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 Travel & Outdoors | December 2005 
Traveler's Leap of Faith Offers Salvation from the Humdrum
 Cindy Loose - Washington Post
| | The original Canopy Tour was in Costa Rica, but the adventures have spread to the jungles of Belize (above) and to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. |
The mind is an amazing instrument.
For example, I'm terrified of roller coasters and won't get on them even when I know they've been developed and tested by stellar engineers and are maintained by famous, responsible companies such as Disney.
Yet here I am in a forest in Mexico, standing 72 feet in the air on a platform less than 2 feet wide. I'm ready to leap off and zip along a cable high above the forest floor for hundreds of feet until I come to another tree - where I'm trusting a stranger to keep me from crashing into it, should I fail to slow myself by gripping the cable with the right amount of tension.
But my mind, you see, has accepted the illusion that I have control, because one of my gloved hands is holding the cable, and the other hand is holding a rope attached to both the cable and a harness I'm wearing. Not only am I not terrified, but I'm rather enjoying it.
So are a lot of other people.
About a million have lined up to take an Original Canopy Tour since 1997, when Darren Hreniuk opened his first in Costa Rica. Since then, other companies have opened similar adventures, which they sometimes call sky treks or zip-line tours.
Currently, there are dozens, and they've spread from Costa Rica, where they were first popularized as a tourist attraction, to Nicaragua, Mexico, Belize, Jamaica and Africa. Watch for more: It's a hot trend about to explode.
For now, you can zip through tropical rain forests or jungles, over an extinct volcano or within view of waterfalls. It requires only a leap of faith.
Zipping through trees
I discover, while planning for a trip to Puerto Vallarta, that the activity has migrated to Mexico and sign up for an Original Canopy Tour, one of at least three canopy tours conducted outside the resort town in western Mexico.
With about a dozen other tourists in Puerto Vallarta, I board the back of an open-air truck fitted with benches for the hourlong ride into the Sierra Madre. I'm thinking the ride is going to be my favorite part of the tour, given my fear of heights and speed.
It doesn't help to know there are no industrywide safety standards for canopy tours, and no oversight body.
But I'm comforted on arrival to find that staff members say they have been given months of training, and one staffer is assigned to every two visitors. The manager says the company has never had a serious accident - in fact, the only accidents have been to people who stumbled on the ground on the way to the trees.
We put on helmets and step into harnesses that are pulled snug against our waists and legs. A series of steps up the side of a mountain leads us to a tree with two parallel cables wrapped around it.
I've since been assured by engineers that one well-maintained cable is sufficient to hold not only a person, but a house. But that second cable gives me the courage to jump off the side of the mountain and go sailing across the valley. A rope from my harness is attached to a pulley that's attached to both cables, so even if one cable breaks, I'm going to reach the platform at the next tree.
I'm wearing nifty leather rappelling gloves. Before leaping, I reach behind my head and grab one of the cables with my right hand. If I put no tension on that cable, I will zip across the forest at breakneck speed. But I can slow myself down by applying pressure.
My guide has gone ahead and is waiting on the far platform, both to remind me to slow down at the proper point and to prevent me from smashing into the tree should I fail to follow his simple instructions.
Each zip line I zoom along gets a bit more fun, because I'm less apprehensive every time. After the first couple of zips I can't wait to zip again, but that's partly because I feel so nervous about standing still on the little platforms. Explain that to a rational mind.
Of the nine zip lines on this course, the longest stretches 272 feet. The highest platform from which you jump is 72 feet above the forest floor.
The tour takes about two hours, and at the end I am euphoric. At the same time, like any explorer who has endured hardship with fun, I'm glad to have returned to solid ground and be done with it.
I won't likely repeat this exact canopy tour, because I've been there and done that. But throw in a volcano, a jungle with maybe some monkeys, a view of an ocean or waterfall, and I'll be up there again, zipping through life, exhilarated. |
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