Our last Friday there we realized, (though we'd been thinking about it all week...) that we couldn't come all the way around the world to the place where bungy jumping was invented, and not try it. So, Sam booked his appointment with death, while I preferred to remain undecided until I could see some folks try it and live. This was on the bus up there,
Before the plunge,
Kawaru Bridge, New Zealand
So, the
Kawaru Bridge is the sight of the very first
bungy jump, it is 43m high, which is a little over 141 ft, so stories are 10 ft high, that would make the jump 14 stories. When you get there you can tell them if you want to be dunked in the water or not, since I didn't want to be cold all day, I declined, but Sam chose to be dunked in past his head, all the jumps are done head first. Sam went first, his face looked a little scared.. but he did it and loved it!
When you're about to jump they say, see that bridge out there? See if you can jump to it! Really?!! I'm thinking, they
are crazy..
Because this is the original bungy, they don't want to change it in anyway, so to get off, they come to you in this raft, hand up a pole, you grab on, all the while you're brains feel like they're popping out of your eyeballs.. and lower you down to the raft. Here's Sam's graceful exit..
I'm sad because I was too busy filming it on our other camcorder and didn't really get pictures of Sam's jump, then he declined to buy the ones they provide and by the time I realized he did, it was too late, they'd sent them to the recycling! But at least I got it on video. Here's another small clip I got on the camera after he jumped!
This is also too fun to not watch! Sam was so excited.
I was feeling pretty good about it once I was up there, so I decided to go for it, easier said than done. When I got to the ledge I realized I was looking around into the faces of all these horrified people. The guy who tied my ankles up, (with a towel, mind you) just told me,
ok, you're going to jump, and I said, no, I'm not. I struggled for a little bit and then finally had to go sit down for a second because I wasn't quite ready to take the plunge. Then Sam came back up, he had been ready to film... and a worker from the bridge saw us, she asked if we'd gotten our T-shirts for jumping yet and I confessed that I hadn't gone yet, she was so nice and said, "well, I'll go with you!" This actually didn't make it any better at first then I thought, well, I'm here and I'll kick myself back home if I don't go through with this.. Since Sam had
already used his turn, he couldn't have gone with me unless we wanted to pay again. So here we are, me and my new
BFF!
That's me in the white sweatshirt
It was funny, at the bottom, I realized I hadn't even asked her what her name was. As we were being lowered into the raft I turned to her and said, " I don't even know your name!!" She told me, hello, I'm Nikki. I then told her she was my new best friend!
It was an awesome experience, in the end, I wouldn't trade it for anything!
At one point I looked through my camera lens and saw the props barely rotating, turns out it was the camera's effort to focus that made it look like it was going slow. I about had a heart attack! Seeing this scenery really made me realize how very small and insignificant we are. The power that it took to form this earth is breathtaking.
This is a glacier.
Coming into Milford Sound, we had to fly out past the landing strip toward the ocean to get away from the mountains and turn the plane around.
Once we got there, we went on a big boat and toured around the sound. They would pull the boat right up the the waterfalls, there were dozens of them.
We got to see some seals playing and sliding on rocks, they were so playful, it was fun to watch.
I started to notice their signs over there, they were so funny to me, and they use funny words for things, like the garbage cans say, "place rubbish here" This one was probably my favorite.
This particular scene was used for the opening in Lord of the Rings where they have some warriors riding in on horses
The Maori Dancers were awesome, when I stood in front of this guy, he said, Whoa, tall... so that's why I'm half crouched. The women do their eyes like this to show beauty. It's a traditional custom, they also flutter their hands to mimic water shimmering. The balls the women perform with are called Poi, they brought some of us from the audience up to try and learn a few moves, it was definitely harder than it looks. This is Julie, she kept me laughing while away from home... I look like a giant compared to her, no fair; it didn't help I was wearing heels...
The place had a fire going inside, so the foggy picture is because of the chimney smoke waving down.
The Kids were so sweet! They were so excited to have us home and couldn't wait to eat the B-Day cake they'd help to make. Vacation's always great but we sure missed them. A big round of applause for Mom and Dad too! They were kind enough to run the house and keep the kids while we were off playing! Thanks again Mom and Dad! We love you.
These are my V-Day - B-Day Flowers, so pretty.
