During my senior year at college when I was trying to convince a friend of mine to try out skiing she told me she would rather try skydiving. I didn't understand this at all, but I thought it was a great idea. In the end her parents wouldn't let her go (doh!), but during dead week (the week of nothing, before graduation) I did go skydiving with a couple other friends of mine (both graduating seniors).

We went to a place out near San Bernadino called Perris Valley Skydiving. For first time jumpers you can choose between a low altitude jump where your parachute opens right when you jump out of the plane, or a tandem jump, where you are attached to the instructor. We went for tandem because you jump from much higher and get about 45 seconds of freefall.

I was curious to see how I would face the prospect of jumping out of a plane at about 12000 feet. To my surprise, not only did I jump without fear, but I was happy and eager to jump!

Freefall ROCKS!! The wind is extremely loud and fast, but other than that it just seems like you're floating in midair. At that height it takes a while to realize you're moving closer to the ground..

Pullin' the 'chute... we floated on down making lots of cool diving turns and spins.

Finally we touched down back at the air strip we took off from... We had been up high for so long that when we got down to about 30 feet I got total vertigo and couldn't tell how high I was as the ground seemed to rush up at me... anyway, I ended up face-planting in the dirt, but we got down ok.. Skydiving was an amazing experience and I highly recommend it! Maybe I'll go again one of these days...