Monday, January 16, 2006

January 9th 2003


Hi Everyone,
My vacation was wonderful. One of the things that I did was bungee jump. The Bloukrans Bungee was the one my friends and I decided on. A reason was it was easy for us to get to and another was is that it is billed as the world's highest bungee jump. I am not too sure about that but for sure by jumping at a place that bills itself as the world's highest one can be assured that it is going to be high and it was. It was the kind of high that people get when they stand on top of a sky scraper and look down and wonder how someone could possibly work up that high. It was the kind of high that even though one is walking on a sturdy stable surface it seems like a good idea to walk slow just in case.

The bungee jump was a lot of fun though it was very easy for me to jump. I was like a model for the others and it was my first time even. I was the same person that as a little kid climbed of the high dive for the first time with my dad watching and instead of jumping off like a scared little kid decided to smile, wave, and jump head first into a dive. I was the same person that as a young child use to climb high into the trees not knowing how I was going to get back to regular ground. Ah, but this time I knew how I was going to get back I was going to be pulled back. Even after I came back up a person that was also in the group watching me said basically that I had a really good jump, meaning I jumped like a person would want to jump, strong and sturdy. I stepped up to the line where people are supposed to jump. The routine was that they yell 5-4-3-2-1-bungee and then the person jumps. The jumper is not supposed to look down for obvious reasons but just keep the head up and look forward.

I stepped up to the line. They started to count down saying "5" I looked down at the ground about six hundred and fifty feet blow me and looked up and smiled. They had now got to "5-4-3-2" and I started to bend my legs down squatting for a jump of a lifetime. I gave a long hard jump and as I sailed of the bridge I could hear them saying "bungee" in the background which was of course my cue to then jump but I was going to jump on my own in my own way. The first second was nice and then I panicked a little bit and started flailing my arms. After a little bit though I let my self loosen up, relax and enjoy the ride. I let my arms go out to my side and I loved it. I was falling and I loved it. I was really getting to like it for the last couple seconds and then the cord caught me and for a second or two started to go taught and I got slightly disappointed because I knew then that I was not going to be in my long freefall anymore. The experience of being pulled up was interesting but just not like it was falling. A couple minutes later I was back on the bridge conversing with my friends that it was indeed something I liked.

Some people say that it is not good for a person to jump like that but far as I know I did not have any of the back problems or knee problems but that I felt like the bungee cord just gently caught be and slowly broke my fall. It was the fact that the fall stopped though that got me I really wish I could of fallen for a couple of minutes. Seems like on my next vacation I am going skydiving! love ya jeff

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