I woke up this morning at 6, ready to jump out of a plane! I met my ride at about 7:45 a few blocks away from my flat. The drive took about an hour. When the four of us got to Strathallan we had to wait to get our refreshers course. Everyone has to have a refreshers course before they can jump that day, if they don't have their license. It was a very long awful morning of just sitting in anticipation. We had to wait for all of the tandem jumpers to jump first before we could jump. Our group of first jumpers from the week before had grown to now eight jumpers. All of us were very excited to jump! Before 2 our group was called. We all went down to get "kitted up" which means I needed a life preserver (in case we land in water), my bright orange and red jumpsuit (very attractive), my 15 kilo pack which contains the two parachutes, the device that reads our altitude, a helmet and a walkie-talkie that sits in a pocket next to my ear on my helmet. After we had all of the equipment on we had to decide as a group of four who was going to jump first. My group was three other guys and guess who had the guts to go first...yup that's right I did. Then we all had to practice jumping out of the plane that stays put in the hanger, which was just so that we could see how heavy the pack was when we jumped out of the plane.
Eventually we were ready to go. We all lined up and got into the plane, each sitting in our specific spots. I'm glad I went first because I got the best seat, I was looking right out of the open door and it was amazing! Imagine the take off of a regular plane except that you can feel the wind and you can see everything below you. It really was an amazing sight. The whole time the three guys were joking around with each other which was great because it made me a lot more relaxed. At 3500 feet and the right area the instructor told the pilot to cut the engine, told me to put my feet out of the plane and get in the jumping position and then to GO! Just like that! It happened so quickly, I totally forgot to count like I was supposed to but it was ok. The parachute opened perfectly without any twists or problems. I had at first forgotten all of the things I was supposed to check but I soon remembered what to do. Plus the walkie-talkie was for the instructors on the ground to remind me what to do.
Now it was time to enjoy the scenery. It was really beautiful, I could see all of the mountains and all of the snow in the mountains! I was surrounded by farmlands, and plenty of little white dots which turned out to be sheep. It was like nothing I've seen before. But soon I realized that I need to check what height I was at and where I was going to land. The instructor on the ground certainly helped me figure out what to do by talking to me through my walkie-talkie (course I couldn't respond) but I was glad I had it. Eventually I was all set up to land and I actually did I pretty good landing, it was much easier and smoother then I thought it would be. I wouldn't ever give up that experience for anything. I don't think I was scared at all, which probably isn't normal because most people don't voluntarily jump out of a plane, but I completely enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I am now hooked, I can not wait till I get to jump again and eventually get to pull my own parachute.
Yes the beautiful jump suit outfit, nice and puffy:)
My group on the plane minus the guy all the way on the left.
Yea the guy in the middle with the scruffy red beard landed in a bush, I mean really landed in a bush, classy guy.
Get Ready!
Get Set!
Go!
Yea you can barely see me but the little spec in the bottom right corner would be me.
Landing!!
Looking awfully proud of myself (I mean rightly so...)
Yup it's official!
When we got down the instructor had to give us feedback on how we did. I got a thumbs up! Although she said I should keep my head up just a little more but overall very good! That made me happy. After being debriefed my group all went to the little cafe to have some cheesy chips (fries with melted cheese, whoever invented these is my favorite person). Then it was time to drive home, and of course then all the people in my car wanted a celebratory drink. We went to this really cool pub and I tried alcoholic ginger beer, which was really good. I ended up getting home around 8:30, what a long day. Totally worth it and now I'll be going back in about two weeks to jump again!
So what's next...bungee jumping?
No comments:
Post a Comment