Final newsletter for 2006

Well its bloody hard to type with a cast on my arm but its definitely a cool twist to the years tale which is full of twists and turns, some the best and a few the worst.
And thus so, the USA, Mexico and Thailand leg of the journey was definitely no exception.

After another seeming endless flight, I arrived in the Mormon wanker capitol of the world, Salt Lake
City, Utah and was greeted by the rest of the crew in our new van, “the A TEAM van”. This van is a ripper. Every seat in it was a lounge chair, which was great for drinking a beer on the road as well as doing all the other fun things you can do while your driving in America.

Our first stop was the Prienne Bridge in Twin Falls, Idaho. A 500 ft legal bridge in which you can do lots of fun types of jumps from. It was also a long weekend in the US so there were a lot of jumpers to watch make heaps of funny and sometimes very lucky mistakes. We had a ball there with the rest of the crew showing up a couple of days later. We were doing all sorts of fun jumps with Dan and Adam Gibson leading the way, with Dan doing barrel rolls, gainers and front loops and Adam doing just about anything you could imagine. Wildman and Prue even did near perfect gainers with me and Wildy doing a 2-way gainer. One of the highlights was definitely the 7 way we did, with bodies and canopies flying everywhere and many US jumpers saying the now standard lines of “ there go those crazy Aussies again” ha ha. We also stayed at pretty much a mansion in Twin Falls. This house was amazing and the view matched it as well. A big thanks to Mark Ridely for that one, cheers mate.

After getting bored at the bridge pretty quickly we headed off to Moab, Utah to start jumping the never ending amount of all time exit points there. The drive was long but we arrived at the bottom of Echo Canyon in the early hours of the morning and woke up to the beautiful cliffs, which we went up and jumped straight away. Somehow when we landed, Wildman managed to bog the van in the sand and so we had to wait for some classic American red necks to pull us out, thanks rednecks. The next week was all time, we jumped a shit load of cliffs, a lot of which I hadn’t jumped before which was nice and Wildy even did a bit of rock climbing which he wasn’t to enthused about.
We met up with a heap of crew which included the infamous Ted Rudd, Mark, Mat, Mike, Dave, Gillian and Redeye and more and we now had a massive crew. One morning we went to a cool place called Indian Cave. A 270 ft massively overhung cave/cliff and we all jumped it safely. I’m not sure how the next bit came about but the end result was a few of us attempting a tard (short for retard for obvious reasons when you see the pictures)off of it. Well Adam and Dan’s jump went fine but Ted had a 180 degree opening and smashed into the cliff coming to rest on the only rock in the cave stopping his fall to certain death. I’m not sure what I was thinking but I jumped off after him with a 180 degree opening also and only narrowly turning the canopy around and landing safe.

A rescue mission followed for the next 5 hours trying to get him out without calling the police or rescue squad. In the end I repelled down to him, throwing a line with Ted pulling me in and swapping harnesses so he could repel the rest of the way. It took sometime but we got him down safely and off to hospital with a broken ankle and a badly cut knee. The only thing left to do was drink and be happy it wasn’t worse.

The rest of the time in Moab was great, with Ted doing ground crew now and lots of cool jumps being done. I achieved my 1400th jump in unique style opening too low and landing in trees by the Colorado River. I bet Dan lunch that I would go lower than him and I sort of won.

We were all exited about the next leg of the journey. We were off to southern Mexico for the first Go Fast event there off a new 3000ft wall that was recently discovered there. It was a challenging looking jump but our main concerns were the crocodiles in the river we had to land in. Before the jump we were excited but it soon turned to tragedy as Adam fatally hit a ledge without getting his parachute open in time. I wont go on about it here as this is not what the news letter is about and he wouldn’t want it to be that way as well. It was very sad times over the next few days with his wife and family bearing the brunt of the disaster.

But through all this the Mexican authorities saw it as a freak accident which it was, and allowed us to jump the cliff again to show that it could be done safely. And that is what we did. A small group of us did a near perfect display, which did show that the sport can be done safely. After the jump I realized how serious the cliff was and that it definitely was only for experienced jumpers to track and wing suit fly only. Just after we landed in the water and got back in the boats we noticed a crocodile casually swimming where we had just been. A nervous laugh went through the group. We drank though the night and bid everyone good bye with the rest of the crew heading back to Las Vegas to jump buildings and party while I came home to Australia for the week with Adams wife Tracy and attended a very sad yet beautiful funeral service on the central coast with a paddle out at one of there favourite surf spots with his brother Ben spreading his ashes.

R.I.P. my friend, you will be missed.

There was no point staying at home so I headed back to the L.A. to meet up with Prue and my best buddy Trent. We drank lots of coronas and went cruising in his red corvette getting me way out of my comfort zone that’s for sure. We also had a cameo on the programme “Sunrise” on channel 7 which was a heap of fun before heading up on a wicked road trip to Santa Cruz for big matts wedding party. We got to see all the spots where the lost boys were filmed as well as getting stoned and walking through the big red wood forest where the trees were over 250 ft high. It was a trip, that’s for sure. The highlight was definitely going out and shooting pistols and automatic weapons in the forest. It was scary but fun for sure. I left Prue in L.A. and headed off to Tonsai beach, Thailand to finish off the tour with some rock climbing, base jumping, great food and lots of hammock time.

It was perfect. I met up with some great crew, especially the two Robs and Gillian and watched some awesome climbing as well as doing some cool stuff myself which included a classic 4 pitch climb called Humanality. We also spent a day deep water soloing, which was sick fun. We climbed straight out of the boat as high as you can and when you cant go any further, you just jump into the water. It was pretty scary at times with one of the good climbers, Jason sometimes jumping from over 20 meters.
Well as usual I didn’t want to leave this paradise but it was time to get back to reality and pay off the debt again. I had 1 night in Phuket before heading home so I went out to watch some Thai boxing. It was pretty brutal but great fun but it didn’t help me too much as later on that night I was jumped from behind and bashed to the best of my knowledge with me waking up In hospital getting stitches in my eye and head. I also copped a broken wrist and nose and I look like a Baboon. As you could imagine the flight home wasn’t too much fun. But it could’ve been worse and I will be back in action in no time, surfing, climbing and jumping my arse off.

So that’s pretty much it for now. Reality is back and all we can really do now is hope that we win the lottery so we can do it all again in style. But until then we must live every day like it’s our last and live life to the fullest cause as I have seen this year as well as every other year, it can all be over in an instant. So don’t go listening to the stupid Christians and the psycho Muslims about preparing for life after death cause its all bullshit. Live for today and enjoy the hell out of it.

Adam had the saying that we should all live by as he did his whole life:

“Everyday…All my life”
So we should live “Everyday…All our lives”

So big hugs everybody, and shine on until next time
Luv Douggs

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