Wednesday 12 September 2012

A LITTLE BIT ABOUT ME :)

Hi everyone! My name is Hannah O'Neill and I'm studying Adventure Tourism Management at Queenstown Resort College. I finished school at Orewa College in 2011, where I then found out I had won the Adventure Tourism Scholarship for 2012 at QRC. This meant I had 9 months of free time before I could start at QRC in July 2012. 


In this time, I decided to travel around Europe for four months and had the most amazing, memorable experience of my life. I absolutely loved it! After returning from Europe, I had 10 days to pack up my room and head on down to Queenstown to start my first term at QRC.


 I'm now a week away from finishing term one, and have had a brilliant first 10 weeks! I have enjoyed all of my classes and the famills have definitely been the highlight. This blog shows just a few of the great experiences I have encountered so far. Enjoy! :)

Monday 3 September 2012

SHOTOVER CANYON SWING

We were lucky enough to experience the Shotover Canyon Swing as part of our Famils at College. This I was extremely excited about, because I had done it the previous year and absolutely loved it! It was a bitter cold morning, but beautiful clear skies.

 We met at the shop at 9am, filled out safety forms and got weighed. They drew little pictures on our hands to signify our weight, like a secret code which I thought was a brilliant idea as it doesn't directly show peoples weights which is good for people who may be self conscious.

We piled into the van, and the staff put on a video about the Canyon Swing and all the different ways we could jump off. This was also a great idea as it hyped everyone up and got us all excited.


We arrived at the Canyon 15 minutes later and headed down to the platform.The staff on the platform were amazing. They were really funny and kind guys who tried to scare people for a laugh. They were however very professional and very knowledgeable about the product and their procedures.

 I was the second person in line to jump and the adrenaline started pumping. I walked towards the edge of the 109M cliff and turned around as I chose to jump off backwards. This was absolutely terrifying as I couldn't see the direction I was going to fall. A minute later, I was plummeting down a 60M free fall at 150KMPH and then swung over the Shotover River. The feeling of falling backwards was one of the scariest things I have ever done, but it was so much fun.


The staff at Shotover Canyon Swing, I believe showed us the best customer service. They communicated with our class extremely well by telling jokes and talking about the nightlife and social side of Queenstown which the class loved. They were very professional and willing to answer any of our questions, and gave us all a hug after we had jumped which I thought was really cool.




They made the entire experience very fun and memorable and I would reccommend every one to go the Canyon Swing. If your not confident enough to jump, I would go along and watch and support friends and family! Its a great view and a very enjoyable experience. Check out the Canyon Swing Blog

Sunday 2 September 2012

AJ HACKETT LEDGE BUNGY


Another one of our Familiarisation visits was theAJ Hackett Ledge Bungy. To add to the thrill, we did it in the dark! I had already done three previous bungy jumps in different locations, so I knew what to expect more than the others in my class, but I was very excited to do the jump at night time. Another difference with this bungy, was that we were attached into a harness around our waists. This allowed us to do many different jump styles instead of the standard forward jump making the experience even more fun!


We filled out all of the safety forms, headed down to the platform, and got geared up by the entertaining jump masters. The staff were great. Very casual and kind in the way they greeted us, but very professional and serious about their duties. They asked us questions about where we were form, how nervous we were and shared a few jokes to lighten the mood for the nervous people!


Eventually it was my turn to jump. The atmosphere was great. Twinkling lights of Queenstown were below me, with the intense bright light from the full moon behind the Remarkables mountain range. Music was pumping in the platform, and my friends were cheering me on to jump, so I did! The experience of falling into the dark was scary but so much fun. I loved it. Swinging in the freezing cold with my heart pumping from the adrenaline.

Overall the experience at the bungy was fantastic. The staff made it extra enjoyable by the great customer servive, they were friendly and could communicate very well with teenagers which is sometimes hard to do! I would reccomend this bungy jump to everyone. It's a great choice for those who are less confident about bungy jumps, as this jump is not very high and your attached by your waist not your feet.