Taupo

The next stop was a small town called Taupo. On the edge of the gorgeous lake Taupo, the town is made up of a small square of houses and shops in a grid system, you could walk through it in 10 minutes, it was really cute! Here we had another big night out and watched the all blacks rugby match in a pub which was fun! One of the guys we were with got a little too drunk and decided he wanted to go skinny dipping, or skippy dipping as he said it, in Taupo lake. Unfortunately the bouncers at a pub saw him stripping off and called the police so we got stopped by some very lovely NZ policemen who luckily found it pretty funny, but told us to make sure he didn't go in the lake as he would freeze and die. We got him back to the hostel and all crashed out ready for our exciting adventure the next day.

The next day with slightly sore heads we got picked up in a limo and whisked off for our next adventure.... Jumping out of a plane! We arrived at skydive Taupo and the brilliant staff talked us through everything and we picked our jump, we all went for the highest skydive, 15,000 ft! If you're going to do something you might as well do it properly eh!

After the safety briefings and teaching us how to position ourselves we got all strapped up into our harnesses and got to put on some very sexy jumpsuits and hats, we looked great!
I was feeling fine, more excited than nervous, then we all got into the plane; it's a tiny pink plane and there was very little space, you're all squashed in and sit on benches between each other's legs. The guy I was jumping with was a bit mean and kept joking about my harness not being done up properly which was scary! The views on the way up were amazing, it was a stunning day with clear skies and Taupo lake is even more beautiful from above. It started to get a bit scarier when at 10,000 ft they made us put oxygen masks on, they explained it was due to the thinner air at that height and was just to make us more comfortable, but it felt a bit like the emergency oxygen masks that should fall if the plane is crashing!! At 12,000 ft two people who weren't with our group who were doing the smaller dive left the plane. That's when I started to get really scared, you see the person get shuffled to the door and then they just disappear!! It's hard to explain but it feels so unnatural watching someone falling out of a plane at that height. I was really scared now knowing we were going even higher!

We got to 15,000 ft and the oxygen masks came off, the dive masters started shuffling us forward and I really started to panic! I saw Becca disappear out of the plane door and all I could think was I should not be jumping out of a perfectly good plane!! The absolute worst bit is when you are shuffled right to the door, I forgot everything I had been told, I stuck my head out, exactly as you shouldn't and looked down, the tandem master pulled my head back to his shoulder where it should have been, ooops! And pushed me forward, my legs went out of the door and were swept away by the wind, I was literally, physically, hanging out of the door of a plane and I was screaming my head off!!! The next thing I knew there was a huge push from the guy I was attached to and I was out of the plane twirling upside down!! It was absolutely petrifying but thrilling at the same time. After we straightened out I could take in the fact that I was skydiving! It doesn't feel like you're falling after you level out, it just feels like you're floating. It is REALLY windy and makes it very hard to breathe but you don't really think about breathing when you're falling through the air! After about a minute of free fall the tandem master pulls the parachute and you feel a huge pressure as you suddenly stop. Now I could feel how cold it was!! I pulled some gloves out of my jumpsuit and took in the views as we swooped around in the chute, this bit was so much fun as well! My tandem master let me control the parachute by pulling on the cords, it was so quiet up there and just beautiful.

It only got scarier again as we got nearer to the ground, apparently past 1,000 ft your brain cannot distinguish between heights so it all feels the same, but as you get closer to the ground you realise how high up it is again and also how quickly the ground is approaching! We touched down safely and I just couldn't stop smiling, it was the best experience of my life! I wanted to do it again straight away!
After our exciting day we were all on a high for hours but we had a quiet night this time as we were pretty exhausted!