I Tarzan, You scary as hell.

Yesterday afternoon´s ATVing was absolutely brilliant. The boys and I got on our Quads around 2 for a crash course on steering them. There was couple from New York with us as well and it was a definite highlight of the afternoon when they both had to ask how standard transmissions work as everyone in NYC drives automatic.

Introductory course out of the way it was on to some gravel roads to open them up a little. They weren´t huge machines only 350cc but you could do some impressive fishtailing in them. It wasn´t long before the lads and I were drawing the ire of the guide for pushing the quads close to their limits.

We soon left the gravel roads behind and were driving through rolling green hills of cow paddocks, splashing through half meter deep muddle puds and generally having a riotous time.

Then we got to the real technical riding. Which started with a steep downhill descent over loose muddy rocks. I locked up the brakes once to avoid the guide who had slowed suddenly and began to spin sideways until I gave it a ton of gas and sprayed mud every which way. At the bottom of the hill was a big creek crossing, about 1 meter deep and about 20 meters wide, which our guide cautioned us to keep going or risk going over into the drink. It was an amazing experience to push through a couple of such crossings. The final one I found a deep spot with my front right tire and nearly lost the quad, luckily my other 3 tires held traction and I was able to get through.

We all came back in one piece, caked in mud and smiling from ear to ear. A great day!

This morning we were up early to do a canopy tour, which is walking through cloud forests checking out various bits of wildlife atop a number of different suspension bridges. It was amazing to see the jungle canopy and a variety of cool little animals. The clear highlight of the morning was getting up to the final bridge. To get up to it it was necessary to scale the inside of a strangling ficas tree, which had killed its host tree. It was amazing to climb up the 12 meter inside of a tree and out on to the bridge looking down at the canopy below.

However, as cool as both the above two tours were they paled sharply with what the afternoon had in store. Ziplining! Zipling, for those who don´t know, is when you don a rock climbing harness connected to wire lines by a simple wheel and zip on lines from stand to stand usually for pretty good distances. Another tidbit for those out of the loop. I hate heights and turn into a bit of a baby by them, and were I not with the Irish crew there was no way in hell I would´ve done this.

The first few lines were pretty civilized, 30 meters long and about 15 meters high. Good fun and built up the confidence. They got progressively longer until we were flying about 700 meters about 75meters up! But the real oh shit moment of the trip was when we went to do the ¨Tarzan Swing¨which was leaping off of a perfectly good platform 20m up and swinging out from it for 15ish seconds. I was terrified and tried to back out, however Carl and Carolyn weren´t having any of it, and over I went. I promise I will post Carl´s video of it soon as it is classic. I was shaking with adrenaline after. It really was a wonderful day!