Once we had on all the gear, they took us out to an airplane "shell" to show us how we would jump out. It's not a nice thing to do to drag your tandem buddies shins across the kick plate when exiting the aircraft. This causes pain to someone who is extremely important to you. You want your tandem buddy on your side, or literally on your back. Anyhow, we practiced exiting the aircraft. Again, my stomach knotted up. Then came the time to board the plane.
Now a little description is due here. The plane is not a luxury liner by any means. There were two benches running longways behind where the pilots sit. Both were covered with green artificial turf/carpet. The boarding system is like in accounting. LIFO (Last In First Out). You can back out of this whole thing up to the point where you board the plane. After then, there is no refund. Tyler told me we would be the last ones in. At that point, I didn't realize we would be the first out.
All aboard. In we went on the benches lined up and ready to jump. The plane took off and started its climb to 13,000 feet. It seemed really high. I could see Larry Miller Sports Park down below and it looked like a kids play race track, or spaghetti. I could see over the Oquirrhs, over Salt Lake Valley and Olympus Peak, and all the way to Wyoming. On the back wall of the plane there were two lights. Red and Green. When the light turned green it was time to jump. I kept thinking, aren't we high enough? It looked high enough from looking out. It took a long time to climb high enough, or so it seemed. The high tech plane door was made out of plexiglass and duct tape. On each side of the door were two handles. They told us not to hold on to the handles. At some point on the way up Tyler causally mentioned upon our departure we would do a backflip. I told him "that wasn't in the video." At that point, my life was in his hands...
The light turned green. It was our turn to go. The next thing I knew I was standing with my feet over the kickplate and Tyler was pealing one finger at a time from the handles we were instructed not to hold onto. Out we went. The only thing I have to liken it to is when you wipe out really hard waterskiing. It was noisy. You have no idea which way is up or down. I wondered if we did the backflip? Then I started thinking about the 3 B's and firehose. breathe, banana, and belly button. The free fall lasts just over 1 minute. You fall over 100 mph. I'll admit, it seemed like a long time. I soon started to wonder about the parachute opening. Would it happen? When? And, what was taking so long? Then I heard the "pre"parachute go. This was good. Then the real one deployed. It felt like it jerked us back up in the air a mile! I loved the parachute ride. It was a blast!
Pretty soon we were approaching the landing. Our instructions were to put our legs straight out and that's exactly what I did. I had legs and ankles to protect. Marathons to run, you know. The landing ended up being no big deal. I ended up sitting on Tyler's lap. He unhooked us and that was it. I pretty much was left there laying on my back. What a rush! Then I decided I better see if the others also made the jump. They weren't far behind.
Angelia and her tandem buddy. Sorry Carla and Jeff (not pictured).
Skydiving recap:
Would I do it again? Possibly
Am I glad I did? Yes
Faith promoting experience? Absolutely!
Fun! I didn't know you had a blog! :)
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