Zimbabwe Part 2: Adrenaline

You know that feeling you get when you slip on a rock, perhaps while hiking, and your weight starts to shift? Your feet slide and gravity takes control? Or what about the first time a pretty girl (or cute guy) looks in your direction... that quick breath you take? Or even better yet, when you find yourself walking down a dark street, maybe even an alley, and you sense someone or something near... when the hairs stand up on your arms and your mind instinctively goes into fight or flight mode? Well that is your adrenal glands pumping out epinephrine, more commonly known as adrenaline. And for whatever reason, our bodies, or at least some of our bodies, actually crave it. They seek it out... even do stupid shit to produce it. 

Well for those looking for a good way to manufacture raw epinephrine, I highly recommend coming to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. Because this place is a cauldron bubbling over with the juicy stuff! Hell, the terrain alone is enough to get your juices flowing. Located on the Zambezi river, the waterfall is one of the largest in the world, with a width of over 5,000 feet, that's 1700 meters for my metric friends. Scottish missionary David Livingstone identified the falls in 1855, naming it after Queen Victoria. Today it is the dividing line between Zambia and Zimbabwe. 

But enough with all that, let's get to the good stuff!

First up is Devil's Pool, basically a small pool of water situated on the edge of the falls. We take a boat ride to Livingstone Island which abuts the fall. 

You can already see the spray from the water crashing below. The boat glides close to the edge, let's not lose a motor now. From there we hike to the end of the island and make our way through the water, holding hands as a group. We're only 30 feet from the edge! Our guide tells us to swim to a rock upstream, but the current is pushing us back to the edge. We swim like Michael Phelps as the current drags us closer and closer to the edge. We make it to a rock then crab crawl to another section before working our way to some rocks just past the edge. That's where we spot the pool, Devil's Pool. We're not really going in there, are we? Because that would just be plain stupid. But our guide jumps in the water, swims to the edge, and holds out his hand. “Next...”

Soon we are all on the edge of the world, our lives separated by a thin wall of rock. We peer over and look death in its face. ADRENALINE!!!! 

Next up: jumping off shit! 

I start with the Flying Fox, where some dude straps me into a harness and tells me to run off the ramp and fly like superman. Wait, what? I'm having an emotional breakdown up there. 

The gorge is 375 feet in the air. Am I scared? You bet your ass! But before I can recalculate all the twists and turns I've made over the course of my life which have led me to stand here on this very ramp, the dude begins his countdown: 5-4-3-2-1. I'm suddenly running down the plank and hurling myself into the gorge. I fly across the canyon, rather ungracefully, spinning every which way.

(Zoom in!)

When I finally come to a stop, staring down into the abyss, I feel a tug from behind and realize I am being pulled back to safety. But after touching back down on Terra Firma, before I can even catch my breath, I am whisked to another station and placed into a second harness. Then, as if in a recurring nightmare, I hear the countdown once more: 5-4-3-2-1.  I'm once again shooting across the canyon, this time on a zipline traveling 65 miles-per-hour over 1300 feet (425 meters). I hear the wire whizzing overhead. I'm really hauling ass! 

When I finally stop racing back and forth, I realize there's no rope to pull me back in. I grab the rope above my head and hold on for dear life, suspended hundreds of feet in the air, above rocks and what appears to be a very shallow portion of the Zambezi River. I look behind me, careful not to sway too much, and see a guy working his way towards me. He attaches some pulley thing to me and pulls me slowly back to the cliff. 

It's a long ride back, and by this time we reach safety my muscles are throbbing and my heart is pounding. I want nothing more to do with these adrenaline rushes. I just want to kiss the ground and cry. 

But my guide is having none of that pussy shit. No, he drags me up to the third and final act of my torture and bloodletting: the all-mighty, infamous, Victoria Falls Gorge Swing. Now this is the real deal. Free falling 230 feet (70 meters) before going into a 312-foot (95-meter) pendulum swing. "Mommy!" The last thing I hear is 5-4-3-2-1, then I'm dropping like dead weight into the gorge... 

But if none of these little stunts are to your liking, just take a look at some of the crazy shit the other members of my little Africa-touring group got up to over our three days in Victoria Falls...

I suppose we all find ways to increase the adrenaline to our system: a brisk swim, a long hike, eating a hot fudge sundae... 

But after weeks and weeks of travel, across the breadth of Africa. After being cooped up on a truck for days on end. After being exhausted and hungry and homesick... we all let out a collective sigh and said, "Fuck it! Turn that adrenaline on full blast! 5-4-3-2-1…"