Originally posted by: S Freud
Originally posted by: acheron
Yes. In Switzerland, over the Alps. It was awesome. :thumbsup:
How nervous were you your first time? After talking about it I am a little less nervous but can imagine I will be going crazy in the plane ride up just before the jump.
I'm generally somewhat afraid of heights, but for the most part skydiving doesn't give you the sense of "height" that, say, a tall building does or whatever. I'd never go bungee jumping. But I'm not really afraid of flying in a plane, and skydiving was more like that. Except that you then jump out of the plane.
Anyway, yeah, I was pretty nervous at a couple points. First when we take off and are in the air for awhile, then they open the side door, since even if you're used to flying, it's generally while you're enclosed. There were four jumps going on (all tandem, so eight people jumping), and I was the second one to go. I think the worst part was when the first guy went, and I saw him sitting on the side of the plane and then suddenly disappear. It's like "that's going to be me in a second".
Anyway, doing it tandem was nice since I didn't have to be the one to push off the edge. There's really only a split-second of the "falling" sensation, then it doesn't really feel like anything, either in free-fall or once the parachute opens. Once I was out of the plane I wasn't scared at all. I was taller than the instructor guy, so we had a bit of trouble getting into a good landing position; I more or less ended up in a sitting position and landing on my ass, but it was still a very smooth landing.
It was really awesome, though that's the only time I've been. Hope you have a good time.