I’ve always been one to never stray too far out of my comfort zone. Always the safe guy. Always going with the status quo. Well, you get the picture!! So, in May of 2012, the leader of the GLBT hiking group I belong to out of the San Francisco Bay Area suggested a day of zip lining as an activity, I was on board!! Now keep in mind, I had never done anything like this before. The only “wild” thing I’ve done was gone tubing on a lake a couple times. I told you I was never one to stray too far out of my comfort zone!! So needless to say, I was a touch nervous, but quite excited to try something new and adventurous!! We went zip lining at a place called the Mount Hermon Redwood Canopy Tours, which is located in the Santa Cruz County town of Felton. Felton is in the heart of the Santa Cruz mountains, which is full of redwood forests!! Very pretty country as well!!
A brief summary about Redwood Canopy Tours: it’s actually a part of the Mount Hermon Christian Camps, located near Felton. It offers everything for groups and retreats of all sizes. They specialize in camps, team-building exercises, outdoor education, a conference center for retreats, the aforementioned zip lining, as well as other fun activities.
Anyways, back to the zip lining!! Before I go on, two pieces of advice: make sure your pockets are empty. And wear street shoes, not sandals or flip-flops. You don’t want to lose your shoes, or have anything fall out of your pockets as you’re flying through the air. I can’t speak from experience, but it’s probably a wise idea! I don’t remember if they provide storage lockers or not. After getting checked in and signing a waiver, we were broken down into two groups, as they usually take zipliners in groups of 7 to 8 people. They get you harnessed up, then it’s of for a quick “zip lining school” crash course. And it is a crash course, as you learn how to zipline in less than fifteen minutes!!! After that, it’s off to the ziplines!! There are six ziplines and two skybridge, with people zip lining as high as 150 feet off the ground!! Imagine zip lining through redwood forests!! Let’s take a look:
The first group learning the basics
The group getting harnessed up!
A crash course at “zip lining school”!
Me, Mike and Maren harnessed up!
John, Mike and Maren
A zipline and a skybridge high in the redwoods!
Randy getting ready to go down the zipline……
….and there he goes!!!
Maren, Michael, John and me on one of the skybridges. That’s Mike to the left. He’s just zip lining!!
Zip liners hanging out on the skybridge!!
Looking down at a creek over the skybridge
Oh, John’s just hanging out!
I hope you enjoyed my zip lining tour, and get a chance to do some ziplining yourself!! It is definitely a fun activity to do with a group as a team-building activity. Plus, zip lining through the redwoods? You can’t beat that!! For more information, you can visit www.mounthermon.org and www.mounthermonadventures.com. Until next time……..
Cheers,
Rickey
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