I was decidedly not mentioning my plans today in earlier posts, but I had been pondering the famous (and the original) AJ Hackett bungy jump off the Karawau Bridge here in Queenstown since long before I left for my trip. Queenstown is known as the "Adventure capital of the world", after all, and I was going to be here. As the time got closer and closer during the trip, I thought I wanted to do it, and yesterday I went in and made my booking. When I got back to my room at the hostel, I met Arlene, and Irish woman who booked the same jump at the same time as me! It was fate! So we knew we were not alone, and were ready to meet up the following day.
Through the whole endeavor, the only time I felt really nervous was standing and making the reservation and handing over my credit card to pay for it (non-refundable and all). I was far more nervous at that point than I was when I was about the jump off the bridge! Strange but true.
I felt a bit nervous after making the booking, but wandered around downtown, got some dinner, and went to bed pretty early. I was really tired and got a really great night's sleep (almost 10 hours!), so nerves definitely weren't a problem there. I got up and found a cafe, but kept breakfast light, and didn't want to have much in the way of food or drink before going.
After a bit more killing time in shops, I went up to the AJ Hackett shop, checked in, met up with Arlene, and we waited a few minutes to board the bus to ride out. When we got on the bus, the driver was joking about the trip being quite an emotional one for many people, and about nervous faces. But I was finding myself really cheerful and excited, hardly any trepidation at all.
Arlene and I sat on the bus and she's near my age, on a long trip, and on sabbatical from a full-time job like me. We discussed our reasons for doing the bungy and what we hoped for out of it. Needless to say, despite knowing each other for less than a day, we had a very big bonding experience today!
So the bus pulled up and we could see the bridge. The river and setting is really lovely!
And once in the building we had to check in again and they just send you right up whenever you're ready. Arlene and I got some photos of each other (another benefit to having a buddy!) and put our stuff in lockers before going up to the bridge.
Once on the bridge I had to wait all of 2 minutes or so, chatting with the welcome guy who gave me my harness, before I was invited onto the platform so the guy could tie up the foot parts of the harness. Before I knew it, the final helper guy was checking all of my connections and standing me up. He helped me shuffle out, and told me to smile at the various cameras.
He then pointed to a tree off in the distance and said to aim for that as I jumped. Okay. "5-4-3-2-1 Go!" he says! And for a micro-second I think, "Wait" and then in just another microsecond I think, "Well, what's the point of waiting... it's not going to be any easier if I wait", so I just jumped out.
The falling was quick and easy, and I got a bit dipped in the water (most of my arms and the top of my head), and I'm pretty sure I didn't open my eyes until I was bouncing back up again, but the water was amazing, as was the scene all around.
About 4 bounces later the raft got out to me, I grabbed the bar, they pulled me in, and chatted with me a bit while helping me get free.
Then it was just a hike back up (stopping midway to watch Arlene do her jump), and then marveling that I just jumped off a bridge!!! I got the DVD and many photos, and Arlene and I chatted and patted ourselves on the back for a bit before catching the bus back.
I'm really proud of myself for doing the bungy. And particularly for not being nervous during the actual event! It's definitely one of those things I will look back on for years and think, "I actually DID that!" And what an amazing way to finish off my trip to New Zealand and my trip to the Pacific Rim.
But the day wasn't over yet! Since we were starving by that point, we grabbed some food at a pub, and then we ventured over to take the gondola up. It's a beautiful ride with amazing views of the city and of Lake Wakatipu on the way up.
Then you can take a little ski-lift up to do the "luge", which is like a little car race around curves and down a hill. It's really quite fun!
After a coffee and a rest, we came back down, did a bit of shopping (including gearing ourselves up in bungy gear!) and then came back to the hostel. I'm pretty wiped now, and I have to leave for the airport at 7:30am, so tonight will just be packing up and hopefully a decent sleep.
I expect I'll post a few more times with some other thoughts and reflections on the overall trip or various countries or services, but this about wraps it up for the exciting trip adventures. I hope. Tomorrow's flights will be about 30+ hours of travel time including layovers, so I hope it's just long and slow and not problematic in a way I want to document!
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