Balance - What's that!?

S#1t – Life (skydiving) has been keeping me busy lately, REALLY busy!! My apologies to everyone for being so slack with blogging.

As I am now on my skydiving club’s committee, lots of hours at home are spent working on club newsletters and helping redesign the website. When I am not working on committee / club stuff I am researching my new *possible* project (more about that just now).

I am glad to say that my jump numbers have been racking up very nicely – after this past weekend, I am up to 70 . I know I am still in the very early stages, but hey – it’s not bad since I’ve only been jumping since March!

As I mentioned in a previous post – I’m waiting for my CI’s approval to jump my new 150 Hornet, although my wingloading is less than 1:1, my CI just wants to ensure I don’t break myself on a 150 canopy. Personally, I feel very capable of flying my canopy – but he’s the boss! His requirement of me, is to get my B-Licence and he might then agree to let me jump my rig so – like an excited little boy on Christmas Eve (I used to open all my presents and re-wrap them and stick them back under the tree), I am doing everything I can to get my B-Licence. I passed both CAT 2 jumps this past weekend and am hoping to do my CAT 3 by the end of next month at the ABSOLUTE latest – I have a bit of practising to do in the mean time!

Since I found my new jump partner (Maryke), that moved to my DZ when she found a job nearby, not a jump has passed that we aren’t both working on something (both in freefall and under canopy). So this weekend I guess I’ll be exiting slightly later than her so I can practise chasing her down and pinning the base for my CAT 3 jump .

We are planning a Boogie between Christmas and New Year at one of the towns on the coast line that always buzzes with parties over this period. Again – this is driving me to get my B-Licence, there is no way I’m going to sit and watch on the beach while everyone else lands on it!!

Sorry – I digress.

I have also been spending lots of time helping my coach (Michael) with a Power Point presentation on a First Jump Course, which you can imagine, is quite a bit of typing!
Tonight I am off to Michael’s place to drop off the loan 170 rig that I have been jumping as he sold it, and to pick up my new loan rig.

My *possible* new project :-)


I have decided that South Africa needs a Vertical Wind Tunnel, and who better to build / buy one than me!? Well, probably lots of people, but I want to do it!! So I am investing huge amounts of time and effort researching, meeting with engineers and talking on the phone to suppliers in the States and Latvia.

My main concern is whether it will be financially viable to build one in South Africa; our population is tiny in comparison to other parts of the world that have a wind tunnel, furthermore – the percentage of the population that this would appeal to, is smaller still!

I am determined to do this though, even if it goes belly-up, it will be a good learning experience, but at a cost of about 60 Million Rand, a very expensive one!

I have been trying to decide if it would be financially beneficial to have local engineers design one in South Africa, verses purchasing one from overseas.
I have come to the conclusion that yes, it might be Slightly cheaper, but why save a few pennies and not have the years of experience and trial and error, when for a little extra, I would get all the backup support and a state of the art 14 foot wind tunnel capable of flying a 250lb person on his/her head very easily??:-)

My next big step is to secure financial investors, but this still requires a lot of work to put a financial and business plan together for my proposal.

So – as my heading suggests, there is no balance – I find myself arriving late to just about every function that happens over a weekend because I want to squeeze in just one more jump before I have to leave.

On weather hold days, I am at the DZ watching BASE and skydiving videos, packing and re-packing 150 that I can’t jump yet.

I no longer party on the nights prior to jumping (unless it’s a Saturday and I’m drinking beer at the DZ with my jumping friends), I can’t even remember what I used to do with my weekends before I started skydiving!

Before, I never liked not being in a relationship, now – I don’t mind being single and have given up on the idea of finding a girl that would be happy with me spending me all my time, money and energy on skydiving! I want a skydiving chick!


Needless to say, I LIVE skydiving! My career goals and ambitions have changed, my personality has changed and just life in general no longer contains even a smidget of my previous life – AND I LOVE IT THIS WAY!!

Balance – WHAT’S THAT!?

Blue Skies and Happy Days!

Slightly Confusing Catch-up Post

Firstly – sorry that it has taken me so long to get around to blogging, between work and the DZ, my time is very limited!!

So – I’m on 54 jumps after this weekend…and hoping to be at 100 by the end of the summer :-)

There have been lots of changes with regards to my skydiving life, and I’m loving every bit of it! I am now in charge of our club newsletter and part of “The party committee”, hence why I have been so quiet on the blogging front!

I have also bought myself a “new to me” rig about two months ago, it is a Vortex II container with a 150 Hornet (SA brand canopy), 150 Pilot and a Vigil AAD. Unfortunately because I’m still a newbie, it is sitting in my cupboard while I jump a loan 170 :-( I have done 10 jumps on it so far and I’m loving the Hornet (Yes – my loan is also a Hornet)!

I was expecting to either have to get to 100 jumps, or my B-Licence before jumping my rig, but after chatting to the CI & SO this weekend, he has given me the go-ahead to jump my new rig (Thanks Steve!!) :-) I just need to do another 10 jumps on this 170 and provided he is happy with my landing pattern, accuracy and landing, I can jump it :-) WOOOOHOOOOO…can’t wait!!

I am SO excited to jump my own rig, it just fits me so perfectly which is rare as I’m quite a small guy (5ft 5in and 154 pounds exit weight). Plus it just looks so cool!! Haha – this is important to us skydivers :-)

I recently started free flying and was planning to do my CAT II & III in Free fly for my B-Licence, however – after chatting to my CI on Sat, he has recommended that I first do my CATs in flat fly so I can get my B-Licence quicker, just to have all the perks of a B-Licence, like being able to jump onto the beach at this year’s year end boogie :-) so that is where most of my airtime will be going from now on!

Choosing between flat flying or free flying has always been a tough decision to make, but having a nice cute new female flat flyer doing two-ways with me definitely did help my decision to do my CATs in flat flying ;-) I know – that shouldn’t be a deciding factor, but my goal is to have a consistent jumper that I can jump with, and she will be moving on to free flying once her flat flying CATs are completed. I'm also glad to have another flat flyer & aspiring Free flyer (Lawrance) who I can just with as well.

So – here’s my short term goal list (in order):

-          Beg, borrow and steal money so I can be on my new rig by the beginning of next month

-          Start my CAT II & III training / tests this weekend (in flat fly)

-          Have my B-Licence by the end of the year

-          Carry on with my Free Flying training

-          Do my 100^th jump before summer is over (around the end of March 2011)

Here’s to achieving those goals!!

This weekend we’re holding a Static Line special, as well as having our AGM. This sounds like it is going to be a huge party with lots of new faces around the DZ J As I am part of the party committee, I’m going to steal a saying from our newest female member (Maryke): “We are drinkers with a skydiving problem”.

I have found that skydiving is a way of life, it is not a sport or a hobby that one can do every now and then. Skydiving requires dedication and drive, and LOTS of time and money. No one realizes just how much skydiving actually takes over your life until you do it, it is a HUGE lifestyle change, and it changes your ambitions, your goals and just life in general. Too often I have seen people get through AFF, buy a rig, jump for a month or two and then you never see them again – I have put this down to the fact that they are not happy with the lifestyle change (or at least their partners aren’t).

Sorry – I tend to go off on a tangent every now and then and it’s hard to put everything in writing when I have to mash a few months into one article!!

Cheers everyone, here’s to everyone making their personal goals, lots of “Firsts”, down-down’s, cases of beer, laughs and good times! Plus of course awesome time spent in the sky!

Blue skies everyone and happy days!!

Downsizing Results

On Friday I arrived at the DZ to get my 170 Hornet hooked up to my loan rig. I decided to get this done on Friday so I'd be all ready to jump after my canopy briefing on Saturday morning!

I arrived early on Saturday and read a few pages of Skydiving in 8 Days, this book is actually very interesting, although written in 1997, it is a good story of how you can go from "Wuffo"* to qualified in 8 days.

*Wuffo: These are people that stand around the drop zone with no intention of jumping EVER, and ask you what you jump for, IE: "What for?" - Wuffo!. I read somewhere that there are two types of people in this world: Wuffo's and skydivers! So naturally, "Wuffo" is a derogatory term used for people that do not understand our need / want for jumping out of a perfectly good aircraft.

Anyway (I digress), after getting my canopy briefing from Steve (my safety officer), I was ready to go! And wow, I was excited!

The 12 minute ride up to 12,000ft started getting my mind going - "New rig, reserve repacked, new AAD, leg straps slightly too big, rig not 100% free fly friendly...what could go wrong!?" All of these thoughts should have been dismissed, but you can't help but think of the possible dangers...don't worry, it didn't stop me from jumping out :-)


Because I wanted some canopy time to play with the risers and get used to my 170, I had arranged with the jump master that I'd be waving off and opening at 6,000ft for the first few jumps - This gives me a nice amount of time to play around in the sky a bit and get used to my smaller canopy.

As my rig doesn't have a bungee cord between the two leg straps, I couldn't do any free flying. The bungee cord prevents the straps from sliding up your legs when you are in a sit fly position, so without the bungee, it may be possible to "fall out" of your leg straps (Which can never be a good thing)! So - flat flying it was!

Did a few loops, attempted a few barrel rolls (these worked alright) and dumped at 6,000ft.

After playing with some co-ordinated front riser turns, a bit of back riser input and toggle turns, it was time to setup for landing. The wind was blowing quite gently, but in a different direction to normal. On my approach I thought I'd land cross wind, and down hill as the wind seemed to be blowing sideways on the slope. After realizing that with no head wind, I was coming in very fast, I decided to change my approach to land into the wind, and I'm glad I did because I still over shot my target by quite a bit and landed fast.

My smaller canopy definitely flares harder and I even got a little swoop in on my landing :-)

Jump No. 2 went about the same, although I was no longer nervous about jumping the different rig. I played with riser turns, went into a very strong, fast toggle spiral which scared me a bit as it doesn't come out of the spiral as quickly as the 185 canopies do, but it was still fun! Landing was perfect! I landed into the wind and close to my target and only needed to run a few steps (very quick steps, but landed on my feet).

Jump No. 3. The free fall was uneventful, but still as awesome as always! I think I'm getting the hang of the barrel rolls and tracking on my back, although I seem to go into a bit of a head-down when tracking on my back so I roll over onto my front after a second or two. I guess I just need to work on that a bit, but I am still in the very early stages of my skydiving life so I know I have A LOT to learn! Landing, however was accomplished by coming in a bit too fast, flaring a bit too late and swooping ON the ground resulting in a nice big puff of dust trailing behind me and a lot of sand and grass on the legs of my jump suit. Even though I didn't take a tumble, I still didn't land on my feet - more like my ASS. And got a good few laughs from the people that saw me go down with a puff of dust!

I made sure I dusted myself off before going into the hanger and getting laughed at some more :-) But it's all in good faith!

Unfortunately I was only able to do three jumps this weekend as I had a bachelors party to attend.

This weekend I think I will just be doing DVD edits of tandems to earn some extra jump money!

Blue Skies everyone and happy days!

Friday Write-up

Well, I think a good place to start would be my week so far.

Lets start out on how I got my new rig :-) Well, I originally wanted to buy an audible altimeter so I could begin my free fly training. After I got one from Michael, he mentioned to me that he has a nice Vortex 2 rig, reserve and main for sale. This obviously striked up some interest and got my brain ticking, after chatting to my dad about weather he thought it would be good idea, chatting to Steve, my Safety Officer and advise guru, I decided to buy it, yes - it was an unexpected expense and not budgeted for, but I made a plan. Later in the week Michael emailed me to let me know that he has a 4 year old Vigil for sale with only 26 jumps to it's name - At half the new price, I had to have it (Naturally)!

So, now that I had sort of committed myself to a large amount of cash, it was time to get everything in order. This began with first researching all of the products I was about to buy! There's a wealth of information on the net if have the right facts about what you're buying. I read article after article on everything from Vigil's occasional fires for no reason to the fabric design of the Hornet 150 main canopy I was about to buy. The fabric spec lead me to then start reading up on flying canopies made from ZP (Zero porosity) verses F-111. Shew canopy design and manufacturing is a hugely complicated process with a lot of research involved, makes me feel better considering it is the only thing stopping you from plummeting at 250Km/h into the hard earth below!

Unfortunately, because I'm still an intermediate jumper (only 43 jumps so far), I cannot jump anything with a wing loading of more than 1.0 : 1.0. For those of you who aren't aware of wing loading, basically, it's your exit weight in pounds (your weight + the weight of all of your gear), divided by the size of your canopy in square feet.

IE: My exit weight is roughly 77kg's (170lbs).

Unfortunately, my wing loading on a 150 sq ft canopy is 1.1 :-( this means that until I'm a bit more experienced, I have to jump a 170 canopy which will not fit in my rig.

This posed a bit of a problem: Do I spend all this money to have a rig that sits in my cupboard for a few months? Also - I'm currently jumping a 185 sq ft canopy so it wouldn't be a good idea to downsize from 185 to a 150.

Thankfully, Michael had the answer: He is going to give me a loan rig with a 170 canopy in it to use until I can jump my 150, this solves all my problems as 77kg's is just shy of 170lbs, meaning that my wing loading on a 170 sq ft canopy is 1:1:-)

So, now that all the research was done and plans were made, I got confirmation from Steve to down size to a 170 (provided I have an advanced canopy briefing before my first jump on it). Arranged with the banks to allow me to transfer that amount of cash in one shot and bought my reg :-) WooHOOO!!!

Last night I met up with Michael (my free fly coach who is also selling me the gear), we attached and packed my brand new reserve into the container, attached my canopy to the rig, repacked the reserve and installed the Vigil into my loan 170.

My rig is now completely assembled (besides having to change the risers and install my Vigil before I jump it).

Today I have decided to take half the day off from work, go down to the DZ to get the risers attached to my loan rig and pack the main, all ready and prepared for tomorrow. Then I'll have my advanced canopy briefing tomorrow morning with Steve and hopefully be in the sky bright and early.

I have a bachelors party tomorrow afternoon, so I will have to cut my jumps short, but my plan of action is:

Practise my free flying and open a bit higher than normal to get a feel for the smaller canopy, I've also read a lot of good tips on flying your canopy better so I'm going to be trying a few of those tomorrow as well. Depending on how out of hand the bachelors gets, I might be back at the DZ on Sunday for some more jumping :-)

So, After wanting to buy an audible altimeter, I've ended up with a complete rig, a loan rig and of course, my audible :-) Now I want a camera and camera helmet :-)

Here's to the weekend!

Blue skies everyone and happy days!

Weekend Antics

Wow - What a good weekend!

This weekend, strangely - went roughly to plan :-)

I arrived at the drop zone at about 07:50, ready for my first set of Free Fly training!

When my coach arrived, he handed me my new Alti-2 Galaxy 2 audible altimeter that I had ordered from him the previous weekend. Once I had gone through the different points that make gear "Free Fly friendly", we went on to discuss barrel rolls while you track away, why they are so important during your track away, especially when Free Flying. For those of you who are not aware of the reasoning behind this, it is basically a safety precaution - When there are a number of people in a formation it is important to make sure that you have good separation at pull-time, obviously you DO NOT want to open your chute if there is anyone above you, or too close to you as this can cause serious accidents and fatalities.

With Free flying, this is all the more important because of the much faster falling speeds. The idea is that when the formation breaks and each person tracks away for each other, you would barrel role onto your back for a second or two and ensure that there is no one above you or around you that you may collide with.

So, the barrel role was my first objective - sequence of the jump was to go as follows:

Exit from 12 000ft and go straight into a track (Basically a dive at what I would guess to be a 45 degree angle). After 8 seconds (To ensure that you have enough speed), initiate the barrel role by positioning your hands in a way that would deflect the air in such a way, that it would turn you over onto your back.

Sounds easy hey!? Unfortunately not - I had enough time to try 6 barrel roles on my jump, none of which were successful. Instead of barrel rolling, I found myself doing 360 degree turns, as if I were belly down in a flat fly position. I was not at all happy with the way I executed those barrel roles :-(

After landing, I spoke to a few other people and asked their opinion as to why I went into a flat spin instead of a barrel role - They all very kindly offered their recommendations and gave me examples on how they each do their barrel roles. I got some good tips, but it is going to take a lot of practising.

Although I wasn't happy with the barrel roles, my instructor said "Well, you have plenty of time to work on those" and told me move on to the "Base Position". This is basically the position that you would revert back to if you got unstable during a Free Fly jump, allowing you to transition to any of the other free fly positions, IE: Sit fly, head down etc. The reason we have to revert back to this position, is because of the speeds of free flying, it is very dangerous to just go into a flat and stable, belly down position as there is a huge decrease in speed and if there are any free flyer's above you, they'll crash into you with SERIOUS consequences!

I found the base position to be ALRIGHT, I was basically in a sit-fly, but more on my ass, like I was sitting with my feet up and the back down in a lazy-boy chair!

I still wasn't entirely happy with this, but by jump 3, I was happy! Exited the plane at around 11 000ft and went straight into the base position, back more upright and arms out straight to either side, in-line with my chest and knees right up to my chest.

My objective with this base position was to be able to stay in it for the entire jump and keep a heading (stay stable enough to keep going in the same direction). At 5000ft, my new audible beeps in my ear, letting me know it's time to break away from my fictitious formation, and begin my track, then at 3 500ft, it lets me know it's pull time :-) I love that little toy!

Jump 4 was not quite as good as jump 3, but I was able to keep a heading and at no point went to a flat and stable, belly down position!


All-in-all, a great day of jumping! It feels awesome being back in the sky after a long week of work!

Unfortunately the weather would not permit us to jump on Sunday, so my Free Fly coach invited me to go with him and a few other people from the DZ to fly model gliders, I also wanted to see my prospective new rig that I want to buy from him.

After half the day of watching the gliders and throwing rocks at one that got stuck in a tree, one of the other jumpers arrived with some home made rockets! Now THIS was fun! Right up my alley as making rockets and blowing stuff up is something that I've always enjoyed! After sending a few rockets up to around 700ft, we decided to strap one to an old glider and send it on it's way :-) This, as you can imagin, didn't quite go to plan, but we had a huge laugh as it spun around in a big puff of smoke!

We then went to my coaches place to check out my new rig - it's a nice black Vortex 2 container, with a Hurricane 150 and a reserve - and it looks PERFECT! It fits perfectly and I'm very happy with it! Now I just need to come up with the money to pay for it!

By the time I arrived home, I was BUGGERED! Nick (one of my house mates) greeted me at the door with an ice cold beer...EXCELENT way to end off a great weekend!

What a good weekend! I enjoyed every bit of it - I think I need to get myself a glider for when the weather is no good for jumping!

Blue skies everyone and happy days!

Things that get lost in Freefall

This is a bit of a sore topic for me because I lost a pair of prescription Oakley sunglasses while doing my ISP's. As I didn't wear contacts that the time (I do now!), I used to jump with my sunglasses on, under a pair of those sh!tty, flimsy plastic goggles (I thought they would hold my sunglasses on).

It was ISP #5, one bright, hot, sun shiny day at the drop zone, and the first jump of the day. While doing the required maneuvers for my ISP level, the goggles decided to slip up, off my face and somehow onto the front of helmet. (Keep in mind that I had worn my sunglasses in exactly the same way for my entire AFF course and 4 previous ISP's). My poor sunglasses did not stand a chance at resisting the wind that was forcing it's way past my face at 200+ km/h, and before I realized it (Around 7 grand), they decided they didn't enjoy the freefall with me, and went on to do to a solo jump without a rig :-( RIP 21st birthday present (sorry dad!).

The worst thing was that the instructor noticed this and held onto me all the way down to pull altitude, then pulled my pilot chute for me as he wasn't sure if I could see my alti.

Entry in my logbook reads "...lost sunglasses - BUMMER!". And yes, it was a bummer, especially since I battled to work out which way the wind socks were blowing and took a little tumble on landing :-(

Thankfully I passed that level as I had pretty much completed everything that was required of me.

Side note: ISP#6 is the only ISP / AFF level I've ever failed and SUCKED!

Our manifest lady (Noogs) has an awesome habit of losing shoes whenever she jumps (Don't ask me why she doesn't tie the laces?). Apparently she has lost a good few shoes, always only one of the two!

Besides sunglasses :-( and shoes, I also know of a few camera's, alti's and even entire canopies that cannot be found after a cutaway.

What have you lost in freefall?

So - look around your local DZ, you'll be surprised at what you might find!

Blue Skies everyone - happy days!

When things don't go to plan, but are still AWESOME!

Wow - This weekend was one of those weekends and it WAS awesome (well, parts of it anyway).

Lets start with Friday: As you know from my "Friday write-up" I was planning to jump on Saturday, no such luck I'm afraid! Unfortunately there was a terrible tragedy on Friday, one of the skydivers partaking in the Durban airshow died while practising for the jump that was going to take place on Saturday. I won't go into detail, mainly out of respect for the unfortunate skydiver and also because the investigation has been completed yet, so it would all just be speculation.

As this was jumper was part of the South African Military jump team, they would not allow the rest of the jumpers to use a military aircraft for the airshow as the incident was under investigation. This means that they borrowed our Angel on Saturday to drop the jumpers for the airshow.

This turned out to not be so bad after all, in terms of my plans to jump on Saturday as my entire Saturday was spent digging up my driveway looking for a massive water leak, replacing pipes etc. Upon my house mates and I returning home from drinks on Friday night for a friends birthday, one of my house mates (That was completely sober and driving my car), accidentally drove over our water meter and broke it. We quickly turned the water off as it was spraying like crazy all over the place.

Once the municipality had replaced the meter on Saturday morning, it was ticking over at an alarming rate (something like 250ltrs in 15minutes!).

Worried that we had possibly broken the pipe somewhere further down, we decided to dig up the drive way and replace the pipe! Unfortunately, after an entire day of hard labour, we still hadn't located the leak. So we decided to call in the professionals on Sunday morning to sort it out. Thankfully, this meant that I could go jump on Sunday :-)

So Sunday morning I woke up bright and early to go to my mom's to shower (as we still had no water), and also to pick up my A-License card and certificate :-) I then arrived at the Drop Zone, kitted up, and waited for my slot!

It wasn't a particularly busy day at the Drop Zone, so after my 1 solo, and 2 two-ways, we were done for the day. For some reason all the regular fun jumpers left early which meant that after all the tandems, we didn't have enough people to fill the loads :-( But the two ways went well and I thoroughly enjoyed the day after having not jumped for close to FOUR WEEKS!

I decided not to get my CI to take some photo's and instead decided that I'm going to start training for my Free-Fly CAT II & III tests :-) I found an audible Alti that I can buy from my Free-Fly coach and my first briefing will be next weekend!

I'm really excited for the free-fly coaching, and getting my CAT's done as they are one of the requirements for my B-License, which I am hoping to have by the end of the year (budget permitting).

All-in-all, this weekend was NOTHING like I had planned for it to be, but it was still an AWESOME weekend and it feels GREAT to be back in the sky again!

Blue Skies everyone and happy days!

AFF - Level 7

AFF Level 7 was the next AWESOME one for me, mainly because it was the first jump I did without any instructors :-) I obviously still had objectives that I needed to complete, but shew - so much fun!

Doing a "Tail-facing" front loop off of the wheel strut of a 206 is fun and effortless, no worrying about if you have a good exit and are able to get flat and stable quickly to come in for a dock. In fact - the objective of this jump was to become UNSTABLE and recover, then become unstable again, and recover (again)

Side note: I still love just becoming as unstable as possible and recovering with as little effort as possible, I like to think it prepares me for being able to recover quickly after a bad exit, or a failed dock, but actually, I just really enjoy it!

Level 7 will always be memorable to me as it was the first jump that was completely conscious of what was going on around me, after being prodded and reminded of my lazy legs (29 jumps later and they're still lazy!) as well as just burning altitude completing the required steps to pass the level, it was awesome to have nothing else on my mind besides the jump and the tasks at hand!

Being aware of everything around you is important in skydiving, accidents mainly happen when people are stupid or not paying attention to the other jumpers in the air. This jump was the first one that I knew everything that was going on around me - Where the tandems were in relation to me, where the other jumpers were in the sky and which way everyone would be tracking. It's quite a hard feeling to describe, but basically, I felt like my blinkers had been taken off and I just enjoyed the jump all that more!

Blue Skies everyone - and safe jumping!

Friday Write-Up

WoooHOOO - Friday has FINALLY arrived, week days are now something I dislike and getting dressed in my casual clothes for work on Fridays is a great reminder that it's OFFICIALLY the weekend in the next few hours!

I cannot wait to get up into the sky tomorrow, weather predictions say COLD, so it's going to be MIGHTY cold at 12 000ft AGL! But nonetheless, it is almost time to get air born and some relief from this altitude sickness I've been experiencing for the last FOUR WEEKS!

Unfortunately it's been four weeks since my last jump, due to lots of factors that all just irritate me, so we won't go into that :-)

This weekend is exciting as it will be my first few jumps after getting my A-License (beer) :-) Although I my license was approved two weeks ago, I received my PASA membership card and A-License certificate in the post on Wednesday!

My normal jump partner Lawrence is unable to jump this weekend, so I think I'm just going to start practising my Freefly skills (or lack there-of). I'm also hoping to have my CI, Vernon jump with me and get some awesome FF photographs for this blog site and facebook :-)

I'm also planning on going to watch the Durban airshow on Sunday, this brings mixed emotions for me - I love seeing planes buzzing around the sky, but I get sad because I feel that I should be jumping out of them! :-(

Here's to Blue Skies and BEER!

Cheers!

What I love about skydiving!

• Waiting around the DZ, talking to the long time jumpers, hearing awesome (sometimes hectic) stories, waiting for the clouds to lift, or the wind to die down.
• The amazing and interesting people, very different in personality, but all allot of fun!
• Beer fines! Whether they're mine, or someone else's - Free beer, my beer, I just love beer after a great day of skydiving!
• The smell of Jet Fuel as it's being forced out the exhaust of our amazing turbine Angel!
• The 2 minute warning and all the thumb's up in the plane.
• The "Open Door" instruction and the way my heart always skips a beat when I realize it's jump time!
• Telling tandem passengers that they have the faulty harness on and seeing the expression on their face :-) (I only do this if they don't look very nervous)
• Climbing out onto the camera step and waiting for my jump partner to get into position and give the count!
• The 50 odd seconds where nothing else in the world matters, only focusing on the jump.
• The satisfaction I feel when I successfully complete a new level in training, or complete my goal for that particular jump.
• I just Love Skydiving, and I can ramble on about that all day, in fact - I do, my friends always want to know if I have anything OTHER than skydiving to talk about...haha, sorry mates - I actually don't!

Accelerated Free Fall (AFF) Progression Course

Hmmm...Why do they call it an "Accelerated" Free Fall Course when your first just is from 10 000ft? It would have been 12 000ft if the Angel was around then, but our little Cessna 206 only goes to 10 000 :-(

Anyway, mid February was when I began my AFF progression, I took off work on Friday and Monday with the intention of getting through ground school and my first two or three levels, that didn't happen (people who skydive will know, there's always weather factors or something else that messes with your plans!) This time it was due to one of my instructors having a tummy bug :-( none the less, we got through ground school and lots and LOTS of cutaway drills. It's amazing how you can "Learn" the basics of skydiving in about five hours! As I had the rest of the day to myself, I decided to go through my whole course book, running through my reserve drills and the possible malfunctions.

I got up early on Saturday, eager to get into the sky and fall through it. as I was there before anyone else, I went through my book again. When my instructor arrived he put me back up in the harness for some more practise reserve drills. The drop zone was busy that day and I only managed to get one jump in.

Level one was awesome but a bit of memory loss on my part meant that I was getting instructions from both instructors at the same time in hand signals - this gets very confusing - Make your legs more positive, circle of awareness, legs more positive, three practise touches to make sure I can find my pilot chute, legs more positive, relax more, check alti...shew, besides all the over load in hand signals, the jump went well and I am extremely happy with it :-) my first canopy flight down was awesome, had to run through all my checks (and remember what they all are), then watch the lollypop man telling me which toggles to pull and when. Personally, I don't think I needed him as landing is not difficult at all, but I glad he was there, just in case!

Side note: I never realized how much wind resistance there actually is while climbing out onto the wheel strut! I thought I was going to get blown off the first few times!

High 5's and congratulations from my friends and family - WoooHOOO, only 9 to go!

The next few levels of my AFF went smoothly and were uneventful, besides landing WITH the wind on one occasion and having to execute a PFL...basically just hit the ground running and took a tumble, it was fun!

Level 7 was the next big one :-)

Me reminding myself - "In Case of emergency, pull handle" lol - not quite that simple, and it was camouflaged on my jump suit...

How I came to "Fall" for Skydiving.

Skydiving has always been in the back of my mind as my parents met each other on the Drop Zone, so - Naturally, I had to find out what it was all about.

After nagging and hoping for my parents to pay for a tandem jump for a birthday, my dad quite clearly stated "If you want to do it, it's something you have to pay for yourself". I never really understood the reasoning behind this, but I can only guess it was somewhere along the lines of: "I don't want to pay for you where there is a possibility of you dying"? This I thought was a bit unfair, but understandable I guess.

So after my school years and a few years of building a career to enable me to actually pay for a jump myself, my best mate Katelyn and I were chatting about when we were actually going to do it (talking about it is one thing, but ACTUALLY doing it was a completely different story). Eventually I decided to sponsor her jump as a birthday present, well - and to make sure I had someone to jump with me ;-)

October 2009 was when we agreed to take the plunge (Quite literally).

After mentally preparing myself for my first jump, by watching videos on YouTube, chatting to my parents, reading blogs etc, the day finally arrived.

The drop zone of choice was Skydive KZN, right down the road from my dad's house

I was strangely calm at this point - uneasily so actually :-| Whereas Katelyn and the other friends that decided to join us on the day, were nervous wrecks! LOL - on a side note, there's nothing better than seeing a nervous first-time jumper :-)

I actually only began getting nervous when we scooted to the door of the little Cessna 206! The only thought that went through my head at that point was "I can't believe I am going to jump out of a perfectly good aircraft!" Strange - this is what everyone said to me before the jump, and I laughed it off as a Cliché comment to make. But - regardless, there was no turning back at this point as my Tandem instructor already had me dangling from the side of our jumpship.

Before I knew it, we were hurtling through the air, and towards the ground below. All I could remember (and with the help from my DVD) is a huge smile plastered to my face. With all the excitement, during the "Interview" for my DVD, the only words that I could get out were "AWESOME!", plus some garbled words that made no sense when strung together in a sentence :-/

After congratulatory hugs and high 5's from my friends and family, I thought to myself "That actually was not as exciting as I thought it would be :-(" I've put this down to me expecting it to be a lot more exhilarating - bummer...

I then decided that if doing a tandem was not as exciting as I thought it would be, I need to do the AFF Course and jump by myself to get the full joy and experience out of it.

Just a bit about me

Hi Everyone,

Just a little intro about myself :-)

My name is Lance Darwent, I was born on the 23rd of Feburary 1986, and raised in Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa.

I am currently the Technical Manager of a Software Company that provides software to law firms across the country.

My hobbies include: Darts, Wakeboarding, Water Skiing, Pool and most recently, SKYDIVING :-)

This blog is designed for people to follow my newly found "Extreme Sport".