A LEAP OF NATH

DAY 36: Makarora to Wanaka

Today, I jumped out of a plane at 12,000ft with nothing but a Brazilian called Mac strapped to my back. Luckily he had a parachute attached to him.

We'd left Makarora on our tour bus reasonably early in the morning, on what was a beautiful, warm and clear sunny day. A perfect day for skydiving. After stopping for a few photos along lakes Hawea (a huge 35km long) and Wanaka (an even huger 45km long), we were dropped off by our Stray bus where we met our contact that would take us to the Skydive Lake Wanaka centre. Jen having already skydived before was ground crew today, so it was just me in the air.

I had a three minute video briefing on the bus as I signed my life away, basically saying if I died it was bad luck and not their fault. Fair enough. If you choose to jump out of a plane, who can you blame?

Once suited and harnessed up at the centre, I was introduced to Mac, my giant tandem skydiver, and about ten minutes later we were walking to our four-day old, easyjet-orange skydive plane. I was the only one jumping from 12,000ft (four others were jumping from 15,000ft - that was out of my price range thankfully), so I was last on, which meant first out!

At this point I still didn't feel nervous, which was strange considering what I was about to do. Normally I would have been bricking it for weeks before, but all I could feel was excitement. I think this is called denial.

Once we were in the air and soaring to our jump height the realisation hit me, but I kept trying to ignore it. We climbed really high and I thought to myself; 'Ok, we must nearly be at jump height now', then Mac turned to me and said; '6,000ft. Half way!'. What? Time for the nerves to kick in.

We soon enough reached jump height and Mac pulled open the opaque window-door and the loud, cold air rushed into the plane. This was it. No turning back. I was now bricking it, but I didn't have time to absorb the fear. Legs under the plane, hands on harness, head tilted back and WHOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHHH! 'Arrrrrrrrrghhhhhhh!'...'Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhhh!'...'Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhhhhh!'. In about a second flat I think I saw horizon, sky, lake, mountains, land, horizon, land, mountains, sky, lake as we somersaulted out of the plane plummeting at 120mph towards the ground. It was the most intense adrenalin rush I have ever experienced.

But then, once my body righted itself and overcame the sensory overload it was the most incredible, extreme view of the planet I have ever seen. The panorama across the mountains and down to Lake Wanaka was beautiful. And it was such a clear, sunny day - just perfect. I've never shouted 'wow' and 'amazing' so many times in a minute, and shouting was hard to do due to the unbelievably dry mouth I had.

After 45 seconds of freefalling, Mac pulled the 'chute and the loud onslaught of rushing air was replaced by a serene silence and calm as we sailed slowly down to our landing spot, taking a bird-like 360 degree swirling descent. Legs out and a perfect landing, and that was it. All over in a couple of minutes. But what an intense couple of minutes it was. Mac had a handycam on and I have the whole thing on DVD which is a really good memento. And a saw throat to go with it.

The team dropped Jen and I in Wanaka where Josh, Lisa and Laura had sorted some accommodation at the YHA Purple Cow - a lovely modern 6-bed en suite dorm/apartment just for the five of us.

After we checked in and caught up with the guys we went for some lunch down at the lakeside at Tango's to celebrate me returning to earth alive. They do a lovely gourmet sausage roll (it's huge) made with minted lamb. Jen had a really nice roasted veg panini too. This was washed down with some amazing Hokey Pokey ice cream. I'm still not 100% sure what Hokey Pokey is, but I think it's a butterscotch tasting caramel with crunchy toffee honeycomb bits in.

After a long sit down by the lake as my body came down from the natural high, we met the guys to do some shopping and went back to cook dinner.

It wasn't until we got back that it was unveiled that Josh had, in true backpacker style, stolen some fresh ginger from the supermarket's fresh produce aisle. This was to be the start of 'Gingergate'.

As the girls embarked on cooking their veggie-friendly dinner, they couldn't find the ginger. We looked everywhere. In the fridge, behind the microwave, under the bed. Bad karma or what. With the veggies' dinner at risk of tasting a bit bland (don't they always anyway?), and it nearly being cooked, there was no ginger to be found.

It wasn't until they were half way through their dinner that Josh found Laura's shopping bag in the cupboard - and along with it, the ginger. The look on Lisa's face was one of disgust. More so at Laura's dinner and the fact that she was the one who misplaced the ginger. It was hilarious, but you had to be there.

After dinner we decided to play an epic game of Monopoly which took ages to get going but inevitably, as always with Monopoly, ended up in the most complex deals and negotiations taking place. Jen is convinced I am a cheat at Monopoly. This took us up to about 12.30pm and, shattered, time for bed.