My first skydive

One of my childhood wishes came true yesterday. I dived out of a plane at 13,000 ft..ofcourse strapped to an experienced skydiver :). All I had to do was just enjoy the experience knowing that I am in safe hands. The truth is skydiving is much safer sport than it is believed to be. I didnt tell my family about it.. coz a simple soft "no" from them will stop me from doing it. Planning to show the video to them soon :).

So, four of us decided to go. We started off on saturday morning at 9:30 and reached the destination around noon. The sky was cloudy and we had to wait for the sky to clear. We sat there for around 3 hours after signing few papers. Two of my friends went first. When they landed, one guy looked a bit distraught which made me think "hmm... I am not going to go with his jumpmaster". Now, it was the turn of me and my other friend. We wore the diving gear over our clothes. Guess who's my jumpmaster .. the same diver I thought I shouldnt go with. I was like "Ok.. whatever" :). It was a small plane with space for 9 people sitting on two long benches. We got strapped to our respective jumpmasters. Once the altitude was reached, the door opened. I was the last to jump out of the plane. Myself and my diver crouched perpendicular to the opening and just jumped on our sides into the big blue sky. It was quick and fast. Nothing crossed my mind at the moment of jump. Truth is .. I knew I wasnt the chooser here and its actually my instructor who was burdened with the decision of jump ;) .. I just went with the flow. Good thing.. we never lingered near the exit.

After we jumped out of the plane.. the first few seconds were crazy. We seemed to be tumbling mid air and going down fast. "Shoot.. what did I get myself into". It was pretty cold at that altitude..."so much for wearing a thermal jacket under my gear". Then, my instructor tapped my shoulders which reminded me of the bird posture I was supposed to take. After that, everything was cool. We started going down at the "so said" speed of 120-130mph. The only way I could sense we were going down that fast was the gush of wind I could hear and my ears started to ache because of the changing pressure... "wish they had given me mufflers". Ofcourse, my eyes were wide open. The view was breathtaking.. I never thought I could be out in the sky(outside an airplane) :). I saw clouds and was like
"wow.. I am going to go through the clouds". After we went down past the clouds, there was a slight jerk. Parachute was launched and after that, it was just gliding slowly with some twists and turns to the ground. My other friend had the sense to try out operating the parachute. I wish I had done that. Clarification.. my instructor was really good.. his name is Mickey(1-800-skydive : Toledo, WA). Thanks Mickey for making it a great experience :).

Except for the initial tumble, there was nothing scary about the whole thing :). One can have a lot of fun doing solo once he/she gets an idea of what exactly it takes to do :). I bet it will be much easier than learning to ride a bicycle :). I can see myself pursue skydiving as a sport if my wallet permits :). The truth is this first jump was just one step towards my original dream. I want to do formations and acrobatics in mid air like I saw in the pages of "Sputnik". Hopefully.. some day :).