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Challenge yourself to an activity weekend full of adrenaline

If you're an adventure seeker looking for your next destination to conqueror, Wales is your answer. With it’s rugged coastline, fast flowing rivers, dramatic mountains and green forests it’s the ideal destination for adrenaline sport lovers.

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Tackle our mountains

Wales is home to some of the UK’s highest mountains making it a mecca for extreme sports fans.  The Snowdonia range in North Wales is breathtaking beautiful and includes Wales’ highest peak, Snowdon at 1,085 metres.  Base yourself in the Snowdonia National Park for an activity weekend filled with abseiling, rock climbing and hiking in Snowdonia’s rugged peaks.

Further south is the wide open spaces of The Brecon Beacons, a mountain range which includes the highest peak in Southern Britain, Pen y Fan and 3 other noticeable summits, Corn Du, Cribyn and Fan y Big.  The summits form a long ridge called the ‘Beacons Horseshoe’ around the Taf Fechan River which is popular with walkers and mountain bikers.  Other activities you can do in the park on an activity holiday include caving, rock climbing, horse riding, kayaking and canoeing.       

The Clwdian Range is a chain of hills in the north east of Wales. Its uplands are wild country that contrasts with lush green valleys.  Perfect for an activity weekend filled with hiking, horse riding, abseiling and mountain biking.

Become master and commander of the sea

White Water Rafting
So you’re a team player, and you don’t mind getting soaking wet. So what are you waiting for? River rafting is charged with adrenalin, open to anyone and requires no technical knowledge or special equipment. The individual version, whitewater kayaking, takes more skill, but is shatteringly exciting. You won’t stop babbling for weeks.

Coasteering
A bonkers activity invented by TYF Adventure, Pembrokeshire. First, squeeze into a wetsuit, safety helmet and old trainers. Then scramble, climb, swim and cliff jump your way around Pembrokeshire’s spectacular rocky coastline. Actually, it’s not compulsory to jump – but you probably will. Then climb up and do it again. Even Everest mountaineer Chris Bonington found it ‘immensely enjoyable’. And it can’t be easy to set his pulse racing.

  

Sea kayaking
Open up a new world hidden from the shore. And, with no noisy outboard, stay popular with the wildlife. Seals become inquisitive and dolphins or porpoises may swim within a few paddle lengths. Surf kayaking is a bit more frenetic, they call it tearing up the wave face. Great locations for a activity break with top sea kayaking is the Gower, Pembrokeshire, Anglesey and Llyn.

Kite Surfing
This exhilarating blend of surfing and kite-flying is one of the fastest growing extreme watersports in the world. “It’s the ultimate combination of wind and board skills,” says kite surfer Casey Keppel- Compton. “You’re manically in control. You have to think, and use your body so skilfully. But it’s hugely gratifying when you do get it right.” And it has to be said Wales has many expansive, windswept beaches where you can try kitesurfing.

Other popular adventure activities

Mountain biking 
A mud treatment – without getting bogged down. Our seven purpose-built mountain bike centres deliver a nerve- tingling experience all year round, whatever the weather. We do slalom singletracks like Cwmcarn in the South Wales Valleys. And remote wilderness epics like Nant-yr-Arian in Mid Wales. What Mountain Bike thinks the Afan Forest Park near Neath is in the world’s top 10. Along with Chamonix, Canada and the Himalayas – but more conveniently placed, just a few minutes from the M4. 

 

Caving
Wales is one of the best places in Europe to take your first steps underground. There are over 1,000 to explore, including Ogof Ffynnon Ddu, the deepest cave in the UK, so there’s definitely something to suit all sizes, ages and abilities. Crawl, climb and scramble through this secret subterranean world – where narrow tunnels give way to cavernous halls festooned with stalactites and stalagmites – and you’ll experience something that surface-dwellers can’t even imagine. Find out more about where to go caving in Wales.

   

Rock Climbing 
Mother nature has been hugely generous to Wales, endowing it with alluring, craggy mountains, tempting sea cliffs and inviting walls of stone slabs. Why climb them? Because they’re there. As Martin Chester, chief instructor at the National Mountain Centre at Plas y Brenin puts it: “It’s brilliant adventure and excitement, good healthy exercise, and you get to go to places you couldn’t otherwise get to.” It’s also a superb team exercise: climbers look after each other. Find out more about rock climbing in Wales.