Gimped out with Shotover Canyon Swing!!

smiles, i was all smiles. we, in fact, were all smiles. let me explain. today i did a "shotover canyon swing".

imagine the biggest swing you have ever seen. bigger. bigger than the tall swings we had as a kid because back in the 70s we had cooler metal playgrounds. it's much bigger than that.


how about 109 meters big? high above the river below there is a platform off which from you will walk the plank, matey. there are a number of ways to get off the platform which i'll get into later. once off the platform, you free fall over 60 meters reaching up to speeds of 150 kph and soaring into a 200 meter arc.


ok, that's the technical stuff. amazing. the crazy part involves getting off the platform. there are a number of tried and true ways to commence operation swing including but not limited to: the superman, doing flips, the elvis cutaway, the gimp, the chair, and finally the bin laden. each of these is an elaborate and heart stopping way to do the deed.


i let them choose for me. wise choice? you'll see.

even more of a mind f*$% are the two guys, pat and will, getting you ready to jump. yeah, the ones that are strapping you into, in my case, a chair and a gimp mask. yesh. i just said gimp mask. (how often do you get to say that at a sunday dinner??!)

walking blindly onto the platform, i was afraid that the next step would be my last as my brain forgot the details of my now yellow gimpy world. being tugged and pulled by my harness the boys questioned the strength of my straps and whether certain things were buckled or not. as i had a yellow mask over my face, i could not see and myself absurdly questioned the safety of my harnessed body.

see, though i knew that these guys were masters of their craft, this was part of their shtick. with high safety regulations, they would never ever endanger anybody but it was a part of their evil plan to scare me. and well, they done good.



lulling me into a distracting conversation about my life in queenstown, they pretended to release me a few times before pulling off the mask and letting me and the chair fly.


watch my face, it's funny :)

i screamed like the girlie that i am, soared like a monkey through the trees as the wind and raindrops (yes it was raining) fell on my grinning face. after being pulled back up, i felt an amazing bond with will and pat, (something probably like the bond that kidnapees feel with their kidnappers) the two that graciously helped my departure off the platform, hugged them both and grinned some more.


i stayed and watched the other people in my group as they each flew off in their own particular way and shared in their beautiful frightened and fantastically enjoyed swings.



it was a great day.