Before coming to NZ, I had never even thought about doing a bungy jump. It just didn’t interest me all that much, I mean, it looked rather painful, what with all that flopping around and such. But people just kept talking about it, and no one I spoke to experienced any kind of pain or injury. Plus, everyone, and I mean everyone, said that it was the scariest experience of their lives. Of course, when I heard that, I was sold. I can’t turn down a chance to scare myself s**tless. So the day after my skydive, I was on my way to Queenstown (adrenaline capital of the world) and I signed myself to be amongst the first group on the bus to do the highest bungy in NZ. If I was gonna do it, it had to be the biggest one. The jump was to be that very afternoon, and I thought about waiting a day or two, but truthfully, I kind of just wanted to get it over with. The nervous anticipation started way before I arrived at the bungy center, and steadily climbed until I was literally shaking with fear. There were 22 of us signed up to jump that day, and I was the VERY LAST one to go. The bungy station is actually a cable car suspended over a huge ravine, and it’s the only one like it in the world.
They sit you in a chair, strap you into the ankle braces, lead you the edge, count down from 3, and you just dive into the valley. Everyone else in the cable car cheers you on as you shuffle to the edge, and you look down and totally freak out. It’s so hard to overcome your body, as it’s totally unnatural to stand so close to the edge of such a great height and everything in your brain is telling you to back up. And you can’t hesitate cause everyone is watching so when they say 3-2-1, you make your knees bend and you stretch out your arms and jump out into nothing. It’s an 8.5 second freefall. Close your eyes, count out 8 seconds, and imagine the earth coming toward you at 80mph. I can’t even describe how utterly amazing and how totally different it was than skydiving. The bungy jump is a REAL jump. The distance to the ground is something your brain can understand, whereas the distance to the ground from a plane is rather abstract and therefore less scary. In a plane, you have no control over the jump; someone else is pushing off and you have no choice. The bungy is all you. You have to stand on the edge and you have to push off yourself. That’s what makes the experience so much more intense. So I jumped and then the cord tightened, it was so much smoother than I thought it would be. I was totally high off the rush for a good 5 hours after and I have to say, even though it only lasted about 10 seconds, it was the best 10 seconds of my life. I did get the DVD, and sadly I can’t digitize it and upload it because the look of terror on my face and the number of oh my gods that came out of my mouth is pretty priceless. Conquering fear of that magnitude truly makes me feel like I can pretty much do anything.
That night we all went out, as Queenstown is also the party capital of NZ. I had a ton of energy (probably residual from the jump) and I was planning on having a big night. Well, I certainly drank a lot, and it was a fun night, but I had made plans with a friend to go for a big hike the next day so I didn’t want to totally overdo it. 2 bottles of wine later, I had clearly overdone it. But I went to bed about 2 and dragged myself out from under the gloriously warm blanket at 9:30 am to prepare for the hike. I was not about to let a massive headache and some dizziness stop me from a 6 hour hike. No way. (ha). There were 3 girls that I brought along to do the hike, and my friend had brought one. We approached the trail and I realized that this was to be no leisurely stroll through the woods. We were hiking up one of the tallest peaks, and it was so challenging that within the first 2 minutes of the walk, 2 girls turned back! One simply looked at the trail and said in her very heavy and hilarious north London accent (think Fat Bastard in Austin Powers), “I can’t be bothered,” and turned back before setting foot on the trail (Sorry Emma if you’re reading this! You know your accent is amazing). The second girl went up a ways and also turned back. So then there were three. We were all hungover and exhausted, but also very intent on doing the hike and our egos would not allow us to turn back. So we motivated one another to continue the 3+ hour trek up the mountain, even singing military marching songs to help us power our way up. We had no idea what we were getting into, but the higher we climbed, the more spectacular the views became, and the less our hangovers seemed to matter. About 2 hours in, I was feeling better. I can’t say the same of my friend, but she was a real trooper and pushed herself through it. The muscles in my legs were piles of burning jelly by the time we stopped for lunch and we all planned on turning back.
But a guy was coming down form the very top and informed us that it was only another hour to the peak (albeit, a totally vertical upward climb) and that the view was worth the pain. So we figured turning back at that point would be a huge waste of all our efforts and that we might as well give it a go. By the time we reached the top, we had consumed all our water and we were all losing control over our leg muscles, but the man was right. The view made it all worth it. An unobstructed 360 degree view of miles upon miles of snow peaked mountain ranges, crystal blue crater lakes, rolling golden hills, and the city of Queenstown nestled in between all of it was more than worth the pain.
The sense of accomplishment was a drug in and of itself that erased all of the physical discomfort (momentarily). I was so proud of us because it was by far the hardest hike any of us had ever undertaken and we were not in tiptop physical or mental shape to do it in the first place. But we did do it and I realized that it’s all mind over matter in the end. If I can do a hike like that on 5 hours of sleep and a hangover to boot (oh, and serious blisters form my glacier hike a few days before), then there really isn’t much I can’t tackle. Anyway, the way back was all downhill, but in some ways harder on our legs than the way up. But it took less than half the time to get back, and we were motivated onward by thoughts of a soak in the hot tub at our hostel (which was just heaven, by the way).
So in four days, there has been an 8 hour glacier hike, a skydive, a bungy jump, and a 6 hour hike up a mountain. That’s a pretty full week if you ask me, so today is my day of rest. This is the first day I’ve had in a month to do nothing... I slept in till 9:30 (SO late for me given my dawn risings of late). It’s a lovely day in Queenstown and we have been beyond lucky with the weather (a first for me) so I don’t want to waste the day, but my legs are not in any kind of shape to do much moving, so I’m content to update this blog and sit and process what my body and mind have been though. I met some people in my hostel who are doing the same, so I don’t feel so guilty ☺
We’re staying at a great little hostel outside of town…I met a few like-minded girls who needed a break from the Kiwi bus and all the annoying kids whose sole purpose in coming to NZ was to get wasted every night, so we found an of the way place that is SO much more laid back and back-packer like in it’s atmosphere. Everyone is really nice, open, and traveling on their own, and I sat down for free breakfast in the kitchen and was talking to so many random people that I didn’t leave the kitchen until after I’d eaten lunch! So nice to see how different the travel experience is when you separate yourself from the more commercialized hostel/tour experience. This is what I wanted the whole time, and exactly what I will do when I go back to Australia in a week.
So that’s it for now. Whew. I'm spent. but I might be convinced to to a bike ride around the lake once I regain muscle control over my legs...
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