“The Best Day Ever!”

It’s a big call, but 3 out of 4 of us said that after spending the morning zip-lining through the forest near Launceston. Angus had a ball too, but he preferred the Platypus House experience. We had to book our zip-lining tour online, and I was half hopeful that Angus would choose to do the Segway option instead so I could chicken out with him. Sadly he didn’t choose that and my comfort-zone was well and truly stretched! He tried to change his mind when we got there, but it was all already booked and paid for by then.

We had to be at Hollybank Treetops by 9.15 for our 3 hour adventure, making for an early morning wake up for Lexie. After a short safety intro we were off zooming through the trees. 14 different ziplines, ranging up to 400 metres long! We started easily by being only 2m up in the air, but quickly got as high as 23m and then 50m up in the air. Eek.

The harnesses were incredibly comfortable. They had little built in swing seats, so they weren’t your normal safety harness. We could comfortably lay back and curl our legs up to build up even more speed. Because of course everyone wanted to do that… Well 2 out of 4 of us did!

The platforms (called cloud stations) are amazing. They are clamped to the living tree in such a way so it doesn’t interfere with the tree itself. This means the tree is living which means it sways in the wind! Freaky when it happens. The stations are solid metal bars to hold onto, and metal rings on the base, but the matting is a flexible rubber which really adds to that sense of security. Not!

Three hours took us on a circuit through the trees getting higher and higher each time. It culminates in two really long zip lines which take you over and along the river with absolutely amazing views. One of the girls in our group was incredibly scared of heights and missed all those views, as she spent the entire time ‘flying’ with her eyes shut! I was brave enough to even let go of the straps occasionally! Yay!! Angus didn’t quite get to that stage, but he did do every flight without a hitch. We are so proud of ourselves.