I’d never felt this way before; not about another man, anyway. But when Dean looked into my eyes, held me tight and told me everything was going to be all right... well, let’s just say I didn’t ever want him to let me go.

He did, of course (all men are bastards), and I fell yelping into a big net and everyone laughed at me. But there’s no time for tears in trapeze class; with nothing broken but my heart, I was right back up the ladder and ready to throw myself at someone else.

Emotions do run high (pun deeply regretted) at the TSNY trapeze school in Los Angeles. Founder Jonathon Conant talks (quite a lot, actually) about inspiration and compassion and love and being “moved by what flying trapeze has to offer humanity”.

At one point, in fact, he says, “You can’t imagine what an honour it is to be a part of something so real and necessary,” and I have to check that we’re still talking about the thing where you swing back and forth holding onto a bar.

Walking in LA - your Walk of Fame

Los Angeles can still deliver a thrill - especially if you're prepared to leave the car behind

California preening

The editor of iTraveliShop chills out in the spa village of Calistoga, a community that reflects Napa the way it was 50 years ago

• California's best spa

A cultural side to the Grand Canyon

The Barlows want to visit a Native American village on a Grand Canyon day trip

• Winter at the Grand Canyon

Related Internet Links

• More travel articles about California

Related Links

• Walking in LA - your Walk of Fame

To be fair, he’s not the only one. Nervously questioning those who’d just finished their lesson as I arrived for mine, I was almost knocked over by the sheer force of their enthusiasm.

I heard the word “awesome” (rhymes with blossom) so many times, I thought I was back in the lower-sixth-form common room; but, in among the teenspeak, there was no shortage of people telling me it was “sorta spiritual”, “like yoga in the air”, and “profoundly joyful”.

Then, just when it was all starting to sound a little bit too much like some 1960s cult, my classmates and I were introduced to Sean, our “boardsperson”. Sean had the crew cut, the muscles and the thousand-yard stare of an ex-marine, and marched us through the safety drill like we were about to take on the Taliban.

Something about his manner made you feel you’d happily trust this man with your life (turned out later he actually was an ex-marine), which was just as well, because the boardsperson is the guy waiting for you on a platform at the top of the ladder who sorts out your safety harness and holds you as you reach out to catch the trapeze bar.

This, in fact, is the terrifying bit. Having hauled yourself up two and a quarter storeys of aluminium ladder and got quite used to the idea that you’re going to hang on to a slender strip of steel 30ft above the ground, you have actually to grab hold of the thing.

Which means leaning so far out from the platform that there’s no way you could possibly keep from falling - unless your boards-person was holding you.

It’s made worse by the fact that you’ve almost certainly spent the past couple of minutes failing to listen to what Sean’s been saying; instead, you’ll have been gazing around you.

The school is sited halfway up Santa Monica Pier, so from the launch board you’ve got terrific views back east over the throbbing sprawlopolis; out west to the thundering Pacific, dotted with surfers; and north and south along arguably the most unjustly ignored beach in the world.

Times recommends

• The 10 best bits of travel gear
• Soho's classy, cheap new townhouse
• Germany's perfect Christmas city