Wow! what a rush!
On the 27th May I decided that walking past the Skydiving shop in Queenstown without going in had gone on to long so I decided to face my fear and jump out of a plane.
Considering that the three things I like the least are Flying, Heights and Falling from said heights, you may think this was a strange decision, but I just ignored that and did it anyway.
After watching a video of how the Jump works and filling out the forms we where taken by bus to the Private Airfield, which was litterally a field the planes use to take off. As we arrived (I'm sure they time it to perfection) three parashutes appeared over head as the last group landed. We where then introduced to our Tandem partners, Mine was Chris from California who Has been skydiving for 7 years, and does about 3000 jumps each year. Finally we where told there would be about a 45min wait until our jump.
Each flight fits 9 people on board, so ususally they take 3 or 4 "passengers" on each flight. If you have photo's taken then you also have to pay for the cameraman to join you on the plane. Each flight by the plane takes about 20 minutes, 15 minutes to circle up to 12000ft then it takes 5 mins to get back down, the same amount of time it takes to freefall and parachute.
After watching 3 further groups jump, it was our turn to get into our gear, Jumpsuits, harnesses, hats, gloves and goggles. We then had a briefing and we where quickly led accross to the plane. I was going to be the last out of the plane so I was first in. Squashed in a little plane, attached to Chris's harness with Marius our Camera Guy next to us.
The plane climbed quickly clicling over the Remarkables Ski fields until the little red light at the back of the plane turned green and the door slid open.
Before I knew it the first guy had gone and His new wife was next to the door and off she went too. Now it was our turn, shuffling to the door, Marius had already climbed out and was hanging out of the plane, Ready set Go...
The only way I can explain the next 3 secconds was AHHHHHH Oh... Wow
You go from OMG what am I doing, to This is amazing in a fractio of a second. All of a sudden your flying, you can't comprehend that your actually falling at 120mph, everything is so far away it just feels like your hovering and is one of the most exhilarating feelings ever.
All the time your falling your camera guy circles round filming and taking photographs before whumph, the parachute opens and whips you upwards.
Then the roller coaster ride begins, Chris skillfully spiralling you down towards the ground, swooping a diving, just as exciting as the freefall. You then have a great 5 minute parachute flight back to where you started, circling in over the next bus thats just arriving!
The ground quickly whizzes up to meet you, and in my own typical style, when asked how that was all I could say was Great!
Over all a fantastic experience the best of the trip so far!
You can find my pictures from the Skydive on Flickr at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/liam_omalley/sets/72157618904477580/
Liam
