I had such a good time doing my first tandem skydive on May 31st that I decided to go back for more. Yesterday, my little mother came by and we drove over to the Niagara District Airport. We then flew ten minutes to the Dorothy Rungeling Airport (Welland) for our 10:00 appointment at the Niagara Skydive Centre. The previous two jumpers were late, so we had to wait around for a bit. There are much worse places I can spend time than at an airport! We sat outside and watched the other jumpers come down, then it was my turn to suit up. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to convince Jan to jump as well.
Péter, my tandem master, was very camera crazy that day.
I really don’t like getting my pic taken, but obliged for a bunch. I think I was telling him nicely to put the camera down:
Needless to say, he didn’t. Hehe.
We were sitting next to the door for the flight up to 10,000′. He opened the door early so I could just lean out and enjoy the awesome view:
Then without further adieu, we got in position to depart the Cessna 205:
During my last jump, we did three somersaults out the plane. This time, we did one, although I wasn’t quite expecting it. Tee hee. I was wondering why for a split second, I saw the plane again. I told Péter to do whatever he wanted to make the jump even more exciting than it already was.
We really lucked out with perfect weather.
The free-fall was really neat. Then we were under the canopy:
He let me control the chute for a bit, which was quite fun. I’m not too sure what he said at this point, but I saw him pointing and assumed he meant “There’s the ground. Aim for it.”
It was neat to see my cute little plane from the top down:
And then, unfortunately, it was time to land. I was really hoping we would hit a massive thermal and get sucked back up again, but it didn’t happen.
Just like the first jump, Péter did a perfect landing. What an amazing experience. I’m very impressed with the two jumps I did with Skydive Niagara. Their staff are great – very friendly, professional and accommodating. If anyone ever wants to have a wonderful and exciting experience, I highly recommend doing a jump here. I know I’m going back again. I’m strongly considering doing the progressive freefall course, so I can do a solo jump. It entails a five hour course, then a instructor-assisted deployment from 3200′, a bit more training, then a freefall from 10,000′ while being flanked by a couple instructors. I did four IAD jumps back when I was with the Army, so that gives me a little more confidence for doing this. It will probably be in September or October.
Today’s symptoms: I felt quite good today, despite my very and exciting day yesterday. I think I slept more last night than I have in over 10 years. I started drying my hair last night, and then part way through, I got quite tired. At 7:30pm, I decided to lay down for a 10-20 minute nap. I woke up at 2:30am. Oops! I had a hard time falling back to sleep but did just before 4:00am. I probably had 10 hours of sleep last night. Hehe!
Lizzy McFly 