The chain of events that brought Susanne and I together at Sandy Springs Adventure Park is pretty funny. So easily our day of extreme adventure might not have been.
Memorial Day weekend Susanne was going out of town with her family. They ended up deciding to stay local and go to Luray Caverns instead. We had the day free too and I invited my family (along with Mom/Jim) to go to Luray Caverns with them. While on the Luray Cavern's website I saw that they had a ropes course we could do with the kids after touring the caverns.
The ropes course was fun. Susanne and I could've spent many hours going back and forth over the various bridges. However, the dads (who weren't participating) were getting antsy and were ready to call it a day and start the drive back home. Susanne and I climbed down and said we'd love to do this again.
It doesn't take much before I was on the Internet looking up ropes course we could do closer to home. I found a place about an hour drive from where we live, Sandy Springs Adventure Park. Starting June 13th, they open to the public during the week. Susanne and I picked a Tuesday to go while the kids were still in school.
I can not think of a more worthwhile way to spend the day with the kids in school. We had just enough time to drive out there, listen to the safety briefing, and climb for the 3 hours you get with the paid admission. I made it back home with exactly 20 minutes to take a shower and get the kids from school.
Even though you are safely harnessed in, it takes amazing core strength, balance, upper body, and leg muscles to navigate from platform to platform. There are 13 trails to chose from. Each one is categorized in various difficulty and challenges. It is strongly recommended that you start out with an "easy" one before building up to the more challenging levels. As you progress through the trails, your elevation in the trees goes higher up in altitude. You don't even realize just how high up you are until you look down. Each trail ends with a zip line. The "bridges" going from one platform to another ranged from down right scary to silly to fun & easy.
There was this one skateboard platform that you stand on and take to the other side. I misjudged how unstable it was and stepped right up on it, thinking I would enjoy a smooth movement on wheels to my destination. Ha! The minute I stepped onto the platform, I instantly slipped and ended up straddling the shoe-box-sized piece of wood. Rather than try to get up, I decided to stay seated and transport myself that way to the other side. My resulting fall caused my upper arms to get banged up and bruised. It looks like I've been abused. Both upper arms have HUGE black and blue spots, broken blood vessels and big yellow areas from the black/blue marks. It's not very pretty! Especially in short-sleeve shirt weather. However, I wouldn't have changed a thing. The experience is not going to be worth it unless you give it all you got!
Another highlight was when we decided we had enough time to do one more trail before heading back home. We figured let's take it up a notch and really challenge ourselves. Go big or go home! Ha!! This trail involved us needing to get rescued. Susanne and I got to a point where we had to climb a ladder made of tree planks, that was not anchored to anything. The planks were almost as wide apart as I was tall. One of the staff members down below (Rachel) tried to advise us on how best to get from plank to plank. I managed to do it one time, but I knew it was going to be near impossible to repeat that 3 more times. Rachel shimmied up the tree next to us with a big pack on her back. She got to our platform and assembled a pully type device. Then Rachel lowered Susanne and I one at a time until we reached the ground. It was pretty impressive. This added to our adventure and was one of the highlights of my day.
There was this moment while we were out there that had me reflecting on my situation. Here I was a 42 (very soon to be 43) year old woman doing something that is traditionally left for the younger set. (In fact I think Susanne and I were the oldest people out there on the day we went.) I could've spent the day with the kids in school meeting a friend for lunch or going shopping...something very typical of a mom from the suburbs. However, my friend and I chose to do something new and different. Challenge ourselves and push our comfort zone. When I realized this while balancing on a very thin "tight rope" making my way to the next platform, I was full of pride that this is how we chose to spend our day. It was a proud moment indeed. These 40-something year old moms still got it! In fact after our rescue, this other staff member George told us that a lot of people need to get rescued at the same exact spot we did. He then went on to say that his mom was in her 40's and she wouldn't be caught dead out there doing what we were doing. :)
It was an amazing workout and I was sore in so many places for the next 2 days after our adventure. It even hurt to sneeze! What a great way to spend the day. What can be more healthy than challenging your body for 3 straight hours, being outdoors and doing something that is so much fun??
Susanne and I had a marvelous time. We can't wait to go back. They will open one day during the week (when they are normally closed in the Fall) if you get a group of 20 to come. I am pretty certain I have enough friends interested to get 20 without a problem. I can't wait to climb among the trees with the changing of the leaves and the cooler weather. Oh what fun that will be!
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