Travel-Pattaya, Thailand

Last October, my husband and I ventured to Bangkok for my special birthday weekend.  When we woke up our first morning after arriving late the evening before, we weren’t sure what kind of adventure we were getting ourselves into…

We were picked up by a shuttle bus that drove an hour and 20 minutes outside of Bangkok to Pattaya, Thailand, where we were greeted by 6 more people for our “Go Gibbon Experience.”  Basically all I knew was that we were heading off into the rainforest/jungles of Thailand to be hooked up to a zip-line cable and zip through the treetops.  When I was younger, I went to a cheerleading camp (yes, a cheerleading camp, ha!) and they had zip-lines, but I can’t remember if I tried it or not.  To be honest, I think I did try it and the entire experience was so scary that I completely have blocked it from my memory.  Either way, I had seen it on T.V. and my husband suggested we should do something adventurous for my birthday, so I figured let’s go for it!  Heck, we are in Thailand, let’s live it up!

After our long drive, we hit a dirt, well MUD, road and started our climb into the rainforests/jungles of Pattaya.  Our adventure began…

After we arrived and signed some paperwork, we waited in a small line with our group of adventure-seekers: a couple from Israel on their honeymoon, an older couple from Australia on their regular weekend trip to Thailand, a young guy from Holland (wasting time away waiting for his flight attendant girlfriend while she traveled to Taipei for the day) and a young guy from San Diego, California visiting his dad in Thailand.  We definitely had a good, diverse group.  My husband and I were suited up in our gear, with matching bandanas and helmets and next ushered over to a medium-sized white-board where someone had etched a colorful jungle map of where our zip-line experience would take us.

In total, we were going to be gliding through the rainforest on 26 different zip-lines averaging about 50 meters (150 feet) long, with the longest length of 300 meters or the distance of 3 football fields!  As our Thai guide named Joe explained our course, he said, “Okay, so we start here, we walk up a bit of a hill to get to the first platform, we will rest and take some water, then start back on the hill and arrive at the first platform here, next we climb up the stairs, we ensure safety that everyone is clipped on the wire and then…WE FLY!”  It was so funny!  He continued the entire map explanation this way and whenever we got to a platform, he would pause and say, “And then…WE FLY!”

So there we were, suited up in our gear, matching helmets, my heart beating, my breathing heavy and my pulse pulsating, climbing a 200 stair (well, it seemed like 200 stair) spiral staircase which wrapped around the trunk of a tree going higher and higher up in altitude, leading us to our first platform and jumping off point of our zip-line experience.  One after another, each person in our group left all their instincts behind to grab on to something for support or comfort, as they leapt off the platform allowing the wire above to hold their weight and provide all source of safety.  Then, it was my turn…All I could think, was don’t look down, and “God, please don’t let me die here in Asia!”  I held my arms out in front of me, reached for the cable line, put one hand on the handle harnessing the wire and another hand onto the carabiner located near my chest, I picked one leg up and then the other and there I was suspended in mid-air!  Our guide, Joe, held on to my rope, gave me a little leaway, looked at me and said, “Now…YOU FLY!”  He let go of my rope and I took off on the zip-line, sailing through the dewy air, with my eyelashes batting in the light rain, as I looked far down at the rainforest floor below.   Wow, what an experience!

After almost 3 hours of flying, abseiling, tightrope/bridge walking and viewing the beautiful sights of the rainforest below, it was time for our last zip-line across a 300-meter long wire!  The young wife of the Israeli couple went first and with her small stature, our guides feared she may not have the weight to make it across, but they were about to try.  She leapt off the platform, tightened herself in a little ball and flew.  After passing the first couple of trees, she was out of our sight line, but we could hear the guide on the other end screaming something in Thai, that probably meant, “S&*T, she didn’t make it!”  The minutes went by as the group anxiously peered through the forest trying to determine if she was safely grounded on the platform at the other end.  Then we saw her glide back slowly towards us and we realized, she was stuck hanging in the middle of the wire…with meters and meters of air between her and the rainforest floor below!

Well, this didn’t give me much comfort, knowing that I was the next girl to go.  But after her safe rescue, her husband’s flight and his finish to the endline, it was time to put my comfort level aside and FLY!  I looked right at the guide and said, “I’m scared.”  He looked at me and before he could say another word, one of our team members, the guy from San Diego, looked straight at me and said, “YOU GOT THIS!”  With that, I gripped the handles, closed my eyes and pushed off into the air.  As I soared across the wire, I thought to myself, please let me make it, please let me make it.   Suddenly, the trees cleared and there it was ahead of me, the final platform.  Joe was standing there, reaching his arms out to me…I made it!  But the last couple meters were at an incline and just before I could reach out my foot to the platform, I started to slip…I didn’t have enough force for Joe to catch me!  Oh no, I wasn’t going to make it!!

With the fear of slipping backwards, I held out my hand and screamed, “JOE! JOE!”  But before I could get there, I was already heading back into the jungle.  Joe suddenly yelled, “Grab the wire!”  So I reached up and gripped on tightly to the wire holding me above, but it was too rough and too hard to hold my weight…I didn’t have gloves and I was slipping!  I cried, “Joe, I am slipping, I can’t hold on, please hurry, don’t let me fall!”  Then as quickly as it all happened, I let go and silently slipped backwards further into the jungle.  Before I knew it, I was stranded, dangling in the middle of the wire, bobbing back and forth like a rag-doll on a clothesline, praying that this cord would withstand my weight and I wouldn’t fall below.  All I kept thinking was, I feel like I am in the movie ‘Cliffhanger’…please don’t let it end the same way!  Suddenly after briefly holding my eyes tightly closed and wishing it was all a dream, a backpack came flying towards me on the line attached to a rope.  I heard Joe scream “Grab it!”  I gripped on with one hand and he started to pull.  But that wasn’t good enough…he needed me to hold on to the backpack like it was a baby – with both hands!  That meant I would have to let go of my handles, my safety wire and place all faith in the one cord holding all my weight from the wire above.  With much courage, I took my other hand away from its safe grip and clenched the backpack as tightly as I could.  Slowly Joe started pulling the line and I bobbed back and forth swaying in the mist as I grew closer to the platform.  Joe reached out and grabbed my hand but I was too scared to let go.  So as Joe held on to me and grabbed my hands to release them from the firm grasp on the backpack, I said, “Don’t drop me Joe!”  My legs touched the wooden platform below me and I had made it!  I was a bit shaken and upset, but more than anything glad that I didn’t start crying or something, haha!  Soon, my husband came across the wire after me and I was thankful we were both together again.  We dangled from the ropes one more time as we abseiled to the rainforest floor below and our adventure had come to an end.  When it was all over, I was actually sad we weren’t going to fly anymore.  What a adventurous day!

After today, I will always remember flying through the rainforest in Thailand.  Now, on to the next adventure…