Gravity wants to pull me 3,300 feet down the mountain. All that stands between us is a cold metal gate.
Three. Two. One.
The gate swings open and I'm hurtling through the air – my hair whipping, my eyes watering. The only thing I hear is the sound of the wind and the whirring of metal against cable as I fly over trees, skiers and snowboarders.
I'm riding the newest addition to the Lake Tahoe playground – the Heavenly Flyer is the longest zip line in the continental United States.
"There aren't many of them out there," says Russ Pecoraro, director of communications at Heavenly Mountain Resort. "Plus, with the views at Heavenly and the fun adrenaline rush – it's an experience you won't get in other places."
Heavenly is banking on its crowning jewel – an unobstructed view of Lake Tahoe – by offering visitors another way to see the vista of deep blue lake embraced by snowcapped mountains.
Popularized by the forest canopy tours of Costa Rica and Mexico, zip lines are systems of pulleys and cables that rely on gravity to send riders soaring through the air. The zip line at Heavenly, the first in the Lake Tahoe region, is an effort to make the resort a year-round destination.
The ride lasts 80 seconds, drops you 525 feet – about the height of Seattle's Space Needle – while you glide 20 to 150 feet above the ground at up to 50 mph.
Construction began over the summer and was supposed to be completed in December, but delays – including the January storms and recent windy days – pushed the Heavenly Flyer's opening to last week.
Some of the first riders raved.
"The speed and the freedom – it was like flying," said Cathy Rolewicz, 38, a Chicago police detective.
"I was tucking myself to go faster," said Spencer Chaffin, 15, of Monterey.
"I loved the view and the speed," said Sally Parks, 61, of Jacksonville, Fla., who rode the zip line along with a group of her girlfriends, now in their late 50s and early 60s, on one of their biannual girls' trips.
"It's the closest thing to flying," says Glen Sargent 34, of Oklahoma City, who rode the zip line with his wife, Jennifer, as part of their 10th wedding anniversary trip.
Heavenly's zip line experience begins with a ride up the gondola and a short walk to the Adventure Peak hut for a ticket.
There's the requisite signing away of your rights. And a step onto a large scale that cleverly conceals your actual weight and simply says "yes" or "no" to whether you weigh between 75 and 275 pounds. You also have to stand between 4 feet, 4 inches and 6 feet, 8 inches tall.
Then it's a ride up Tamarack Express – the lift operators stop the lift at the top to let you off safely without skis or snowboards – and then a trek to the top of the wooden launching platform, elevation 9,600 feet.
It's here, while staring down the mountain, that the nerves kick in. Those trees look kind of small; the lake seems really, really far away. And the pair of cables – the ones I'm about to trust my life to – seem more like dental floss.
The friendly operators tell me this is the scariest part. No one to date has chickened out at this point, they say.
So as not to cluck, I awkwardly climb into the red chair, get carefully strapped in and lean my knees against the gateway, my entire body weight balancing on the latched door.
There's a quick tutorial: Ball up as much as you can to go faster. Kick out one leg or the other to spin around. Stick out your arms like wings to feel like a bird.
The police detective from Chicago jets out the other door and we're both cruising down the parallel zip lines. It's like bombing straight down a ski slope, but smoother. The trees make a blurry green carpet, disjointed voices of skiers and snowboarders comment as we whiz by, and the diners at Adventure Peak Grill look up to find the source of that zipping noise.
Then it's over. As I speed toward the landing platform, I wonder how the thing stops. Before I can think too much about it, the pulley hits a giant spring and I swing abruptly to a standstill.
At about 38 cents a second (if you already have a lift ticket, that is), it's an expensive but thrilling way to check out the view.
Wait, I forgot to look.
Call The Bee's Gina Kim, (916) 321-1228.
