Ziplining Maui

The name of this adventure starts with the first syllable of a feature on your pants. 

That was clue #3 of 3 that I gave Jordan in order to figure out what we were doing for his Maui birthday surprise. Ziplining!

It was both of our first times zipping down a mountain, and the canyons above Kaanapali were the perfect setting for a birthday-themed adventure. So we piled into the off-road van and the 14 of us – 12 zippers and 2 guides – made our way up the winding, bumping, red dirt road.

Preston and Pat were our guides. I appreciated their alliterating names and their complementary personalities. Preston – a zipline guide by day and reggae singer by night – “graced” us with his melodies and obviously recycled jokes. Pat – soft-spoken until he wasn’t and last year’s supposed Employee of the Year – offered a more subdued humor that you had to pay attention to notice: little mumblings under his breath and off the wall comments like “Have you guys seen We Bought a Zoo?...great movie.”

At the top awaited 8 lines averaging about 500 feet in length and varying in height off the ground. As you would expect, the lines got longer as we went along, so as we got more comfortable we had the time to look around and enjoy the impressive view.

Looking down on Lahaina. 

On an adventure scale of 1 to scary, I’d give ziplining a cool 5. Before I explain why, I should mention that I think Splash Mountain at Disneyland is scary. It’s true that I’ve bungeed jumped before, but that was an isolated incident brought on by post-Australia identity confusion. So really, you should consider me a bit of baby when it comes to thrills. That said, ziplining was not scary; I’d put it somewhere in between surfing (not scary) and mountain biking (kind of scary). It’s like white water rafting – a perfectly approachable outdoorsy adventure. 

Here’s a video of me on one of the middle lines (with a bit of narration from Preston).

We were also invited to take running starts and curl up into a ball once on the line in order to maximize speed and fun. Here’s a video of Jordan doing a running start.

At the end of the final line, the group surprised Jordan with a round of "Happy Birthday" that sufficiently embarrassed him. Mission accomplished. 

Me and the birthday boy.

I'm curious: Where have you ziplined?