SURPRISE!

Guess what?!  I didn't run this weekend. Again. I know, shocking. But I did get a bit of advice in a training newsletter this week stating that marathoners should spend around three weeks not running or doing light cross training. So...I don't feel as guilty. Although I do have a 5k on Thanksgiving morning that I'd like to actually do well in. If I can get in a couple runs between now and then just to shake my legs out I'll be a happy camper.

Since running didn't fill up my weekend, I decided I might as well take my life into my hands. Yup, I went skydiving.  And it was AMAZING.  I wasn't willing to spend the extra $80 to get a video of the experience, but I won't be forgetting it any time soon. Obviously couldn't take a camera up into the plane with me, so my friend and I just took a few pictures on the ground in our harnesses before joining our tandem partners and hopping into the plane.

 There really wasn't much to the plane at all and I wouldn't exactly say were were trained either. It took about five minutes for them to tell us what to do before, during, and after the dive.  Not that they did a crap job, just that the tandem partner handles a lot of the important stuff. The plane itself seemed like an empty shell compared to what most of us are used to flying in. Then again, most people also don't intentionally jump out of a perfectly good aircraft. We cruised up to about 13,000 feet before it was go time.

The plastic door rolls open and the wind comes rushing in. I was the last of the group to jump, so I had a few harrowing moments of watching people jump into nothing and disappear. When it was my turn we sat on the edge of the plane door, legs dangling into the air. The next thing I knew I was falling 120 mph towards the ground. It was a huge rush! I didn't exactly look around to take in my surroundings, the air really pushes hard against your face. If you don't breath through your noise it feels like you're suffocating.

After the cord was pulled, we had several minutes to coast to the ground. I got to steer the parachute for a bit, sending it left and right into this fast corkscrew turns. The air temperature was crisp to say the least but the sky was clear and the sun was shining. Lovely views of the land around us, up towards DC and out to the mountains. After all the waiting we did on the ground the experience itself seem to go by so fast. One by one each of us reached solid ground and I crossed my fingers for a graceful landing.  I didn't want to be the one that landed on their ass, (and we'd seen several people do just that on the jumps before ours) and sure enough I managed to keep my feet under me.

All in all it was an incredible experience.  I made sure not to tell my family until afterwards, for which they were quite grateful.  I didn't have any intent behind going (working on the bucket list, etc) other than to be brave and try something new. I'm not in a hurry to do it again but I also wouldn't say no to it either. The cost can be prohibitive, but I can thank LivingSocial for hooking us up with a deal. Between skydiving, rainforest canopy ziplining, and waterfall rapelling, I think I'm pretty set in the adventure arena for the time being.

How was your weekend?  Do anything wild and crazy? Have you ever skydived before?