Travel Story «A perfectly good aeroplane....»

Australia | 0 Comments 01 November 2006 - Last Update 24 December 2006

I have done some pretty stupid things in my life, (swimming with sharks, jumping off a cliff, dancing alone of the 'dancefloor' in the Tea Gardens...) but jumping out a perfectly good aeroplane holds pride of place as THE most insane thing I have yet to do in my life. I have long talked about doing a sky dive and bungee jump - well talk is easier than action I soon learned. Before I booked the sky dive, I attempted to visualising the whole experience of hurtling out of a plane, face down with the ground rushing at you - a rush of emotion swept over me - second thoughts and indecision were the primary sensations followed closely with a small gag reflex for effect - not adrenalin or excitement. Nevertheless, I felt I had backed myself into a corner with all the talk and (false) bravado I had exhibited (normally after a few alcoholic beverages and with a bit of an audience to entertain), which is easy to do when you are in Ireland and not sitting in the booking office paying $250 dollars for a one way plane journey.... Grainne and Aisling could not be persuaded to join me on this trip as they (say they) are waiting for New Zealand to reveal their true insanity colours and do their sky dive over Lake Taupo - one of the most popular sky dive spots in the world. After a McDonalds Egg and Bacon McMuffin breakfast (which I was sure I would see again in a few hours) I hoped on the bus with my fellow nervous companions for the 2 hour drive south of Cairns to Mission beach - a popular landing spot due to the magnificent views of the Reef (you know the Great reef - you may have heard of it...), that is, if you open your eyes when you jump/are pushed from the plane.... It was a very early start (7am after a night out!) so I slept most of the journey, enacting the Head-Bob between mini-nightmares of faulty parachutes and an inexperienced co-jumper. I was nervous to say the least when we arrived. I booked into the 14,000 foot dive which allowed a 60 second free fall before the parachute was (hopefully) deployed followed by a safe and soft landing on to Mission Beach - again, this could not be gauaranteed.... Indeed I had just signed away my life and all possibility of placing blame on the JUMP THE BEACH company for any injury and or loss of limbs and or loss of life - a fair exchange for nearly $500 really.... I was in the 4th group to go up that day so there was a bit of waiting around - plenty of time to get even more nervous... thankfully, they dropped you to the resort on Mission beach where you could relax in the pool and watch the other jumpers land while you waited - turns out life wasn't too bad after all, still I don't know if it was worth $500... Then came my turn. A brief instruction from my Tandem jumper, I was then 'suited up' and thereafter followed a wonderfully eloquent (when I say eloquent I mean gibberish type nonesense) Camcorder interview with the next victim, (that's me), which I like to call the Last Will and Testament/please dont let this be how the world remembers me. All of this was caught on DVD (which I paid an extra $150 for - it's not cheap) so there is plenty of evidence of my pre-jump nerves and verbal diahrea. I was last in the plane which meant I would be first out (fantastic). The plane is TINY. Not even one meter wide, so we are all squashed in and were quite literally sitting ontop of our tandem jump instructors. The plane journey up seemed endlessly slow, until that is my cameraman (who had to jump separately to me to film me) reached for the sliding door to open it in order that he could stand on the OUTSIDE of the plane and film me falling out, (Oh Sugar-Honey-Iced-Tea this is for real, I thought.) Yes people, he was hanging onto a plane while it flew around at 14,000 feet - and he does this 5 times a day. This is when I started to question myself - not a frequent occurence:- Why, infact was I doing this? It suddenly occurred to me that this wasn't the best idea I had ever had. I mean really, the view was lovely and I had enjoyed my ride up (ok I hadn't because I was sweating profusely and shaking like a leaf all the while trying to use the powers of my death stare to silence the other three Korean dudes in the plane who had obviously overdosed on sugar or were all simultaneously having epilectic fits that caused them to repeat the peace sign over and over again and shriek loudly in Korean) but I would quite happily have gone down again in the plane to the airfield and let them keep my money. Really I would. My instructor had other ideas (suicidal freak) and suddenly he was lifting and tightening and heaving and we were tied so closely together I felt he should really have bought me dinner beforehand. And to think I was his fourth person that day.... Anyhoo. Cut back to me sitting on the edge of the plane with my feet dangling into mid air (that's mid 14,000 feet air) trying to look all cool and natural for the camera (my last Will and Testament). My instructor shouted at me to blow a kiss to the camera and it was only AFTER I had done it I remembered he said this would be the signal from me to him that I was ready to jump and before I knew it I had wet my pants. Well, very nearly. Good thing I was dehydrated.... So where are we now - oh yes, OUTSIDE OF THE PLANE HEADING FOR EARTH. The breath was literally KNOCKED out of me so I had no initial reaction to the free fall. Then I opened my eyes and all fear and panic immediately morphed into excitement and awe - cue the very eloquent Emily again and after a few seconds I managed to emit a very loud WOW. WOOOOOOOOOW! (I know, I know - soon enough I'll have one my quotes in those crappy little stocking filler type present books filled with "profound' sayings. Wow. I am a literary genius waiting to be discovered. And unique too. I bet no one else has ever said Wow when doing their sky dive....) So there I was, falling at 120mph towards earth with the cameraman beside me (how he appeared at my side I will never know - the man is some sort of superman-type-flying-machine who could go above and below and around us and stay in control of his direction the entire time - oh and FYI, you didn't hear him screaming or saying profound things like WOW - he was cool calm and collected. Show-off.) Everyone else who had already landed that I had spoken to had said that their free falls were over in the blink of an eye, but mine wasn't (mini panic that maybe parachute was faulty...?) so there was more expressions of wonder and excitement (WOW. WOW. WOW. etc) and then the parachute was released (phew!) and we just cruised around. Even though we were the first one out of the plane I was the last to land which meant I had extra time in the air - value for money, thank you - we were just floating above the Great Barrier Reef (views = amazing) and my instructor (hereafter referred to as Barry seeing as that is his name and I am in fact, not dead - job well done Barry) continued to point things out to me. It was so so quiet up there (we are now at 5,000 feet) that the two of us were having a conversation at normal speaking volume. Crazy quiet. After a few minutes Barry gave me control of the parachute which allowed me to change direction (told you he was suicidal) as we descended to the beach. Such a sureal feeling. Once we landed my camerman rushed over to me again to capture gormless (but alive - yea!) and speechless Emily (oh yes, they were both out in force) and her thoughts on the jump. Thoughts - amazing! Do it again? Defnitely. Now bring me that beer and the poolside once more. Emily