Today Peter and I did something no rational human being would ever do. We jumped off a 141 foot high bridge which spanned a beautiful river gorge with only a rubber band tied to our feet - yes today we bungee jumped.
But I am getting ahead of myself. In actuality this day started VERY early. Stacie and I woke up at 2:30 in the morning in order to register Lea for summer camp. The camp fills up within minutes so you have to register online as soon as registration is possible, which for Lea happened to be this morning at 3:00 AM. We wandered upstairs and got set up for the mad dash to registration. We actually got up too early and were just sitting there nervously watching the seconds tick off. When the clock struck 3:00 (7 AM in Boise the prior day) we clicked on the register button, found the right link within 5 seconds, clicked it and were greeted with "Sorry, this Camp is full - click here to join the wait list." The camp had literally filled up in under 10 seconds. I was a bit crushed and a bit pissed. We dropped Lea on the waiting list and then went back downstairs to go to sleep. Stacie was able to get back to sleep after a while, but I was wide awake and after about 40 minutes of tossing and turning I decided to get up. I sat and worked away for hours as the house slept. I had not slept much the night before either because our neighbors were trying to recreate the Hot Tub Time Machine party at 2:30 in the morning.
Once everyone was up we checked the forecast and found out that it had changed to be mostly rainy over the next several days. We decided to try to get some activities ticked off our list while the weather was good. Peter and I had booked a bungee jump for Monday, but it would now be raining on Monday so we decided there was no time like the present. We called AJ Hackett (the company that created the sport) and changed our reservation to 1:00. As soon as Peter hung up the phone I started getting butterflies. I really had no desire to do this, but Peter wanted to so I was along for the ride. Given the lack of sleep over the two prior nights, my nerves were already pretty fried and I struggled to settle down.
We all loaded up into the car and headed about 20 minutes out of town to the bungee site at the Kawarau Bridge. This is the first bungee site in the world and is literally where the activity was created, which is pretty cool. When we pulled up I was astonished. The infrastructure is incredible. There is a huge welcome center built into the side of a cliff packed with technology and merchandise - this is clearly big business in Queenstown. We immediately tried to check in, but were told we were a little early, so we wandered out to the viewing platform to watch some people jump. Watching the first person jump was not helpful. It's a pretty big fall and the thought of jumping was truly starting to frighten me. However, I was trying to play it cool, because Peter was really nervous as well and it showed.
We finally got checked in and headed over to the jumping spot to get in line. They have two cords they use for jumpers, one is for lighter people and one for heavier, so as you can imagine Peter and I had to split up. His line had about 6 people in it, mine was empty :-( so I would be up first. Stacie and Lea wandered down to the viewing platform and got set up to take pictures.
I kept telling myself, just get up there and jump, don't hesitate. Before I knew it I was putting on a climbing harness and my guide was calling me down onto the jumping platform. Fortunately, they had Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon playing, which actually did calm my nerves a little bit. I sat on the platform and the guide made small talk while wrapping my ankles in a hand towel and then he wrapped the towel with an ankle harness. He was done securing me to the bungee in about two minutes and then screamed out 81, which was my number - it was time. I shuffled over to the edge of the platform.
