California Diary: Skydiving

Last saturday when we came back to the apartment after the beach trip, we found we had visitors. Some cognizant colleagues of mine had driven in a rented car about 70 Kms from a place called Thousand Oaks to visit their friend who lives in the same apartment as me. Over the course of the conversation, I found out that they had hired the car, especially for a skydiving expedition on Sunday. I immediately got the phone number, & booked my reservation too in the same group.

The only hitch was that there was no way that they were going to pick me up or drop me again the next day, which meant that I had to go with them that night. On the other hand it also meant that I will be stuck on sunday, with no way of getting back on Monday morning to work. But then my colleague informed me that another colleague of us actually did commute all the way from 1000 oaks to Glendale. I called him up and he said it was fine with him. He would pick me up on Monday morning. :-) Hallelujah!

So Saturday night, I left the apt and stayed over at 1000 oaks. I have never met these guys before saturday night. Sunday morning, we (4 of us) made a 200Km journey one way (it took just 90mts) to the drop zone. This guy Pradeep drives at about 180Kms/hr. But on these roads you hardly feel it. We had an awesome time. I did a tandem skydive from 13000 ft. It is exhilirating but not scary. Its awesome.

We flew in this WW-II kinda dual propeller plane with very spartan interiors. Barry holebuck was my personal instructor. I was strapped to his front. Shaza, a petite,brit girl was my videographer. We jumped together, Shaza taping all the while in our 1 minute freefall. Shaza & I even held hands & did a spin in mid-air. Then at about 5000ft, we pulled the cord, the parachute deployed & shaza went her own way. As we parachuted down, I took in the view. Its awesome. Its like looking out of your window in a plane; except that you are out of the plane. :-) We landed acurately on a small grassy patch near the runway. Its awesome. Its out of this world & its not scary because at that height, you kinda stop noticing how high you really are (relativity??). :-)

We made the 200 Kms trip back to 1000 oaks, where we hooked up with a few other cognizant boys around and had a lovely 2 hrs volleyall session at a local court. Then we went for a birthday dinner to another colleagues place where I had lovely desi food and some soothing tamil & malayalam to my ears. :-)All in all I think that was a very satisfying weekend.