July 18 Zipline! (Day 295)
A very early morning walk through the tunnel and down the steps towards the beach had to be cut short because we had a big day in store!
We drove into Omiš to meet other adventurers for a Zipline course over the Cetina river canyon!
The older part of town with Mirabella fortress overlooking it. This 13th century fortress protected the pirates of Omiš who would retreat with their ships into the safety of the Cetina Gorge upriver!
The Cetina river flows from The Eye of Kroatien, a spring north and west fed from the mountains across the border in Bosnia, to its outlet in Omiš.
A brand new bridge spans the end of the gorge of the Cetina river. The highway allows a bypass of the town.
Eleven fellow adventurers climbed into vans along with several guides for the short ride up the gorge to the ‘jumping off’ spot. First we had to gear up with the harness and practice on a short section of cable to insure we knew how to sit and most importantly, how to brake! This is the first zipline that we’ve done that requires the user to actively work brakes on the pulley system you are hanging from! It is a simple matter of lifting the pulley brake pad off the cable, or pressing the brake pad down onto the cable. You just need to know when to not brake and when to brake, or you will crash into the landing or not make it to the landing and have to pull yourself in hand over hand! We all passed the initiation and proceeded to hike about 15 minutes to the first of 8 zipline cable crossings!
High up above the river canyon you can’t quite see out to sea! The hazy skies hint at the humidity and heat we will experience today! You can see the anchor cable in the middle forefront, follow it to see the yellow helmets of the guides at the first platform.
Robert is assessing the zipline route, the first and the longest of the 8!
Since both your hands need to be on the cable brake you can’t take any pictures during your ride.
So here’s Robert, coming in for a landing!
And here on another route, he sticks the landing!
Our second to last ride, does the river look any closer? The routes zigzag down the forested canyon, sometimes through trees, crossing the river twice before a short hike to the road to catch the vans.
It was an exhilarating 3 hour journey from first van ride to returning to town. It was beautiful zipping through or over the forest, with a brisk breeze created by your speed as you descend the cable by power of gravity! It was sometimes hard to focus on the guide at the incoming platform giving you signals to brake or not brake because you wanted to look around and down at the river! Yesterday we changed our time slot from 10 am to 8am, thank goodness because by the time we got back it was too hot to do anything else for the rest of the day! For more information and great videos click here on Zipline Croatia Omiš!