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Freefall! Skydiving pt. 3

  • Taupo Airport
    Taupo
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Freefall! Skydiving pt. 3

  • stomps from Houston
  • April 29, 2006
Attempting to landMore Photos
This is a continuation of Freefall! pt. 2.

Skydiving really is one of those experiences where you just can't put words to it at all. My entire being just felt exhilarated, and surprisingly, not at all scared. It was just an absolutely amazing rush. I could definitely see how people could become pro divers that do this all the time without getting bored at all.

Part of the way down, I wondered if I would ever hear again because when I tried to unpop my ears, they just rang loudly. It was a very short but amazing 45 seconds until he opened the chute (without doing what one of the other guys did--"Open, dammit, please open!," which ended up with the girl he was diving with landing in hysterics). Parachuting down was great too--we went through a cloud that I could see our shadows in and a complete circular rainbow. We went in some dizzying circles. This part definitely felt much more like a roller coaster, since we were spinning and not falling as quickly. I didn't realize when I went up, but you can put your camera in a secure pocket and then take pictures on this part of the jump! One guy in the same plane as me did that and got some brilliant pictures. I got to actually talk to my pro during this portion too--and apparently he had been skydiving for 5 or 6 years, with 10 or 15 a day! I heard some other people say that one of the guides had done 12,000 jumps, and another had gone from 30,000 feet once, which is a 6 minute Freefall!

Anyways, we finally landed, in which I ungracefully skid and fell over, almost taking the guide down with me. All of this was captured on the ground video. Then my pro shook my hand and said congratulations, I thanked him, and then he gathered up the chute and went to get ready for his next jump. We filmed the rest of the ground video. Walking back to the hangar, I felt very much like the people in their space suits, walking in slow-mo in Armageddon.

The ground video they were filming was a $15 DVD video, which included us before and then getting into the plane, then the landing, and the aftermath (us bouncing off the walls). It was essentially proof that we had gone skydiving without actually having to pay the $140 price for a full dive video. You have to pay that much because they actually send another person up with you to film your dive. But, for this price, you also get an entire roll of film of you in the sky so people can laugh at your horrible expressions later. I decided, however, that I would rather dive again before paying nearly the same price for a video, so I stuck with the ground video.

I thoroughly enjoyed my skydiving experience and once I landed I was already planning my next one!
From journal Crazy, Crazy Taupo