When we were first planning our trip to India we had never included or even heard of Rishikesh, but people we met along the way had told us we had to go there, and one of the reasons was Jumpin Heights. It’s a company that offers a giant swing, Flying Fox, and India’s only bungee jump… and it offers them for pretty cheap prices! We were interested in the bungee as we’d both never done it, and after hearing that it was only £30 we mentally signed up.
Once in Rishkesh, we saw loads of travel companies offering packages for Jumpin Heights that included transportation. This was a bit costly for what it was, but to be fair Rishkesh is a weird place for transport, with a bridge that tuktuks can’t go over, and rarely any public buses. We considered taking out rickshaw, but like I said there was this bridge that it wasn’t possible to cross in, which you had to cross to get to Jumpin Heights… so we looked into renting a motorbike for the day. We’d had a quick look around before we heading to Incredible Adventures to book our mountain hike, and on leaving their shop mentioned that we were going to go and rent a bike and do a bungee. Raman, the shop owner then unexpedly said “Take mine, its outside” and threw Ash the keys!
Today's vehicle of choice
We went outside and saw his bike… which was a Royal Enfield. These things are sooooo much chunkier, heavier and cooler than anything we’ve ridden before, and it was a bike that Ash had wanted to ride since coming to India and seeing guys in aviators roaring up steep mountain trails on them. I was a bit more nervous than excited about the ride, especially seeing it take Ash fifteen minutes to start the thing, almost dropping it several times. I don’t know how Raman didn't take the keys back off us, but he just watched chuckling until eventually it had started and not stalled, and I was on the back of it. We slowly set off, and were soon on some gorgeous mountain roads with great scenery!
Us and the open road
He bloody loved it, haha x
Who's this badass?
It was about a half an hour ride, and we knew we were near when we turned a corner and saw the big crane with the bungee attached to it… Waaaaa it was so high! We had seen online that it was 83m, but I can never really image heights or quantities until I see them… and this looked massive! We carried on to the reception asked for two bungee tickets at the window. Weirdly, she told us that we had to get that inside, and that this window was to pay the 100 rupees to get inside - Im not really sure why we had to pay this, always a surprise with anything you do in India! So we paid and went in. Once there you can choose which of the three activities you do, and get a small discount if you choose to do a combination of them. We chose the bungee, filled out our medical form, got weighed and signed our lives away.
Everyone had a nervous chuckle at the first line...
Then we waited. I was pretty nervous at this point, my hands were sweaty and I thought “Why have I just paid to jump off a high platform?”. I decided to get to the loo too, last thing I wanted was to wet myself up there, haha! When I came out, the guy had called us and told us to go out and make our way to the jumping station - eeeeek!!! We decided to take it in turns to jump and film, seeing as you weren’t allowed to take GoPros on, and the videos they offer are 750 rupees (£7.50) each! So I went up to the platform first, while Ash stayed at a spot on the side of the road and got ready to film my jump. We had also met another girl from England called Abbi in the waiting area, and had offered to video her bungee too after saying that we had a camera with us.
Once you’re up there you have to wait at one end of the crane, until they call you over the jumping area. This seems like ages of course, and all you keep doing is looking down and trying to make small talk with the other people waiting. I was quite surprised to see rocks below us with a small stream, in my head there was a huge, deep river that would save my life incase the rope did somehow let me down… Nope! When it was my turn to jump, I made my way along what seemed like the longest walkway of my life, and reached the jumping platform.
There were two really nice guys sorting out the equipment, an Indian guy and a guy from New Zealand. I had read online that the company had a lot of staff from NZ and that they also followed NZ and Australian safety guidelines, and really this was the thing that sold it to us. No disrespect to the people of India, but they’re not really well-known for their health and safety! The Indian guy made conversation with me while I put on my harness and he checked my weight (written on my hand) and strapped up my feet, before passing me onto the guy from New Zealand. He then double checked all of the equipment and asked me to make my way towards the edge.
This was obviously a strange sensation, being asked to not look down and slowly waddle like a penguin towards the edge of a really high, open ledge. I crept forwards until I thought I was where I needed to be, but he told me “Keep going!”. I think this was probably the worst bit, because you don’t really know how far you have before you fall, you can just feel less and less solid ground under you as your toes creep more and more off the end of the platform. Eventually I was where I needed to be. The guy then moved from beside me, held me by the harness on my back and instructed me to lean forwards but DON'T LOOK DOWN. And then came “3!… 2!… 1!… AAAAAAAH!”
Is it a bird? It's a plane? Noooooo, it's a screaming Notts girl!
I can tell you Ive never felt butterflies like it, I had to squeeze my eyes shut at one point to try and make them go away - you know how you do on a roller coaster sometimes? Like that, but x1000. But it’s all over so quickly! You bounce back after about five seconds, the butterflies are gone and you’re just like “Wooooo! Im alive and this is fun!!” After a bit more bouncing and swinging around, you’re lowered down towards two guys on the ground who offer you a long stick to grab hold of (and to remind you that you’re still in India!) and hold while they guide you onto a bed. Once down and unclipped, I was given a bottle of water and a novelty badge - I made it, yay!
Oh yeah baby, haha!
The walk back up to the road was pretty intense, just 15 minutes of solid incline - not great if you’re legs were a bit shaky at this point like mine and Abbi’s were! When we got to Ash, he showed me quickly how to use his camera by doing a video of some random guy jumping, and then he set off up to the platform. When I saw him crossing over the bridge I got the camera settings ready and waited for him to stand up and get strapped in. As soon as he was ready, I hit record… and then the battery DIED! Arghh I couldn’t believe it, so gutted! He did a really good Jack Sparrow dive and I completely missed it on camera… Instantly regretted recording the random guy’s jump at this point! :(
When Ash had made his way back up after the jump he looked pretty pleased, and told me that he wasn’t real that nervous, just took a few deep breaths and jumped - nutter! I told him about the camera dying and we agreed to look at the video that the company had filmed, and that we would buy that if it was any good. And it turns out it was pretty decent! It was from a camera in a box, like a security camera, but was pretty clear and good quality. In the end we got both of our videos on a disk and on Ash’s memory card for £10, so wasn’t too bad and at least we have footage of us both now :)
We would definitely recommend Jumpin Heights! It was a professional business, and we did our jump quite quickly - within half an hour of paying for it. It’s also super cheap compared to Oz/NZ! Anyway, here is a short video to show exactly what to expect... enjoy the terror on my face!