Went to the Earth Centre
Went to the Earth Centre today with Woodcraft & the Germans. Saw some wonderful stuff there - and found another potential wedding venue.
In the afternoon we spent some of our tokens on the climbing tower - I was keen to do the zip-slide, also quite keen on abseiling, not so keen on climbing but thought I might just as well do the whole package. Glad I did. I’ve never climbed before (missed out on various opportunitites) but think I’m likely to do it again. Got three-quarters of the way up quite quickly, without really thinking, then started thinking (a bad thing) that it would be really easy as long as I didn’t look down. Then looked down. I wasn’t exactly scared - I knew that somebody had me on a rope and I wasn’t going to hurt myself, but it sped the adrenaline around my body, and made it a lot harder choosing hand and foot-holds after that. The last metre, to reach up and touch the top plank, was the hardest part of all. Then I walked and bounced backwards quickly to solid earth again, where the instructor told me I’d done really it well for a beginner and very quickly. I hadn’t realised how much I was exerting myself, but as soon as I was standing on the ground I realised my heart was in my mouth, finding it hard to breathe, adrenalin everywhere. It was a wonderful feeling - and I still had the other 2 activities to go.
Abseiling was a piece of the proverbial - lost my footing once, but no worries, I still had a little bit of adrenalin left over from the climbing and it felt as easy as going for a Sunday stroll. Zip slide was also not really challenging - but was a lot of fun. By now I had lost all fear (quite unusual - I’m usually terrified of heights) and as soon as I was given the word I hurled myself from the tower and starfished my way back down to earth.
It was amazing how different these activities are from standard theme-park fare of rollercoasters etc. Although they didn’t involve as much “danger”, i.e. not the speed and heights of a theme park ride, and are just as safe, being under control of an instructor, safety-harnesses ahoy, the fact that you perform the activity yourself, choosing a path to climb etc rather than being stuck in a rollercoaster’s static path, made them 10 times more exciting and fulfilling.