Amanda: “Name two jobs Holly had in college.” Ding. Me: “Pizza delivery girl and driving the lead paint detection bus.” Correct!
Me: “What was the ridiculous name Amanda came up with for her childhood cat that was white? Bonus points for correct spelling.” Ding. Holly: “What is W-Y-T-E-K-A-T?” Correct!
Holly: “Amanda. What cartoon character did Jen most look like growing up?” Ding. Amanda: “Annie?” Holly: “Wrong! Ha! She wanted to be Annie, but she looked like Strawberry Shortcake.” Correct!
More amazing still than our ability to entertain ourselves anytime, anywhere was how—without even trying—we’d gotten to know all the silly details about one another that on the surface seemed insignificant but as a collection represented who we were as people. Amanda and I had always said that even though we hadn’t become close friends until our twenties, in our collective memory, we’d been pals since the playground. And at this point, Holly was fully painted into that scene with us, racing to the swing set to claim the best seat, then deciding all of a sudden that mine looked more fun than hers and asking me to trade.
Before the trip, I’d known Holly as the gorgeous, athletic, bright, and bubbly girl who everyone claimed was one of the nicest people they knew. And while she still was all of those things, I’d grown to understand her as an extremely passionate, conscientious, and unfailingly patient and sympathetic confidante who stood strong by her convictions and had an uncanny ability to see the best in everyone and find the sunny side of almost any situation—a trait that did not come as easily to me. To this day, it still amazes me that Holly had stuck with the trip even after all the stumbling blocks, like maintaining a long-distance relationship, having her magazine column crash, and then barely having enough funds to get the whole way around the globe. But Amanda had been right that day at the Indian consulate in New York when she’d said that the trip wouldn’t work without Holly, that Amanda and I needed her to balance us out. And that when it came to our round-the-world adventure, three Lost Girls were definitely better than two.
We’d foiled the dastardly plans of bag slashers, defended one another against maniacal cabdrivers, convinced embassy officials to put a ‘“rush order” on visa applications, and raced to clinics in the middle of the night to assuage fears of parasites. So crossing an inlet together as the waters of high tide rushed in to greet us? It was all in a day’s work. And I couldn’t wait to get up and do it all again tomorrow.
Though we’d certainly tallied an impressive number of badass activities during our time in New Zealand—rafting over a twenty-one-foot waterfall, sliding down the steep volcanic slopes of Mount Tongariro, attending an Abel Tasman pirate party, and hiking the legendary Franz Josef Glacier in the Southern Alps—I hoped to up the ante during our next stop: the country’s adventure capital of Queenstown. Sailing down the scenic State Highway 6, the three of us were poised in our typical road trip stance: me at the wheel belting out radio tunes, Amanda riding shotgun, feet propped on the dashboard, harmonizing with me—though considerably more on key—and the earplugged, eye-masked Holly power napping in the back.
Upon arrival in hostel rooms, it generally took about 8.5 seconds before the contents of our backpacks exploded across the floor, bed frames, doorknobs, pretty much every available surface. To be fair, we treated our car equally. Wet clothes were strewn across the back windowsill, drying in the sun; rolls of toilet paper and bottles of hand sanitizer overflowed from seat pockets; a collection of half-empty soda bottles, assorted snack bars, and lollipop wrappers was sprinkled on top of muddy sneakers, guidebooks, and some weird Maori tribal tongs (possibly for salads, who knew?) that Holly had just had to buy in Rotorua. To us, this scene epitomized the freedom of the open road, which we reveled in after months of public transportation slavery. And with hours of uninterrupted bonding time came impromptu pit stops, moments of pure goofiness, and frequent conversations about the state of our precarious futures.
“So I know we were just kind of joking around that day in the redwood forest, but I’m seriously starting to wonder. Maybe living in another city after the trip would be good for me,” Amanda said, turning the volume knob until the music faded to a low background hum. “I mean, if we went to Colorado, life would be full of hikes and skiing and rafting. Just like it is here.”
“I know. It’d be amazing. As much as I love big cities, I really miss being outdoors and having some semblance of a well-rounded life. I mean, the entire year before we left on the trip consisted mainly of working late, eating disgusting amounts of take-out dinners, drinking too much at happy hour, which prompted ham, egg, and cheese hangover sandwiches the next morning and lazing around Brian’s apartment in sweats. I was gross,” I said, rolling down the window to inhale the intoxicatingly pure air.
“Well, at least you had a boyfriend and made some time for friends. Until I met Jason, I just sat at home and wrote articles and totally neglected all social invitations. I seriously can’t let that happen again,” Amanda said, pulling her windblown curls up into a loose bun. “Do you remember our list? We need to make another one.”
The list was a sheet of notebook paper we’d hung on the fridge of our first shared Manhattan apartment, covered with all the fun things we wanted to do that summer in the city, plus a few future life goals: Take a jazz class at Broadway Dance Center. Get half-price tickets to Rent and Les Misérables. Join the Niketown running club. Have drinks at the Rainbow Room. Score an invite for a weekend in the Hamptons. Volunteer for New York Cares. Get promoted in less than a year. Go on a date in Central Park. The list had gone on and on, and aside from a few items, we’d accomplished everything and continued to add more. But sadly, that piece of paper had disappeared years ago.
With powder blue lakes and cloud-ringed mountains painting our view, and Holly snoozing in the backseat, Amanda and I tossed around the logistics of possibly moving to another city and starting all over again. Would we need to buy a car? Could we even afford one after spending all our money? We had such an amazing circle of friends in New York. Would it be foolish to give that up? Would there be enough job opportunities in our field? Maybe we could just spend a summer somewhere else…and so on.
“Oh, my God, you two are hilarious,” Holly said, stirring from her slumber. “I’ve been half awake for the past fifteen minutes listening to you talk, and even my head is spinning from all your scenarios.”
“I know, surprise, surprise that I would be a tad neurotic,” Amanda said. “But we’re mainly just having fun fantasizing. I have no clue what I’ll want a few months from now.”
“Believe me, Hol, if I had a boyfriend and an apartment to return to like you did, I’d run back to New York with open arms, but right now it just seems scary,” I said.
“Well, you never know what’s going to happen when I get home. But I know that if you both do come back to New York, yes, please for me”—she grinned—“you will get everything you want. It’s more of a challenge, for sure, but once I switched magazines and moved to Brooklyn with Elan, I felt like I was living in a whole different city. So you’ll just reinvent yourselves, and it will be amazing. We can have barbecues on my back patio, you can join my street hockey team, which has tons of cute guys on it, and we’ll force each other to leave work at six p.m. every day and go running in the park. And you’ll find the loves of your lives and we can all buy apartments in the same building.”
Every time Holly went off on one of her enthusiastic list tangents, it always made me feel so much better, as if somehow her confidence in me guaranteed a successful and happy future.
“Well, if you say so, Hol, then I believe it,” I said. “I just have to figure out how to date since I’ve never really done it. You two will have to teach me how.”
“Okay, Jen. Well, I promise to share all my infinite pearls of dating wisdom with you if you do me one favor.” She paused. “Pull over at that apple stand,” she said, leaning forward between the two front seats and pointing to the ORGANIC APPLES road si
gn.
After picking through the huge bin of New Zealand’s finest Fiesta and Akane apples sold to the passing public with an on-your-honor money jar and a 3-FOR-$1 sign, we hopped back into the car and continued on to Queenstown, the stereo pumping full blast and the three of us singing at the top of our lungs.
Fumbling around in the dim light of dawn, I tried to locate a pair of jeans and sweatshirt from the pile on the hostel room floor without waking Amanda or Holly. Today was the day I was attempting my most daring adrenaline feat yet, a triple-header bungee jump. My heart was already pumping with anticipation. While Queenstown offered an endless supply of action sports and adventure activities (more per square meter than any other similarly sized town in the world, as we’d learned) to all those courageous enough to take on the challenge, those same brave souls also needed to come equipped with a bulging wallet. Everything from jet boating and canyon swinging to white-water rafting and river surfing came with a hefty price tag. And considering we were barely squeaking by on $50 a day (nearly twice our pre–New Zealand budget), we had to choose our splurges wisely.
Since Holly had the least money left, she’d opted out of any costly experiences but had designed a schedule of free hiking excursions and cheap off-roading jeep tours to make up for it. But as much as I cajoled, needled, and begged Amanda to join me for this once-in-a-lifetime set of leaps, she hadn’t budged. I was standing in front of the bathroom mirror, slathering on a layer of sunscreen, when I heard a soft knock at the half-open door. Amanda stood there in a rumpled set of PJs and half-cocked sleep mask.
“So I decided if you’re going to seriously do this, you can’t go alone. I’m coming with you,” she whispered.
“Really?” I squealed softly in disbelief.
“Yes, but if I die, I’m holding you responsible.”
“Absolutely. But you know, Pressner, if you want the ultimate rush, you gotta be willing to pay the ultimate price.”
“All right, now is not the time for Point Break quotes, Baggett. I’m kinda freakin’ out,” she said, reaching across me to grab her toothbrush off the counter.
“Okay, sorry. I’ll stop. But I seriously think you’re going to love this. It’ll change your life, swear to God,” I said, slipping out of the bathroom before she could administer a death stare.
Being Amanda, she’d somehow managed to score us a discount coupon from someone at the tourism office for nearly half off the price of AJ Hackett’s Thrillogy combo package, which delivered three unique bungee experiences back-to-back in a single day. Along with dozens of fellow rush junkies, we boarded a bus at the main company office and headed out to our first location, Kawarau Bridge, the world’s first and most famous bungee-jumping site. At only 43 meters (141 feet), it was a baby leap compared to the next two, but it was a good warm-up to get our juices flowing. And with the option to graze the water below or even to be fully immersed, it was an early-morning wake-up call I was actually looking forward to.
After signing away our right to sue AJ Hackett in case of accidental death or dismemberment, the friendly attendant weighed us, wrote our kilograms in permanent marker on our hands so the experts at the ledge could adjust the rope properly, and instructed us to go outside and across the bridge to wait in line with the other jumpers.
“I think I’m going to pass out. I don’t know if I can do this,” Amanda said as we moved up through the line.
“Yes, you can. Just look straight ahead. Walk to the edge, and before you overthink things, just let yourself fall off. I promise you, you’ll be so hopped up on endorphins by the time you bounce back up that you’ll want to do it again immediately.”
“All right, seriously. Where did you come from? And what did you do with my friend Jen? I mean, you’re not even scared at all. How is that possible?”
Although Amanda wasn’t exactly right (I did have a tiny bit of nervous energy), my lack of true fear didn’t surprise me. Though I’d always been innately petrified of my house catching on fire or a tarantula coming within even ten feet of me, ever since I can remember, I’d craved a healthy dose of thrill-induced adrenaline like a junkie jonesing for a fix. But none of the most extreme highs I’d racked up in my life (skydiving in Switzerland and numerous Xtreme Skyflyer drops at amusement parks) had been done in Amanda’s presence, so I could understand her disbelief.
“Look, it’s okay to be nervous, but you’ll watch me go first and you’ll see how fun it is,” I said as the hottie AJ Hackett staffer tightly secured my harness. Considering that the company had been founded by the Father of Bungee Jumping, Alan John Hackett, and had an impeccable safety record, I figured we were in the best hands we could ever hope to be in during such an adventure.
When I was all geared up and my rope was adjusted to allow me to skim the river with my fingers, I shuffled out to the edge of the platform and, without hesitation, flew. The second I saw the water whizzing toward my face, I got the jolt I’d been waiting for.
“Whoooo hooooo!” I screamed as I sprang a quarter of the way back up the way I’d come. After a few more wicked bounces, two men on a raft rowed over and extended a line for me to grab. Pulling me slowly down into the boat, they unlatched my harness and sent it back up for Amanda. I felt like a proud parent as my little Pressner soared out into the clear blue yonder for the very first time. And though her shrieks were noticeably more deranged-sounding than mine, she braved the jump all the same.
“Holy shit, I’m shaking,” she panted, coming up the stairs to the viewing platform to join me. “I can’t believe I just did that.”
“You were so great. I’m so proud of you, seriously,” I said, grabbing her in a hug. “Wasn’t it amazing? Are you excited to do it again?”
“I haven’t decided yet, but I’ll let you know when we get to the Nevis.”
My pulse quickened at the very thought that I was about to do something I’d dreamed about since we’d first decided to come to New Zealand. While I was a die-hard Lord of the Rings fan, the themed tours that cropped up across the islands were not for me. Rather, after seeing Orlando Bloom hurl himself off the legendary Nevis Highwire Bungy during one of the DVD special features, I’d vowed that I would follow in his righteous fling-steps if I ever got the chance. Finally, the moment I’d been waiting for had arrived.
Unlike your standard bungee adventure, where you walk up to the edge of a bridge or the top of another sturdy landmass, the Nevis experience requires boarding a special pod that carries you across a vast canyon, sliding along cable wires to a suspended platform in the center. Dangling 440 feet in the air, the Nevis provides a mind-blowing 8.5-second free fall through a breathtaking river valley. And though it’s not the tallest jump in the world (another brainchild of A. J. Hackett, the Macau Tower in China, is a staggering 760 feet), the Nevis certainly holds its own.
By the time we were next in the pod line to go, I’d long since stopped trying to persuade Amanda that bungee jumping was the best thing ever. At this point, I just hoped to stop her from hyperventilating. I have to admit, as thrilled as I was to take the ultimate plunge, the Nevis was seriously intimidating. Even more nerve-racking than actually going over the edge was hopping up to it. With a pretty brisk wind whipping through the ravine, you felt like a sitting duck standing out there, with the potential to blow sideways off the ledge if you lost your balance for even a second.
Luckily, I’d made it past the point of no return. With my heart thumping in my ears, I waited for the signal, spread my arms out wide, and let myself get carried away by the breeze. A lot can go through your mind in nine seconds (what if the rope snaps?, my cheeks are seriously flapping, pay attention or you’ll miss the scenery), but the one thing that stuck out in mine was that this was the closest I’d ever come to flying. For some reason, watching the water below speeding closer to my face was way more thrilling than scary. And with such a long fall, I got an exhilarating rebound and went sailing back toward the sky. Soaring upward, I reveled in the temporary feeling of weightlessness
, at the same time mentally prepping for the technical portion of the fall.
Before you jump, the guides instruct you to do a mini–abdominal crunch on your second bounce, reach up, and yank a special cord attached to your foot. This serves to turn you upright, so that you’re sitting in a swinglike harness with your legs dangling down toward the water and your head in the direction of the cable car. One poor guy who went before me had failed to follow instructions properly so was upside down, blood rushing to his head, the whole ride up. Though it wasn’t unsafe to ascend that way, I was determined not to. Luckily, when I swung myself upright, I felt the line in my fingers and pulled, which was a much more beautiful and enjoyable way to float back up. Plus it gave me extra time to fully soak in the view before being lifted back onto the platform by the attendants.
Once again Amanda courageously followed suit, and with only a few minor outbursts, she plummeted headfirst out of the pod. Though she confessed to having been utterly terrified, she grinned proudly and posed in a genuine hard-core stance during the group photos we snapped after returning safely to terra firma.
At that point, we had a two-hour break before our final jump, so we caught the bus back to town and had a light picnic lunch before heading over to the Ledge Bungy, the only urban jump in the heart of Queenstown. After Nevis, it was nice to give our adrenal glands a break, although the downside of the wait was the inevitable comedown from being amped up. But a few Diet Cokes and a 400-meter gondola ride above the city, and we were back in business. As we neared the top of the Skyline complex, which housed a restaurant, gift shop, private events spaces, and conference centers, we spotted Holly waiting for us at the entrance.
The Lost Girls: Three Friends. Four Continents. One Unconventional Detour Around the World. Page 45
