Day 5
I woke up feeling a bit worried. Today's the day I do my AFF level 7. The qualifying jump before i'm able to solo SkyDive. I don't know what was making me nervous, it was just more of an overall uneasy feeling. Soon enough though I was suiting up, checking my rig, planning my dive and I even paid for a guy to come and video my final AFF level.
As soon I was in the plane and we were gaining altitude, all fear drained away and I switched back to nervous excitement. Theres nothing to worry about, I've done this before! This is fun!
I have the video and an undeveloped roll of 35mm, these are shot on the TV in the bunk room using my Mavica.
I exited the plane and stabilised,
Did a forward roll (the plan was, if I tumbled out of the plane, dont worry about the roll)
Spun 180,
Tracked along a course for a 5000 count (in thousands, obviously), hovered (relatively) turned towards the Drop Zone and tracked for another 5000.
I popped my canopy at 5,500ft after grinning and waving at the camera, then landed with a bump after I flared a little early!
I was feeling 10ft tall as I walked into the hanger. Everything had gone to plan and I could now skydive on my own!
After my dive debrief with Zak, and after another load had been up, I saw (AFF) Steve walking around in a daze as he'd just done his first solo jump. I was still buzzing from my Level 7 and he started telling me about how his solo jump was completely different from all the AFF levels as theres no one there to look after you if you do something wrong. I saw him looking even more flustered later on when he realised what he'd done. "I've just jumped oot ov a bluddy plane man!" (he's Scottish) "I had to jist stop and walk oot as it all sunk en." "I thought 'Why am a doing this?'"
Great, just what I wanted to hear before my first solo.
The wind picked up in bursts so Rod, one of the JM/Is said to his students to wait. My JM/Is had said its probably OK as its only sporadically strong, but I figured 'Its my first jump' I'm in no rush, I'll wait untill its safe as possible.
Another load went up and seemed to land OK so I suited up. I was expecting to feel nervous or scared, it being my first solo, but all I felt was excitement. And not even the scared/excitement, it was just pure joy that I'd got to this stage and was ready and confident to go up on my own!
I breathed deeply all the way up (keeps you cool, calm and collected) and when it got to my turn to jump I couldn't wait to get out the door! I had a nice arch, got stable, tracked towards the DZ for a bit. Did a spin. Tracked a bit more. I looked at my Altimeter and I was still only at 9000ft! We'd agreed (Rob before and Steve after) to deploy at 4,500ft so I still had at least another 20seconds of freefall to go! Its weird being up here without anyone else and without having loads to do as I can just enjoy my time up here!
Rather than doing a flip or anything too crazy (hey this is only my first solo!) I thought I'd express what my body was feeling and started shouting WOOOO-HOOOOO! and YEEEEE-HAAAA! While doing a some 360s! I had a successful deploy at 4,500ft, did my canopy checks, had some fun spinning around under the chute and even managed flare at the right time to land on my feet!
You know what? I was thinking of just doing my AFF and leaving it there. Skydiving is an expensive hobby, it frightens my family and theres a risk of broken ankles and legs if I don't land correctly. And at the end of the day, I'm a backpacker, there's just some things that are too expensive. The way I'm feeling right now though, I think I should apologise in advance to anyone who was hoping going to get a christmas present from me this year, or any year... I get the feeling I'm going to spend the rest of my life very happy, but very poor!