October, 25, 2014

 

My good friend Tess and I tried TWICE before to go skydiving.  First time was back in 2011 over spring break......debris on the runway.....  Second time, my 23rd birthday.......We didn't make a concrete appointment.  UGHHH........OK!! THIRD TIME'S THE CHARM!! This time I got the discounted price from Groupon and Tess made the appointment!! DONE. DEAL. 

 

I took some of the money I made from the summer (that I was originally gonna use to go down to Mexico to scuba dive with another friend of mine....sadly that didn't happen. Boo.) and went down to Tennesee to see a few friends who lived down there.  Tess and I were ESTACTIC!!! We could barely believe it was ACTUALLY going to happen this time.  

 

At the end of my stay in the Smokey's we did it.  We could barely find the place because it was such a small, privately owned place.  The runway was a meer field and the plane seemed to be held together with duct tape! The plane was so small! Tess and I had to dive separately.  After a round of rock, paper, scissors - it was decided that Tess would go first.  It was fun to see her decent before mine.  Laying out in the sun watching the tiny dot that was her get larger and larger until she landed.  It was a good 10 or so minutes in the air until she landed.  

 

My turn.  It made it so much more exciting because our good friend Courtney decided to fly with me. It was her VERY first time in a plane! So all three of us had firsts that day!  In the plane, I was a little nervous before I got strapped onto the parachute.  But after that, it wasn't so bad.  I really thought it would take a lot of nerve to step off that step of the plane.  Once the door opened though,  I didn't even really have much time to think about what was going on before I was out of the plane and the world around me was spinning and I was falling.  Apparently both Tess and I weren't too good at positioning our legs where they ought to have been because our instructor guy kept trying to position our legs for us (oops).  After a full minute of free fall, the chute opened, I felt a tug, and I began to soar.  It was wonderful! The views of the smokies all around me!  We did get to put it into a spin....which hurt the groin a bit.....or maybe a little more than a bit.  Who cares, it was awesome! 

 

Finally we landed and I felt a wonderful sense of exhileration, freedom, and a great sense of accomplishment.  I would definitely do it again!