We were up bright and early and very excited, if a little nervous!! Once ready and had just about managed breakfast we went to the tourist information where they confirmed the skydive! AH!! We then drove out to the airport which was just around the other side of the lake. We contemplated texting home but decided against it..we though we'd wait until after!
Once we had checked in we had a bit of a wait. We watched them packing the parachutes up, hoping that they weren't getting distracted and doing it wrong!! We then got kitted out! We had amusing all in one suits to wear and a snazy hat! We met our jumpmasters who had already done about 3 jumps that morning with about 6 more after our jump! We were led out to the aeroplane which was very tiny!! As Mark and I were jumping from 15,000 feet we were the first in. The rest were jumping from 12,000 feet so would be let out before us! There wasn't much room and as the plane was so small you felt the wind and just how unsteady it was! EEK...at least we had parachutes attached! The journey up took much longer than we thought it would and the views were incredible! When we reached 12,000feet the first group jumped out one by one! When they did jump it was like they were being sucked into the sky..vrey weird and hard to explain! It also meant that the plane tipped up slightly! I think we were more worried about the plane than we were about the actually jump!! Neither of us were particularly nervous, just excited to see what it would be like!! When we reached 15,000feet I was taken to the edge of the plane first, even though Mark was supposed to be jumping first! As I was attached to the front of the jump master, he sat on the edge of the plane meaning that I was dangling over the edge, trying not to look down!! We had our final pictures taken by a camera on the plane and by our video man! He had a camera and a video camera and jumped with us filming and taking pictures as we fell! The initial jump from the plane was such a strange feeling! We kind of fell to the side and tumbled head over heels before falling face down! The g-force was crazy and it was so so so cold but the free-fall was pretty cool! It lasted about 60secs and we were traveling as fast as 200km/h but it went surprisingly quickly!! Once the jumpmaster pulled the shoot we slowed right down and we were able to take in the views! Lake Taupo is the same size as Singapore and we couldn't see all of it from where we were! We could see across the mountains and as the pictures will show, it was pretty special! This is where our views conflict about the sky dive because I preferred it when the shoot was out as it was warmer for one but also you could enjoy the views more as you had more time. However, Mark preferred the free-fall as the having the shoot out made him feel funny, partly to do with how they have to turn to get back down to the ground. I landed first, obviously, and was lucky as I didn't have to help land as I am so small! Mark came in just after me and we couldn't believe how quick it all went! After we had finished our dvd filming we went back to the centre and watched the dvd. We were both excited at having done it but it hadn't sunk in properly!! We're both glad we did it as its something we wont forget and it was such a cool experience!
After we went back into town where I called home to a not very impressed mum!! haha! We treated ourselves to fish and chips by the lake while watching other people doing sky dives!! We then started the very picturesque journey south towards Wellington. We drove along much of the lake and stopped at various points for pictures. There were some lovely views along the way. We stopped at Himatangi beach for the night.