I got a little more work done with Terry and Emily before deciding to leave Colville. I’m not great at goodbyes and always draw them out, but finally got in the car and headed south. I left the night before my 30th birthday to reach Mt. Maunganui and slept in my campercar for the first time so far! It was a weird experience, the car is very cramped and I was sleeping in a parking lot in the industrial part of the city. There was a really bright streetlight over my head, and it was stinkin hot inside. And I was sooo so nervous to take a big leap the next day.
With not as much sleep as I would have liked, I drove over to the Tauranga Airport and donned a skydiving suit and helmet! I decided to celebrate my 30th birthday by jumping out of a perfectly working plane. I jumped from 15,000 ft and it took about 82 seconds to freefall to half that height. It was absolutely unreal to be climbing higher and higher in the plane, asking my jumper questions about the local geography and industries we could see, and knowing I was going to be falling to the earth in just a few minutes!! Standing on the little ledge on the outside of the plane, and suddenly tipping forward was such a rush of whatever the fear hormone is haha.
