China || BASE jumping and Travel in Review

In all of my years of traveling I have come to realize two things.

1. I LOVE traveling more than just about anything else in the world
2. I think I will always get sick upon arriving home... With out fail!

My most recent trip to China did not disappoint in either department (unfortunatly). I was invited back to YunYang to participate in the 2018 World BASE jump Competition. An event I had previously, in 2016, judged. Which was an adventure in itself. Check out the video

This year I went as a participant and had so many differences! My travels began in the stunning location of Arcata, CA. Although the epic redwood and ocean mix leaves little to be desired on the view front, accessibility to a major airport is less than ideal. When I say less than Ideal I mean it was a 7 hour drive from Arcata to SFO, adding a full day of travel to each end of the trip. Not the nicest thing, but hey, it could be worse. I am fortunate enough that one of my best friends lives pretty close to SFO so her and her husband put me up for a night on my long trip!

Arriving at the airport to start the flying portion of my journey bright and early at 5am. Flying from SFO to LAX, then LAX (passing back over SFO) to Beijing. Which of course was not my final destination, that would be far too easy. The aircraft was equip with the most epic auto dimming windows, which came in handy to bring the entire cabin to an even and relaxing light level allowing us all to sleep!

Upon arrival in beijing I was shuttled to the hotel where all of the participants were being put up for the first night as we all arrived from different parts of the world at different times.

The next morning we were taken back to the airport to fly to the Wanzhou airport where we were met by our bus. Unfortunately the plan for the rest of the day was not divulged to us participants so my camera and phone was locked away in my luggage, not allowing me to capture the epicness that was to unfold, but nonetheless they proceeded to drive us to a local peninsula where there were about 50 middle aged women in matching red tops and black bottoms doing some form of a dance that looked more like calisthenics. We were ushered off the bus and before we knew it we were all dancing in the street with these women, whom in my limited experience were some of the most grabby women I had ever encountered. The hilarity that ensued was nothing less than some of the funniest moments of my life. At one point, during a photo session post dance the woman next to me refused to loosen her grip around my waist as she very firmly grabbed me by the butt. She then grabbed me by the face and forced mine to look in her direction. I laughed nervously and thought she was for sure going to try and kiss me. But much to my relief she didn't. After our epic dance battle we were told that we would take a short walk. It ended up being one of the hottest hikes I had been on in a while and I was massively under prepared. Wearing combat style fashion boots, long pants and a t-shirt with no water. It was a struggle for sure. At the end of the hike we were greeted with nothing less than an authentic hot tea ceremony, which I'm sure we all made a mockery of, not intentionally but we may have laughed a little to much for the liking of our ceremony leader. After our hike we were guided to an ancient temple where we were met by a master calligrapher who taught us all how to write a few characters, then pulled me aside to write me a special scroll, something I will cherish forever! I was told it can be interpreted to something of the degree of "Fly through the sky like a bird" with my name signed, the date as well as his two official stamps. I take their word for it but I surely won't be getting it tattooed on me any time soon ;)

After the scroll signing we were back on the bus to our final location. Yunyang, Chongqing. The tiny little mountain town that houses one of the coolest and scariest Glass Skywalk BASE jumps. If you watched the video above you could see how heads up the object is, with a wall about 90 degrees to the right and another wall about 45 degrees to the left, Body positions and openings have to be spot on otherwise the object becomes exponentially more dangerous.

The first two days after our arrival to YunYang we experienced un-jumpable weather. Fog and wind, that made for some beautiful and sometimes total white out views, but were less than ideal for us competitors.

On the first official day of the competition we finally had a window to make some jumps and everyone was a little nervous but ready to go. The first several people jumped and a few had some issues with their parachute opening a little off heading. One worse than the rest with a 90 degree off heading opening facing the wall. The jumper managed to turn it around and land safely. It was my turn and I hadn't been that nervous in a long time. I spit over the edge to see what the wind was doing and proceeded to walk up the steps to the platform. I was stopped at the top and told to wait until I was cleared to jump. This took over a minute and in that time the wind picked up slightly, but I couldn't feel it where I was standing. I was given the go ahead and I ran and jumped off. As my parachute was opening the wind shifted the pack job and I ended up opening facing the wall completely with a 180 degree off heading opening. The worst possible direction for an opening. I was immediately super close to the wall as I pulled down on the risers to stop my forward motion and back up before letting one up to turn around, nearly clipping the wall and the foliage growing out of it. The wide angle on my head mounted camera made it look closer than it was but it was terrifying nonetheless. After safely turning around I flew for several minutes under canopy through the beautiful canyon, trying to ignore the desire to just be on the ground and instead enjoy the epic beauty surrounding me. I landed in the target on the floating platform below and was greeted with open arms by my friends.

Although there was a certain amount of disappointment I encountered within myself, I also felt very fortunate to have made it out of that situation. This one was surely a mix of skill and luck and with that knowledge I took myself out of the competition even though I placed 6th in that qualifying round. I proceeded to watch my friends compete, jump, get nervous, laugh and everyone land safely for the next 2 days.

Albeit a scary event it was successful and that is all anyone could ask for. After an additional 3 days travel home, complete with a refreshing 13 hour long flight from beijing back to LAX sitting next to a good friend, we all returned home in one piece and for that I am grateful. I will have the video edited and ready to post soon and I will share it on my Instagram page @TheBASEgirl with in the next few days.

China has some of the most interesting and unique landscapes that is both inspiring and intimidating.. I can't wait to go back and get a little redemption! But for now I am writing this at 2am, still massively jet lagged and recovering from the intense cold I caught on my trip back. Grateful to be here even in my current state of delirium, so please, excuse any typos or rambling sentences