“I was terrified, hardly able to turn my photography brain on. ’Five. Four. Three…’ I was shaking trying to stick to my pre-composed frame ...”
Six of us set out for Frenchmans Cap, the most prominent peak in the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park in Tasmania. Looking at everyone’s enormous backpacks and drunken walking style, I wasn’t the only one feeling like gravity had been dialed up to 11.
Collective suffering can do wonders to lessen your own though, and it helps when you’re wandering through a paradise. We passed beautiful button grass plains, navigated tarns and lakes, and fought up the unforgivingly-steep Barren Pass – each painful step bringing us closer to our goal to climb up, BASE jump off and somehow make a movie about it.
We spent the night at the summit and woke into the beautiful sunrise that only mountain bivvies can deliver. Back then I had never seen a BASE jump, let alone shot one. I was terrified, hardly able to turn my photography brain on. ’Five. Four. Three…’ I was shaking trying to stick to my pre-composed frame “…Two. One. See ya.” The camera fired, the whistling of the tracking suit faded, I could not breath then relief and exhilaration as I heard the bang of the canopy opening far below. Far out… still trembling, I stared at the tiny dot.
In BASE jumping it’s bloody obvious what’s at stake, there is no sugar coating with bolts, cams or hiding behind your mate’s belaying skills. This is it, I thought, the pure love for what you do that cannot be faked to show off in front of your mates.
BASE jumper Pete Wyllie (@petewyllie), Frenchmans Cap, Tasmania, Australia
If you want to see the film of the project put together by our friends from Mission Control Collective go HERE.