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July 26, 2005

7.23 (part 1)

one a day a year we all get to have a special day. saturday was mine for the 31st time. what better way to break into the 30's then go sky diving. ye had something already setup which was a very unexpected surprise. so we headed up to the north shore just outside the town of haleiwa to throw ourselves out of the sky towards earth....


cloud coverage was heavy when we arrived so we thought we might have to wait for a while. of course we were excited to go & then realized we had forgotten one of the two things they asked us to bring. SHOES! flip flops are not going to cut a good landing, not to mention we would feel bad if our flip flops fell off at 10,000 feet & landed on some unlucky poor sap standing in their yard. needless to say the group we went with had a pile of hand me downs we could dig through to wear for the jump. style is not an option when looking for a shoe within a size of your normal kicks. anyhow, we had to wait for a bit to let mother nature water the lawns & mtn side. so to kill some time we headed out for breakfast at haleiwa cafe. (relatively famous surfer hangout/ breakfast joint) was cool to see the roomies there as well as some new frineds from british columbia. after a large breakfast with all the sides & hot coffee one could handle.....low & behold the sun popped out & it was @ that point we realized we're going to be jumping in 5 minutes on a full stomach. about that time we got a call from the manager of the jump base. in her great broken chinese voice she proclaimed "where rrrr u? da pane is goin to be weavin soon"

so we hustle over & with little instruction we were ready to be hurled out of the plane. "don't worry you have no real need to do anything but fall out of the plane" was our instructors fonder highlights of the lesson. which brought up the immediate memory of signing the waiver an hour ago which stated about 20 times "you may die, you will die, you could die, it's possble you may/ will/ could die, please sign here here & here. by the way are you willing to take full responsibility for the fact you could die doing this? if so please sign again & again."
(Corey's goodluck shirt)

we hired a video guy as well as a camera guy to give us a little more special treatment. (which by the way the video of ye is great!) so at about 12,000 feet the door opens & we shuffle like penguins to the edge for our slip into the blue yonder. this is where the only real lessons of the day occurred. "head back, arms on the straps, 3..2..1..& we're screaming throught the air @ 130mph for about 25+ seconds. or another way to look @ it is 180ft per second. (4500ft in estimated 25 seconds)

thats one hell of a rush. we were hooked for sure. i had a moment in life where the rush was so sic i could have just died & vanished w/ that feeling inside. the cool thing was that the camera guy & my tandem guy grabbed hands & started to do a centrifical force spiral move. all of us spinning around & then the camera guy lets go and lauches about 30 feet away as we all rip through the clouds towards the ground. which by the way is a wicked feeling to drop through the clouds hurling toward earth. it gives a really distinct perspective of the geography
& layering.

once the chute was pulled the views were choice. the tropical waters, reef formations & landscapes were epic. one hell of a way to grow up thats for sure. :-)
Ye sticking her landing (1)
stand up landing (2)

2 very stoked jumpers!

(extra bonus shots of north shore & makaha)
shot 1
shot 2
shot 3

Posted by Single Fin at July 26, 2005 10:00 AM

Comments

Posted by: ja at July 26, 2005 02:35 PM