“Someday I hope you get the chance to live like you were dying” – Tim McGraw
Before reading this blog entry, I highly recommended you type “Live like you were dying” by the above artist into YouTube and listen to this song, as it sort of captures my motto here in Australia and certainly this past weekend’s activities.
As some of you may know, I’m absolutely terrified of heights. I don’t like driving over bridges, standing on roofs, looking down off a high building, ect., so naturally I decided skydiving was a good idea. It’s number one on my Australia bucket list, and everything is opposite here so it made sense to me that I should face whatever I was afraid of. I was set on booking skydiving, and when a few of my friends were interested I jumped (pun!) at the chance to go this past Saturday.
Friday night, I promised myself I wouldn’t drink too much for the obvious reason that I was going to be jumping 9,000 ft out of a plane the next morning. Of course I proceeded to get rather drunk, wake up the next morning, still drunk, and thought “Shit I’m jumping out of a plane today”. At that point in time, I thought this was really funny until about halfway through our bus ride, where my laughter slowly turned to dread and a sense of doom (and the onset of a hangover), and then once we arrived at Byron Bay Skydiving, Australia’s #1 skydiving company, I felt an overwhelming sense of anxiety and fear. We walked into their little office, filled with videos and pictures of people free falling in midair, and I felt the first wave of reality hit. I panicked; I said, “Nope, not doing this” and turned around to leave, but my friend Campbell grabbed me and dragged me back, saying, “Yes, you are”.
For the next three hours while we waited for our turn (after we signed forms waiving our life away), we watched people “falling from the sky”, as my friend Angie said. They were too high to see at first, miniscule dots in the air, and then all of a sudden you would see brightly colored parachutes swirling and twisting in the air. “That’s gonna be me”, I thought, and the fear was beyond anything I’ve ever felt before. I thought about my life and how happy I was, and the fact that this was the craziest thing I have ever done.
Soon enough, we were up and after a brief training session on what we were supposed to do when we jumped and landed, we were hustled onto the plane. We did a tandem skydive, meaning you are attached to someone else and they release the parachute, but you were supposed to lean back and stick your hips out to form a “banana” shape to make it easier for them. My partner for this, whose name I don’t remember so we’ll just call him Josh, was a jaunty, upbeat middle age guy. Upon introducing ourselves I promptly confessed that I was scared out of my mind. As we climbed the plane, my whole body started to shake and Josh hugged me and gave me a motivational speech and said phrases of encouragement.
Once the plane took off however, I felt a sort of calm, in a way. Everything was out of my hands, I was no longer in control of anything, of my life, and ironically I have never felt more free. There’s something peaceful about being aware that there’s absolutely nothing you can do anymore, which sounds strange, I realize, but that’s the best way I can describe it. Josh may have sensed this from the look on my face because he said, “that’s right love, let go”. And I did, partially because this man was in charge of my life and I had no choice but to listen to him, but also because I really felt detached from everything – I was no longer grounded (literally), in other words.
The view was incredible. As we climbed higher and higher, I looked out onto beautiful golden beaches and bright blue ocean and a backdrop of forest green mountains in the distance. Absolutely amazing. And then, before I knew it, they were opening the chute to release us. My friend Kristina was going first, I was going second. I watched her partner scoot her up to the very edge of the plane, her whole body was outside the plane with her legs curled under – and then all of a sudden they fell forward and she disappeared into the sky. And in that moment – that was when my stomach jumped to my throat and my heart started pounding so hard I thought it was going to explode. I’ve truly never been more afraid in my entire life, but before I even had time to think, Josh was pushing me forward.
“Deep breaths, deep breaths and SMILE! This is going to be fun”, Josh said, as he thrusted me out of the plane and my whole body was hanging in midair while he sat on the very edge. I wasn’t aware of anything at that time except intense panic, although my friend Dean said I had a look of “pure terror and absolute fear” on my face. Before I could react, Josh rocked us forward and we fell into the sky. The next few seconds were a blur – we tumbled, flipped in the air and fell forward, through clouds, and I remember screaming but not hearing anything, as the wind overpowered any sound. But then we were hovering midair, still free falling (the parachute hadn’t been released at this point) but I felt motionless. I’m telling you, it was the most insane feeling – just free falling in the sky but not really feeling like you were falling. I couldn’t even see the ground at this point, just pure blue sky and crazy winds. I got a tap on the shoulders from Josh, meaning I could let go of my harness and spread my arms out wide. When I did this, I no longer felt any sense of fear and I really truly felt free, alive. If this is the closest thing to flying, it was the most amazing thing I’ve ever experienced.
Supposedly we were free falling for 25 seconds, but it felt a lot less than that, or maybe longer, all sense of time was lost. Then I felt the pull and tug upward, as Josh released the parachute. At this point, he started to loosen me from him a little to make it more comfortable as we had been tightly bound to each other. So tightly, in fact, it felt like the buckles were going to pop off. I forgot that he had warned me he was going to loosen me, however, and as I felt him undoing buckles I panicked and screamed “DON’T LET GO OF ME!!!!” I caught my breath when I remembered what he was doing, and we laughed about it and made conversation as we floated downwards. All my anxiety was gone at this point and I was overcome with the view – Josh pointed out the names of the mountains in the distance, the highest one being Mount Warning, which Ben and I camped at later that night and hiked to the summit the following morning. Mount Warning is the highest peak of eastern Australia, and the first part of this side of the world to receive sunlight. Josh pointed down to whales in the ocean below us, which were flipping over on their sides and spewing water into the air. I couldn’t believe it – we were thousands of feet above the ground and yet I was loving every second. “Welcome to my office”, Josh said, gesturing to the beautiful, amazing scenery and incredible view. I will never ever forget that feeling of complete bliss and appreciation for the wonderful world around me.
After at least a few minutes, if not longer, we got closer and closer to the ground, and I could make out cars and houses that still looked like small toys from the distance. As we approached the landing, Josh told me to bring my legs up and stretched them out. Suddenly we were coming down fast and before I knew it, I was on the ground again. At this point, I jumped up to hug Josh and thank him profusely for bringing me back alive. Kristina and I high fived our survival and watched the rest of our friends descent. For the next few hours, we were all high on life – recounting our experience over and over again and feeling euphoric at our success.
I will never ever forget skydiving. It was the most incredible thing I have ever done, and the best experience of my life. For anybody who is thinking about it, I strongly recommend it. There’s nothing like a little adrenaline rush and risking your life to make you really really appreciate being alive.
The rest of the weekend was also heaps of fun. I met up with Ben and we camped at the base of Mount Warning, as I said above. It was wonderful to be in the woods and hear nothing but birds and insects and all the sounds of the wild. We made a campfire and looked at the stars and I felt peaceful and calm and truly truly happy with my life. The next morning we hiked the 8K up to the summit, which was a pretty steep incline and at the end you literally had to rock climb, using a chain they had added for support. It was pretty tough but the view was worth it – absolutely beautiful, and even crazier was the fact that I had seen it from thousands of feet above ground the day before. Also at top of the mountain, people were gathered around a Python snake, all curled up. I jumped, frightened, this being my first time seeing a Python, or certainly in the wild, at least. For Ben however, this was more of less a regular thing, and on the way back down he pointed out another one right off the side of the trail. This one was awake, however, and I freaked out, running down the trail at full sprint, which Ben pointed out wouldn’t save me anyway. He told me not to worry though, because apparently pythons don’t go after humans but like to squeeze and suffocate other animals. I decided I didn’t like snakes.
Overall it was a fulfilling, action packed weekend, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I realize that I never updated about my Whitsunday Islands sailing adventure, so I would like to talk about that real fast. I know this post is getting pretty long but hang with me for a bit longer. The Whitsunday trip was a blast – we arrived Thursday afternoon in Ariel beach, a typical beach town with lots of seaside bars and not a whole lot else. We spent a night in a backpackers, which was my first experience with a hostel. It was quite pleasant – the rooms were big and there were a few bunk beds in each, with hammocks and a swimming pool outside. Not bad. That night we also bar hopped and found some pretty sweet outdoor bars with live music. The next morning we made our way to the docks, where we met up with Wings 3, the boat company where we would be spending the next 3 days and 2 nights. Our boat consisted of 25 people, including me and my five friends, the 3 crew members, and a bunch of international couples who were travelling around. We made friends with an Irish couple who told me I made the right choice by studying abroad here rather than Ireland because of the gorgeous weather.
The Whitsundays are comprised of 70 different islands, all uninhabited, located on the very southern part of the Great Barrier Reef. Over the next 3 days, we sailed around to different islands and anchored the boat at various bays. We put on wetsuits and snorkelled a few times, all right on the reef, which was really really cool. I saw all sorts of coral and schools of fish and swam close to sea turtles! We took hikes along the beautiful, pure silicon beaches. I’ve never seen sand so purely white and water so light blue. Back on the boat, we would hang around the hot tub and have a drink or two, while being fed some of the best food I’ve had here. They took really good care of us. We watched sunsets, and for those of us who don’t do well with sleeping and motion, we got to see some sunrises too. It was a really fun trip and a wonderful experience – the Whitsundays is probably the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to, and for anybody who is travelling to Australia I recommend doing a boat tour around it. I chose that over Cairns, the other Great Barrier Reef destination, because it was less touristy and more beautiful and I don’t regret it.
This weekend the adventures continue! We are going to Tasmania (or Tassie, as Aussies call it), the hiking aka “bushwalking” destination of the world! I’m really excited, it’s supposed to have some spectacular scenery. We will be doing a bunch of hikes as well as a 3-hour zipline through a rainforest, along with other activities.
I really, really love my life.
Cheers,
Emily
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