A Little Tom Petty Might be Appropriate

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Charlotte and I are now to be officially know as "Extreme" dude and dudette.

So far in New Zealand we have White water rafted over a 7m waterfall, Black water rafted through glow-worm caves, cruised down hills on a Luge track, spent afternoons Snorkeling and Surfing, but now you can add another extreme sport to our formidable adventure resumes. Today we survived 40 seconds of free fall, jumping out of a perfectly functioning airplane. That's right we SKY-DIVED!!! 12 000ft of nothing but air baby!!! It was some seriously big air!!

The anticipation was really killing Charlotte, we had sort of decided that we would do it about 4 days before. Every night and day and in the morning and especially when we were driving Charlotte's mind wandered to skydiving. All kinds of thoughts: cost, death, injury, and disfigurement being the main ones. She was really not sure if she was going to get enough guts to "go through with it". As it turns out you don't have much choice once you get into the plane. Charlotte was the closest to the door so she had to jump first. Anyway they don't give you much time to think about it. They don't spend much time in the doorway. I guess I need to say that we tandem jumped, which means we were strapped to some professional jumper who knew what he was doing and made sure the chutes opened and everything. Anyway they kinda shuffle you toward the door and then you go. My only thought was OH MY GOD. Free fall is amazing. The view was incredible. I had no butterflies or anything until we were beginning to fly then I realized that there was nothing below us. When the door opened Charlotte said she could see all my fears bubbling up in my face. I guess at that point I was starting to think of all those thoughts that were bothering Charlotte for the last couple days, you know death, disfigurement, etc.

Anyway it was an incredible experience, and we are completely safe and unharmed. I guess I will keep this blog short since we just wrote about the surfing. The DVD and photo package was crazy expensive so there is only photos of Charlotte, but I'm on bits of the video. But anyway this last week has been totally fun and we have definitly ended on a high note. Plus we ain't finished yet. Saturday night we are gonna go to another Rugby match and we will try to get out surfing at least once more.

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Photos

Psyched up in the plane
(or psyched out)

Ha ha
Can u believe it ?( in case you can't read it)

Comments

[Mom]

Good on ya!
What an incredible experience - good thing you didn't tell me til after your feet were safely on the ground! do you think maybe it's time for you guys to come home and get back to the dull and boring...............

[Betty A]

Wow!
That is really amazing! I have really enjoyed watching your adventures around New Zealand! Great jounaling, wonderful pictures, I'm glad you've had such a good tme.

[Kyle]

NICE!
I'm impressed and amazed! And likely jealous (although God only knows how much convincing it took the two of you to get up in that plane!). Congrats guys, can't wait till you get home!