Cowabunga! Paragliding in Queenstown

Kia ora!

You want me to run off the cliff?!  Sure, okay.

Queenstown caters to adrenaline junkies.  But even for those of us who aren't, Qtown offers other ways to get the ol' heart pumping.   Only 2 of the hikes I did were relatively flat, the Queenstown Gardens and the Frankton Arms tracks.  All the other hikes were pretty steep.  The steepest (ugh!!) one was the tramp up Gondola Hill.  It took 80 minutes to go all the way to the upper Gondola ($25 return) terminus.




As I tramped up, I fretted that I would have to tramp down the same track.  It wasn't as scenic as advertised.  Marvelling at the occasional mountain biker and trying to glimpse the zip liners was entertaining.  But the trees were too thick in most places; it was dark and difficult to see the city and lake below.  (And since Douglas firs are an introduced pest, the Dept of Conservation has sprayed herbicide on large areas to kill them, including areas along the track.  Pseudotsuga menziesii are native to California and the Pacific Northwest.)  Near the top of the track, I saw a sign for the Gondola: $14 down; so the Gondola was an option though I would rather have ridden up and walked down.  Lol!

Disc golfers at Queenstown Gardens

I enjoyed the view of the city and surrounds from on high and watched the tour helicopter take off and touch down.  I rode the luge chairlift (free) further up the mountain and watched the lugers careen down their tracks.  I investigated the gift shop, restaurant, cafe, and theater offerings.  Then I saw the G-Force Paragliding kiosk.  My friend, Jody Linick, had gone skydiving for her (35th?) birthday.  I considered it for my 40th but soon realized that if I thought I REALLY was gonna die on a roller coaster ride, skydiving is not a good idea.  Paragliding doesn't have a drop/freefall.  Hmmm....  Paragliding for my upcoming 50th birthday might be a good present to myself.

Parasailor on Lake Wakatipu

Well, I thought that at least I would enquire about the adventure.  $199 for the glide and a CD with photos taken by your pilot.  $20 extra for video.  They stamp your hand in ink with FLOWN so that you can ride up the Gondola to do the return trip you missed by gliding down.  Well, I did want to do the glide from this location.  And gliding is only available when the air currents permit it; for the 2 days previous, gliding had not been available here and rain was expected the next day.  And I did need to get down....  So I did it.

I plunked down my credit card, got weighed and stamped and then had to wait my turn for about 30 minutes.  Each pilot provides his own canopy/parachute; they can sell advertising space on their canopy.  My pilot was Dominic and I was his 7th glide of the day.  We rode up the luge chairlift and then had another very steep 10-15 minute hike up (Argh!!) to Bob's Peak, the top of the mountain.  Dominic drove 2 gearbags up on a tractor, drove down, and then hiked backed up.  Believe me, I didn't have to wait for him long.

Here we go!

Dominic put my gear on, a helmet and a harness/seat.  The harness clipped in front and around each thigh. Under the seat is an airbag (just in case there's a rough landing?).  Then Dominic laid out our canopy, plain white with a magenta leading edge.  A solo paraglider got his lines tangled up with our gear with a sudden gust.  Another solo got his lines tangled with the wind sock.  Then the wind died down.  So we walked (I waddled with the air bag) closer to the cliff edge.  After he attached himself behind me and we were positioned, Dominic instructed that I would have to take a few steps and then run with him to the edge.  Here we go!!

Paraglider - not me.  Yet.

One step, two steps... and we're gliding!!!  Not scary at all.  Exhilarating!  I scooted back into my seat and we floated and turned on the air currents with Dominic taking pictures/video with his camera attached to a pole.  He explained that we would do circles and that we would be pulling Gs and that he would do one 360 and then more if I wanted.   Whee!!!  Yiiiiikkkeeeesssss!!!!  Gulp.  One circle was enough.  Then we were going to swing with me telling him when to stop.  After a few swings, he had to stop cuz I didn't want to puke.  Yes, he's been puked on many times cuz, unfortunately, puke does fly back.  Lol.

We talked for much of the way down; he loves his current job, loves getting paid for doing it, is working on getting sponsorship and advertising.  We watched a paraglider do what Dominic said are especially tricky acrobatics and that rarely do you get to see them from above.  I thought the acrobat would land on the beach; Dominic said that he would land on the raft in Lake Wakatipu.  I've walked by that raft; it's small, maybe 3 meters square.  We did a turn; in the few minutes before the area was visible again, the guy had gotten his canopy in and been picked up by a boat.

I sat back and enjoyed the ride.  Landing was a matter of trying to land and stay on our feet and maybe running a few steps.  We increased our speed for landing; the grassy ground was coming up fast.  We landed on our feet and took a couple steps.  Easy peasy.   He had me watch the video he took while he began packing his gear.  Although the video caught me screaming and closing my eyes during part of the 360, I paid to have it added to the CD of pics.  (I subsequently discovered that there was no video on the CD.  Boo hiss.)

Safely landed!

The adventure took about 45 minutes about 20 minutes of it in the air.  Dominic was a smooth and entertaining pilot.   I have before and after pix that I took with my camera.  I had a terrific time.  Next adventure: bungy jumping!  NOT!!!

Cheers!
Cyn

Ps:  I haven't had access to a computer with a CD drive to transfer the pix onto a USB stick.  So I'll add in flight pix later.