Across the valley rises something that looks very, very big. It’s Mont Blanc, Europe’s highest mountain at 4,400m above sea level.

From our viewpoint on a small outcrop, Mont Blanc looks like the archetypical postcard. Capped with snow and framed by a bright blue sky, it’s the kind of image that sells a thousand ski holidays, but the benign picture belies a beast of a mountain. Some 20,000 people try and conquer her every year and many of them never return: on peak weekends in summer, the mountain rescue team flies a dozen missions.

Unlike those people who try and climb this monster, we’ve ascended to Planpraz on a lift. And unlike most of those who descend by ski or snowboard, we’re about to take the quick route by jumping off in pairs with a paraglider strapped to our backs.

My instructor is Sean Potts – founder and owner of local paragliding school Fly Chamonix. Sean is a Brit who has been taking the leap of faith off this mountain since 1991 and who now has more than 4,000 flights under his belt. But his cheery confidence does little to assuage the vertiginous thoughts buzzing around my head as I look down at the view below.

‘Taking off is the easy part,’ he says. ‘All we do is take a running jump. The paraglider, which is more of a sail than a parachute, will fill with air and we’ll slowly take off. Once up, I might let you take control of steering and by far the hardest part is landing.’

And there was me thinking jumping off the mountain was the tough bit. ‘Seriously,’ he says, ‘we’ll be hitting the deck at around 25 miles an hour so you must remember to run – and fast – when we land.’

It takes Sean just a few moments to lay out the paraglider and get me strapped into a harness that is then attached to his; before I have time to entertain any more negativity, we are running off the edge of the mountain as I say a few quick prayers.

As the wind catches the sail and we lift off gracefully, I realise that, rather like a cartoon character, my legs are still whirling in the air. ‘You can stop now,’ Sean says. ‘You only have to run again when we reach the bottom.’

For the next 20minutes we swoop down in ever decreasing circles, catching the odd thermal that makes us rise again and then descending some more. ‘Being up in the air like this is what makes birds sing,’ says Sean as he passes the steering handles over to me. ‘Pull to the right and that’s the way we’ll go,’ he shouts as icy wind rushes past my ears.

I pull the right cord hard and both our legs swing out to the left, almost perpendicular to our bodies. ‘Not that hard,’ he shouts and I release gently and realise I can turn us this way and that with just the slightest pull on the ropes.

All too soon, we’re circling the Chamonix sports ground where we’re to land. ‘Remember to run! Remember to run!’ shouts Sean as we come closer. Predictably, I forget and the two of us land in a crumpled  heap, the sail billowing over our heads and Mont Blanc still looming massively above us.

Flights with Fly Chamonix cost from Euro 100. www.fly-chamonix.com

Other places to fly:

While paragliding off Europe’s highest mountain may be a pinnacle for some, it’s not the only place in the Alps to take to the skies.