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| Free falling, nobody pulling on the bloody strap! |
When we were in Austria in 2009 I watched people leap off a perfectly good mountain into the abyss while strapped to a parachute spread across the mountain behind them. This looked amazing and I though, 'I have to do this'. Later I mentioned it to Brenda saying I would have to try it. She way not up for it. We decided to track down the guy running the service. Heading out the next day Brenda said she was going to do it too. I was surprised and delighted
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| Brenda goes first, without a glitch. I was so proud of her : ) |
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| I hope this chute is strong enough to hold the combined weight of the expert and myself!! |
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| What a view, what a thrill even it takes two tries to take off |
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| Still in one piece : ) |
Now, before you watch the short video below I have to explain the very dry mouth. There's a bit of a story behind that, there's always a story : )
As I mentioned above, Brenda went first. I watched as she ran down the mountainside along with her tandem partner. The take off was majestic, a soft glide into the air and off the mountainside. I was so proud of her taking on this challenge and the ease with which she took to it. I waited on the mountain until the two of them eventually came back up to the summit on the ski lift.
The day before this I had taken one of my skiing nose dives and afterwards found it difficult to breath. I only found the day after the paraglide that I had in fact fractured a rib. The medical facilities at the resort were great.
Anyway, back to the story. I was informed that the combined weight of myself and my tandem partner was at the max allowed for the chute. However he reassured my that all should be OK. So, the chute was stretched out across the mountain behind us, just as it had been for Brenda. Then we had to run downhill as fast as possible in the hope that the chute will catch the wind and lift us off. Still running but not feeling the lift. Then we trip up and slide down the mountainside, on my belly, with my tandem partner on my back, funny to watch but not to experience. I was gasping for breath when we stopped, still unaware that my rib was fractured. Clearly not helped by me being turned into a human sleigh. We had to walk back up the steep section of the mountain to the starting point. At this stage the instructor said he did not think there was enough wind to lift us up off on this side of the mountain and suggested we consider using the other side of the mountain.
Stepping over the summit we were shown the alternative take off site. This is where 'dry mouth' kicked in. I had no water and decided to put a but of show to my lips. It became black on contact so I abandoned that and decided to put up with the dry mouth.
This side was very steep and had a limited run space before a drop off, how much I did not know. I had to dig my heels into the snow t stop falling forward. The chute was spread out behind us. We run, or more accurately hurtled, forward at speed and just as we were about to run out of mountainside we were whipped into the air. What a rush : )
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