The Back-Up Option

As previously stated in one of my posts titled “Gaby”, I studied abroad during the spring semester of my junior year of college in Prague, Czech Republic. A big goal of mine for abroad was to see as many places as possible. It was natural that it only took about five days into studying abroad for me to book my first weekend trip to Interlaken, Switzerland. Before I even left America, I planned that my biggest adventure in Europe was going to be helicopter skydiving in the Swiss Alps.

I went skydiving for my brother’s 18th birthday a year and a half prior to going abroad. My brother and I flew up into the clouds in what I thought would be the smallest airplane I’d ever be in (there wasn’t even a seat for me to sit in), but I have since been in a smaller aircraft, also with my brother. We sat together strapped to our instructors waiting to reach 10,000 feet. Even though I wasn’t nervous in the slightest, I looked at my instructor after he went through the safety strap checks and said, “Do it again, please. I got a life to live.” Seconds afterward I watched my brother free fall to Earth, and then it was my turn.

It was the most exhilarating experience I’ve ever had in my life. I have a memory of the instructor opening the door of the plane for my brother to jump out, and I remember thinking it was the most bizarre feeling to be eye level with crisp, white clouds. In that moment, it felt like nothing was impossible.

It was so loud and cold up there, too, but in a way I had never experienced noise and coldness. It felt like I was experiencing a whole new world that I didn’t know existed. Right before I jumped, in the seconds where I was dangling outside of the plane while my instructor was scooting forward to push us out, I thought, “this is it.” Nothing has emulated that feeling for me since. It was the vivacity I had been craving.

So, I planned to do it again, but this time I would be in a helicopter jumping from 14,000 feet in the Swiss Alps. Higher heights meant more time to free fall, which is the best part of skydiving. That may be some people’s worst nightmare, but for me, that’s a dream.

When I arrived to Interlaken the weather was crumby. It was raining on and off the entire time, and my goodness, was it foggy. Interlaken sits at the base of mountains, so one of the coolest parts about visiting there is that you can look up at any angle and see snow capped mountains. However, I was never able to fully see the Swiss Alps because it was that foggy. I tell myself that I wouldn’t have been able to handle all that beauty had I seen them, so thanks to whatever was sparing me.

The company I was supposed to jump with called me while I was there and said that the conditions weren’t up to standards, so I wasn’t going to be able to heli skydive. I tried to reschedule for other times slots that weekend, but long story short, I never went. This was something that was on my bucket list. A “must-do” that I had verbalized to friends and family while I was still in the States. I had no idea if I’d ever be back in Switzerland, so the time was supposed to be while I was abroad.

It turns out that I wasn’t disappointed at all when I wasn’t able to go. I’m a firm believer in “everything happens for a reason”, so I trusted that it wasn’t meant to be. Every second I was there was a dream come true, so it just felt like anything extra was icing on the cake. Plus, before abroad, I always had this barrier between me and the rest of the world. I never thought I would be fortunate enough to see different parts of it, so when I say that even breathing European air was a blessing, I truly mean it.

My friend and I tried to figure out what else to do during our weekend there. We wanted to do something we had never done before, and one of the mutual things neither of us had done was night sled... let me just say, this was more of a, “okay, yeah, let’s just do that” type of conclusion. Not a, “YES, WOOHOOO, THAT’S THE ONE” decision. I’m sure we’ve all been sledding before. Night sledding? Maybe not. But sledding? That’s most likely something we stopped finding tons of enjoyment out of in our pre-teens.

Anyway, we booked a reservation, bussed 45 minutes up one of the mountains near Interlaken, then hopped onto a cable car and rode that to our meeting spot. Each of us wore a dim light that rested on our back, so we could see the person in front of us. We were handed a regular old sled, and then one by one, we started sledding down a windy, clear path.

I remember the instructor saying, “okay it’s obviously very dark out here, so my piece of advice is to always sled where the white is and avoid the black areas”. That literally translates to, “white is snow, and black areas are where the edge drops off”. There were no guard rails, very little light, and no safety equipment. Just me, my sled, and a windy path spiraling down the edge of a mountain.

Night sledding in the Swiss Alps is one of my favorite memories ever and genuinely one of the coolest things I’ve done. I laughed the entire way down and had such a good time from the moment we started until I was back on level ground. We picked up speed at several points during the descend, and just for some context, I literally felt like I was in a video game trying to steer and stay on course. I did not expect to enjoy it that much at all. It was the back-up option for skydiving, and I booked it really just to have something to occupy my night with.

The icing on the cake for me was when we sled to a portion of the trail where it completely opened up. I remember it being dead silent, the kind you don’t understand until you’re in a place where silence slips out of the unconscious mind and enters your stream of consciousness.

Amidst the silence, I couldn’t believe my own eyes, either. I was staring at more stars than I had ever seen in my life, and they felt close enough for me to reach out and touch them. I found myself standing up from my sled and just gazing at the little town that was sitting at the base of the valley, mesmerized by the view. I felt like I was in a storybook. All I could do was stand there and think, “I’ve never seen so much beauty before.”

That image is tucked away in a part of my brain that I hope old age never gets to. It was the first time I knew what it felt like to be speechless. I still don’t understand how places like that exist, and how they exist so quietly just waiting to be admired.

As you know, I never went heli skydiving. I didn’t get to cross that off my bucket list. It’s still an unchecked item on my imaginary notepad, and maybe one day I’ll get to it. All I know is that when things don’t work out in your favor, you shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss what’s coming to replace it. I’m sure if I were able to skydive in the Swiss Alps it would have been a legendary experience, but I also wouldn’t trade that silence and those stars for anything.

Turns out you don’t need to jump out of a moving plane and plummet back to Earth at 120mph to feel alive. You just need to have an open mind, a “yes” mentality, and if the opportunity presents itself, a little red sled.