Hang Gliding Instructors
Eric flying the coast
Robert at cloudbase
About Bay Area Hang Gliding
Bay Area Hang Gliding is San Francisco Bay Area's premier hang gliding school and shop, BAHG promises to give their students the highest quality hang gliding experience in Northern California. In March of 2008 BAHG started with some of the best and most experienced hang gliding instructors in California, together these USHPA certified instructors make up the preferred full service hang gliding school.
Hang Gliding Lessons Instructors
Eric Hinrichs
Eric started learning how to fly with Jim Woodward of Natural Flying in 1992 and started teaching with him in 1994. After many years with Jim, Eric started teaching for Pat Denevan of Mission Soaring Center in order to teach more students. He considers himself lucky to have trained hundreds of students and many instructors for Mission Soaring Center, learning from all of them. Eric met Mike Jefferson several years ago, and he quickly found a home here at Bay Area Hang Gliding. Eric has extensive experience flying many Western US and Canadian sites, and is rated as an Advanced Instructor and Tandem Instructor with USHPA.
"My favorite flying is when I get the chance to interact with wildlife or cross country flying"
"I love helping people realize their flying dreams and to help pilots of any experience level achieve their personal bests."
Robert Booth
Robert joined the free flight community when he came to us at Bay Area Hang Gliding a few years ago, and flying soon became his passion. Dedicating his free time to flying, he quickly became a soaring pilot, achieving his Advanced rating within the first year, and then completing the USHPA Instructor program. Gaining knowledge from flying with a lot of very experienced pilots, he realized that being a newer pilot allowed him to translate what he was learning into something his students could easily understand. Robert is mainly a mountain pilot preferring to thermal at sites like Dunlap and McClure, but occasionally you'll find him in the smooth air at the coast.
"Seeing pilots progress with the help I was giving them became very rewarding, and it helped me develop a logical step by step process to help teach anyone to fly. Identifying the individual's strengths and weaknesses, and allowing that individual to excel at his or her own pace is very important."
"I never dreamed I would be able to fly, and now I am helping others achieve their own dreams of flight. Seeing someone go from their first day on the training hill to their first hour long soaring flight is one of the most amazing things I have ever experienced."
Are you ready to fly with us?