Just Like Daddy :)

Skydive...easily the best thing I have ever done. Couldn't do it on Sunday afternoon had to do it Monday morning for weather reasons in the end. Definately cleared away the 8am cobwebs though.

You get about a 3 minute instruction of cross your hands over your chest, put your head back on your guys shoulder, when your out of the plane you'll get a tap on the shoulder and then you should stretch your arms out, on landing lift your legs and hook your hands under your knees so that you land on your bum. Oh and because we're diving over water, that yellow thing around your waist is a lifejacket. We'll tell you if you need it. (what like you think I won't notice we're about to hit the water?) That's all your instruction. For a country that is so stupidly regulated and all mental about safety I was really rather surprised, but glad as a long arse safety briefing wasn't high on my to-do list as we had to check out of our hostel by 10am and I still hadn't finished packing. Anyways so I was going to go out of the plane first, wasn't scared until just before we went, but I think that my excitement just squashed anything at all that wanted to freak me out. At 12000 ft the oxygen got a bit thin and I went all light headed and woozy, but got it together eventually. Anyways I was teamed with a guy called Strop who was a bit stroppy at first. Got up in the plane and I was sat right by the door obviously as I was going first and we go up and up and up and up. Took about 20 mins to get up to the full 14000ft, but you have no idea of height and distance because you've got nothing to measure against, it's very strange. The little plane reminded me of when I was a little girl and Daddy put me in a little plane somewhere. First time I ever flew. I'd already doner the whole proud daughter bit on the ground when I was telling everyone how I'd always wanted to do this, just like Daddy used to. Some of the instructors were giving it the big I am and paratroopers are cak etc, but I brought them back to earth when I reminded them of the dangers involved, having to jump out of a plane with all this excess baggage that won't open it's arms when you tap it on the shoulder and won't walk itself off when you land and come rain or shine conditions etc, etc. They soon went quiet.

Anyways...

We're right up there in the atmosphere and they've been trying to freak me out with their little height watches the whole way and I'm still just excited, then it's "I'm just clipping you on" and next thing open the door and my bum is no longer touching anything and my legs are hooked under the plane. Got my googles on and I'm in the position thinking come on let's go, but after about a minute they pull me back in and close the door saying it's to cold! I was a bit freaked out then, was weird to just be hanging over the edge of the plane with your options in someone elses hands, unlike the bungee where jumping was all down to me. So second time hanging out to dry and then...

Nothing. I can't even begin to tell you what I was thinking because I didn't know, I just knew it was amazing. Looking back at the time it seemed to go so fast, but now I remember little things like giving him the thumbs up, trying to scream, trying to breathe, just basic things I did that had nothing to do with what my brain was feeling. Strop called it sensory overload. The ground doesn't even rush up at you, even though you're going at 220kms an hour. I've only ever been that fast on Daddy's motorbike I think. You fall 9000ft in 55 seconds. Intense. It was excellent when he opened the canopy though, if a little uncomfortable. He did it just as we were coming into a cloud so all of a sudden, the rushing in my ears stopped and I was just surrounded by all this white. Like being in a room filled with odourless smoke and your just floating. Kind of like a pure childlike version of heaven, like I was an angel or something. Totally amazing. Then we break through the cloud and the scenery is just mind blowingly beautiful and you're just up there flying above it all. So we have a few minutes of chatter and canopy ride as we descend. It's fun when they pull the leads and you swing out and around and stuff. The whole thing about jumping at Mission Beach is that you land on the beach which I did, but me and Strop did it via a tree. Literally I've got my hands under my knees, which is hard as anything in that harness and we go crashing through the top section of a bare tree and I get a branch in the face. So I fell out of a plane with the Strop and landed in a tree.

Spectacular. I highly recommend it to anyone. Hopefully we're going to do the Frans Joseph when we go to New Zealand which is over a glacier from 15000ft. I didn't get a DVD of this one, but Lauren did. I'm going to get a DVD of the other one I think. Everyone says it's the best and because of the mountains and stuff you really get a feeling of the height which you don't really get on this one.

It was so good though.