Victorville Outdoor Activities

When 20-year climbing veteran Zeke Federman started a rock-climbing school, he needed to situate its headquarters someplace that was more than simply rocky. The spot he settled on falls squarely on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountain range—an area boasting a varied landscape and steady climate that is friendly to year-round mountaineering and offers challenging routes to both beginners and experienced climbers with their own pet mountain goats. Zeke's climbing academy, Sierra Rock Climbing School, leads students on guided excursions across the region's higher-altitude cliffs. His staff of Professional Climbing Guides Institute–trained guides has won points with clients for combining an easygoing demeanor with a serious attentiveness to safety and the needs of beginners to go slowly. In addition to small groups, the company has also guided successful climbing outings for large corporations such as Google and Frito-Lay, and appeared in segements on The Bachelor and Dr. Phil.

Equipment crafted by companies including K2, Rossignol, and Burton lines the walls of Goldsmith's Boardhouse & Ski Rental, where experienced staffers help snow explorers to hit the slopes in style. Snowboarders and skiers on their way to carve up nearby Snow Summit, Big Bear Mountain, or a local mall Santa display swing by Goldsmith's to pick up gleaming new gear or all-inclusive rental packages that fit feet with cushy boots before outfitting riders with a snowboard replete with bindings or skis paired with poles.

With his white hair and mustache and his penchant for hot air balloons, Wil LaPointe often jokes that he looks like the Wizard from The Wizard of Oz. On every balloon ride, LaPointe wants to create an unforgettable experience for his basket of passengers, peppering historical tidbits about early ballooning with jokes and stories such as the history of the white tiger adorning one of the balloons in his fleet. The white tiger, a ward of LaPointe’s friend—a wildlife caretaker—was one of three cubs abandoned by their mother and eventually raised by an open-minded golden retriever.

Though LaPointe is a self-proclaimed “balloonatic,” he got into the business of ballooning by chance when he bought a hot air balloon to advertise for his cellular-phone business. Today, LaPointe works as a master instructor of ballooning, training new pilots in addition to travelling to schools with miniature balloons, which he uses to teach hands-on lessons about mathematics, physics, and engineering.

LaPointe was featured on CNN.com after donating a balloon ride in his deceased wife’s name to Cy Breen, who raises funds for cancer research, on Breen's 100th birthday. Breen, who raises money each year by shooting one hole of golf for each birthday he’s had, did a little jig as he walked over to the white-tiger balloon, eager to check another item off his list of lifelong dreams.

In 1992, Phil Dietro's younger brother Stu became enamored with his friend's paraplane, prompting him to learn how to pilot the motor-powered parachute. In an old fashion bout of sibling rivalry, Phil too wanted to master the strange flying contraption, traveling with Stu to Santa Ynez Airport for his first flight. As gusts of wind rearranged his hair, and impressed birds beckoned him over for high-fives, Phil became hooked, later seeking further training from the paraplane's inventor, Steve Snyder.

A year after his first flight, Phil's newfound hobby inspired him to establish Inland Paraflite, where he currently schools fledgling aviators in an airborne classroom high above the Apple Valley desert. His exhilarating flight courses instill cloud-curious students with the knowledge to man a dual-controlled Powrachute Pegasus, which reaches speeds of up to 32 miles per hour—the same speed at which the sound of soft rock travels.