Gone Indoor Skydiving
November 20, 2011 Filed in: Entertainment
"Flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss."
--Douglas Adams
Earlier this year, there was a Facebook Deal for an indoor skydiving vertical wind tunnel place called iFly in Union City, a Bay Area city southeast of San Francisco. iFly actually has seven locations, including Dubai and Singapore. The deal was pretty cool because it was for two people, and each person gets two flights each. Since our friend Ryan's birthday was last week, we thought it would be cool for him to have this experience too.
We registered with the front desk and headed upstairs. The chamber that we would later be using was immediately visible. There was already a session in there, and we could see other first timers having fun. It was cool to see this, so I would have a better idea of what to expect.
We waited for about a half hour before our session started. First, we sat through a video that showed the basic position we want our bodies to be in and also talked about the hand signals our instructor would give us. There were four signs: chin up, straighten legs, bend legs, and relax.
After a short quiz on the video, it was time for us to suit up. We got a jumpsuit, a pair of goggles and a helmet.
Before we went in the chamber, we even practiced a little.
I have to admit I was a little nervous about how I would do when I was inside the tube. From seeing others do it before me, it looked pretty difficult to control the body when the wind was blowing it at such high speeds.
There were about 10-12 of us in our session and we all sat on a bench awaiting our turn to fly. Each person gets about a minute or so on their flight, and then we go back and sit down to wait for our second flight. When I got into the tube I was super tense, and our instructor Vince gave me the relax signal quite a few times. With the wind blowing me around, my body was moving all over the place, but Vince was very good at guiding me.
I put together the video from the chamber's internal camera with J's footage of both of my flights.
The deal I bought also came with a DVD. We waited and talked to Vince while it was burning for us. I cannot say enough how great an instructor I thought he was. He was patient and super enthusiastic, and I could tell he totally enjoyed doing it.
I have to say this was really fun. It was not easy at all, but I was able to get the feeling of flying. I like the idea of booking a party to do this because it seems like it would be a great group activity. Even though the regular price is a bit expensive, I would totally do this again, especially since I feel I left a lot of room for improvement. Although I may never jump out of an airplane, I enjoyed this experience and would totally recommend it to others.
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