The last week of our stay in Africa, our host Susan organized a trip for Nick and I, our friend Sintu who works forThe Kusasa Project, and our newest roommate, Beatriz from Mexico. We traveled through the Garden Route taking us from the Western Cape to the Eastern Cape of South Africa…about 10 hours worth of driving. Road trip across South Africa… not many people can say they’ve done that one! Our first day of traveling we made a stop in a town called Plettenberg Bay where we spent the night at Hunter’s Country House. It was a beautiful lodge with a very quaint atmosphere, tucked deep inside the woods. It was Nick’s birthday so we enjoyed a fabulous dinner at a new restaurant called Zinzi where the champagne was free and the wine flowed like water. Nick even had the pleasure of enjoying “Happy Birthday” in both English and Xhosa. Very cool. After struggling to wake up the next morning, we packed the car, ate a quick breakfast and headed out for the next half of our road trip.
About an hour away from Plettenberg Bay, we made a pit stop in a town called Tsitsikamma, the location of the world’s highest bungy bridge. The company Face Adrenalin organizes bungy jumping off of Bloukrans Bridge. Now, if you know me you know that I’m usually up for anything, and this was no exception. I’m not going to lie and tell you that I did it in full confidence, in fact when we walked across the bridge I forgot that I needed to breath in order to survive. I was speechless while waiting at the top and nearly had a stroke when the guys that run the place told me I’d be the third jumper. Luckily, they blast techno music while you wait which helped me think about dancing instead of slipping out of my ankle straps as I fell to my death… not to be too dramatic of course. When I watched my video of the jump I was able to see the visible fear and fright on my face and heard myself say, “I’m not gonna die right?” “I can’t do this.” And let’s not forget, “Don’t push me.” After a hop to the edge of the bridge I heard a nice and loud “3… 2… 1… BUNGY!” and felt two men literally push me off the bridge to face my 216-meter fall. The next 5 minutes are still blurry, but I was told I was the loudest jumper of the morning and I can tell you that though many of my words needed to be censored, I simply could not control what came out of my mouth. When both of my feet were back on cement I slowly started breathing again and felt the rush of adrenalin that every junky needs. It definitely was a good rush… and I’m glad that when I’m “in Rome” I do as the Roman’s. It’s not every day you get to jump off the world’s highest bungy bridge.
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