Auckland's Adrenaline Rush

Thrill seekers come from thousands of miles and spend good money to jump from a silver spaceship high over the city of Auckland. Not a ‘real’ spaceship, mind you, but a bungee platform beneath the Auckland Harbor Bridge bolted into the buttressing 130 feet above the water.

For travelers to New Zealand, attempting their first bungee jump is often high on their list of things to do. Those who make the trek but are then ready to chicken out at the last second would do well to heed the advice of the jumpmaster, which may make the prospect of hurling yourself out over the water with nothing but a string tied to your ankle a little less foreboding. “Walking out to the edge is the hard part. Once you’re there and the countdown is complete, don’t wait. Just jump.”

“I still get a little nervous every time I jump,” said Sam Allen, the Auckland sales manager for AJ Hackett Bungy, Harbor Bridge’s bungee operator. “And that’s half the fun. You’re meant to be scared. It’s an adrenaline rush.”

Allen likes to tell particularly nervous people, those wavering about whether or not to bungee, about the awesome sense of achievement folks typically feel right after a jump. “It’s really rewarding. Once you’ve done it, you’re going to feel amazing and feel like you’ve really accomplished something.”