#7 – go on a zip line

So I initially chose this item because of the zip line that was going through Robson Square in Vancouver during the Olympics. When Kait was here for the Olympics I thought for sure that we would be able to try it out! A zip line, during the Olympics, in the busiest part of downtown and free, what could be better? Apparently 30 million other people thought it would be awesome too. It didn't even occur to me that the line up might actually be long! On every single news channel they said to anticipate a wait for 7-9 hours to take a 20 second ride on the zip line. I was beginning to think that this would't happen for me. I was under the impression that the zip line would only be open during the Olympics and would shut down after the closing ceremonies.

I re-watched the gold medal hockey game on Shaw V.O.D and then watched the late night news to see if they had any Paralympics on – can we say Olympic withdrawal? I decided to go brush my teeth and then they started talking about the zip line! My ears perked up a little and then they mentioned the line up - ONLY 90 MINUTES! Are you kidding me?! I could definitely handle a 90 minutes wait. I thought it was a dream! I sent a message to my friends and got a few commitments. Unfortunately, the day of my friend Keshika couldn't make it but I was determined to try out the zip line.

Alvin and I head down there and the sign said 3.5 hours. I know what you're thinking – who would wait 3 hours to go on a zip line for 20 seconds? Well, Alvin was a trooper and stuck it out even with low blood glucose levels and it starting to get cold. To be honest, it didn't seem like three and half hours at all, we had so much fun and met a good group of people while we were waiting. Who knew you could get that close to some people in such a short amount of time? Within the first half hour we had our full twenty second zip line experience planned out and what we were going to do. We had all decided that we couldn't go across looking like fools – bottom line: we're all cooler than that and you don't wait in line for 3.5 hours just to have a boring ride.

After we got suited up and started climbing up the 6 stories of stairs we decided we probably weren't going to be going across upside down, backwards, superman, or running man but still had to have fun going across. Here is what the ride looked like!

NOTE: The screaming is not out of fear but we were really trying to milk the twenty seconds experience for all that its worth! We did get some attention while we were up there – that's for sure!

Quote for the experience from my friend Benjamin Franklin: He that can have patience, can have what he will