your face. Only the cave separates you from these animals and if it ever broke, you could have quite a problem.

Question 15: Where does the shark cage diving take place?

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Question 16: What kind of shark can you observer from your cage?

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9.  Climbing the steepest peak on Earth in Nunavut

At 1,675 meters tall, Mount Thor is by far not the world’s highest peak, but it is the steepest. The most famous summit in Canada is made of pure granite. Mount Thor has a 1,250 foot vertical drop, at an average angle of about 105 degrees.

Despite the fact the mountain is in a remote area, it’s a popular destination for avid mountain climbers. If taking on the peak is too much for you to handle, you can also visit the site and camp out instead.

Question 17: What is Mount Thor known for?

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Question 18: What is the average angle of the mountain’s vertical drop?

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10. Stay at the coldest inhabited place on Earth in Russia

As the coldest inhabited place on earth with a recorded temperature of -71.2 degrees Celsius in 1924, the small Russian town of Oymyakon, with a population of 472, was once only used as a location for political exiles. Winter temperatures average at about -50 degrees Celsius. The ground is permanently frozen all year long. At the village’s northernly position, day length varies from three hours in December to 21 hours in June. The town currently has only one hotel. Popular sports include skiing, ice hockey and ice fishing.

Question 19: What’s the village’s average winter temperature?

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Question 20: What was Oymyakon once used for in the past?

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