When we were making plans to come to Hawaii, I discovered two drop zones at the same airport - Skydive Hawaii and Pacific Skydiving. I envisioned them on opposite ends, but they are right next to each other. They share the same access road, runway, landing area, and view.  

Fortunately, I had a friend (Arvel) in Hawaii to help me pick. Pacific Skydiving was the place to go and he was coming to jump with us! We parked in the lot and Arvel came out to greet us. After a quick hello, he took us to fill out our waivers and helped us get checked in with experienced manifest.

During our drop zone briefing, we watched some tandems land. Surprisingly, there was NO wind! It was a very unusual weather day. At least we didn't have to deal with the "high winds" that we'd heard about. Everyone kept telling me how windy it would be. 

While we were getting ready, we asked about Skydive Hawaii.  Apparently, the two drop zones are like the Hatfields and McCoys! There were some interesting stories, but they aren't mine to tell! If you want to know more about it, you'll just have to go to Oahu and ask one of the locals! Since we only visited Pacific Skydiving, I will not be doing a review of Skydive Hawaii.

At the boarding area, Arvel talked about leaving in a train exit. We've done a bunch of train exits so I wasn't really paying close attention to what he was saying.

It wasn't long before we got on the Caravan with a few tandems and some local fun jumpers. Fortunately, it wasn't a full load so it was very comfortable!

On the way to altitude, one of the local guys was playing cards on his phone. I'd never seen someone doing that before.

This would be a bad thing for me to do on the plane!

At some point each day, I put my phone on my lap. I forget it's there until I stand up and it bounces on the ground. With my luck, my phone would leave the plane without me! 

When it was our turn to climb out, Arvel took the camera step facing me.  I was confused. I thought we were doing a three way train? It turns out that Arvel wanted to dock on my legs so that he could get a great shot of us over the island. This is now my FAVORITE skydiving picture!

What an amazing view!

When we were dirt diving, I did listen to part of what Arvel was saying! After we went to our bellies, we shared a kiss pass.

Then, Arvel docked on us.

When it was time to turn and track, I was the only one headed toward the ocean!

I ended up pulling a little high and had no problem making it back to the DZ.

Even though there was no wind, my landing was sweet! We got Hawaii! We did it!

I was thrilled to be able to cross it off my list. One of my biggest fears is that we'd travel all the way to Hawaii and something would go wrong, but it didn't! As a matter of fact, it couldn't have gone better! We were so lucky to have Arvel on your jump to capture the memory.

We packed our rigs in the carpeted packing area for experienced jumpers. There were rig racks, picnic tables, real bathrooms, running water, and plenty of friendly people. After we put our things in the car, we took a few pictures.

Arvel was headed to work and Matt and I were planning to explore the North Shore. Just before we left at 9:30, we told Arvel we were going to take Highway 83 to do some sight-seeing. He told us we'd be driving past where they filmed Jurassic Park - COOL! I wondered how much we could see before our 4:48 flight back to Kona. Time to get moving!