June 3 (Friday): Zip Line

We bid adieu to the very nice Coeur d'Alene Resort today but not before an exciting (for me) activity.  I have wanted to do a zip line for some time.  However, the opportunity was never quite right.  Today the stars aligned.  We had time, the weather is great, I loved the course and I had confidence in the safety of the operator.

Timberline Adventures (www.ziptimberline.com) has constructed a zip line course with seven zip lines terminating on platforms high in the trees and joined with three rope sky bridges.  The first zip line is only a few hundred feet long through trees.  Each zip line gets progressively higher, longer and faster.  The last of the seven is 1,600 feet (a quarter of mile) long set 400 feet in the air.  It was thrilling.  It was fun.  It was scary even though I was clipped in with a safety wire the entire time.

This video gives an overview.  Everything you see in the video I did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5scaX3qhI0

Here I am on the mountainside all geared up.
The start of the very first and easiest zip line.  After this there are no railings.  It is easy to start once they get you clipped in.  You just lift your feet and you are off.  Landing is a little trickier but easily enough done.  I decided that zipping was a lot like an Oreo cookie.  I loved the zipping (the part in the middle) more than starting and landing.
A couple of views of the rope sky bridges.  This is really scary.
In between and after these pictures the iPhone went into my pocket because I needed to hang on with at least one hand.  The transition from one zip line to another occurs on small, railing-less platforms high (sometimes 100 feet) in the trees and even though I was always clipped to something I still felt a need (mostly) to hold on to something.

Here are some stock photos from this course.
The "money shot" of the seventh zip line.
Oh, I almost forgot about the surprise ending.  The last zip line simply ends on a platform set in a tree.  There is no way down except a "self belay", a gizmo that you strap onto and when the gizmo senses your weight, it gently and slowly lowers you to the ground.  The only problem is that it is necessary to simply step off of the platform into the air and free fall momentarily before the gizmo takes over.  It was the hardest step of the entire course because of the initial free fall.

It was a fun morning.  After that, lunch in town and a little shopping, we have one last "big dinner" at the Cedar's Floating Restaurant, a seafood restaurant that actually floats in Lake Coeur d'Alene.
Clam chowder and steelhead trout.
Pan seared sea scallops with cauliflower mashed potatoes, bacon (everything is better with bacon) and corn.
Tomorrow we fly home from Spokane.  It will probably be a late post.

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