Monday 19th February 2007. Auckland, New Zealand.

Well I am in New Zealand the home of the bungy and so here I go...







Though technically not a bungy I threw myself off the Sky Tower making me the day's first jumper.

At 328 metres the Sky Tower is the tallest tower in the southern hemisphere where you can leap from 192m plummiting to the ground below at around 85kph with the thrill taking all of about 14 seconds.

As the first jumper it was a good job the wire held; though I heard from a Lancashire couple who had been watching the spectacle from the Sky Deck that they were not sure I would go through with it.

Built as a tourist, broadcasting and telecommunications facility the Sky Tower is the twelfth largest tower in the world and is 8m taller than the Eiffel Tower. Designed to withstand winds of up to 200kph the building is capable of swaying one metre at restaurant level. Opened on August 3rd 1997 the building is anchored by 8 reinforced concrete legs.

Well back to my jump. Technically this is not a bungy but a base jump. Base jumping being the latest extreme sport craze to be taking the world by storm. The jump from the Sky Tower is not only the highest jump in the southern hemisphere, it is also the highest base jump by wire in the world...and once you have jumped over the edge the only way is down (all 192m) and it was awesome dude!!!

Oh and it was in 1988 that the world's first permanent bungy was opened at Kawarau Bridge in Queenstown.

I had hoped also to climb up the inside of the tower, but Vertigo is closed for a few months for repairs.

So after my jump I headed back up the tower the conventional way, by elevator to the main observation level where strangely enough I was more frightened of walking across the glass floor than jumping from above??

Later as I left the elevator at the Sky Deck, I was welcomed by a South African lady saying to her husband..."he is the nut that jumped".

Like most jumpers I forgot to bend my knees and hit the ground with quite a thud.

Anyway I celebrate my first ever jump by having lunch at Dine by Peter Gordon at the cities Grand Hotel.

The last fifteen years have seen New Zealand food and wine take on the world and Chef's are stars in some eyes...rarely mine!

Peter Gordon took his virtuoso Pacific Rim cooking style and shook up tastebuds in London at The Sugar Club and The Providores...he didn't shake mine!

The food here was ok but the service was appalling. Too many beautiful people staring in the mirror and ignoring the customer. As the only customer there I felt that I was intruding on the waiters attempts to catch each others eye...bit of a gooseberry feeling.

So after lunch I took a long walk along the trendy waterfront where the myriad of America's Cup yachts are berthed. My journey took me from Market Square to Westhaven Marina where I decided that I needed to do the Bridge Climb.

The Auckland Harbour Bridge took four years to construct and was officially opened in May 1959. It may not be as iconic as the Sydney Harbour Bridge but to this city it provides just as vital a link to both the North Shore and economic vibrancy.

The bridge was the last lattice girder bridge built in the world and in its construction some 6,500 tonnes of concrete and 14,300 tonnes of steel were used. At 3,597ft long the bridge actually carried some 20,980 cars on its first day.

Traffic was a problem...seems strange I know for a bridge designed to carry traffic...but in the first three months of its life, over one million vehicles crossed the bridge and so the designers were sent back to the drawing board. The answer, the Nippon Clip-Ons that were added some ten years later to provide for four lane traffic each way.

The Clip-Ons were the idea of two Japanese university students and were constructed between 1966 and 1969. In total six piers support the bridge which rises to a height of 67m above the water when we reach the summit.

From our vantage point above the harbour which is crowded with yachts in sail you can see why they call this the City of Sails.

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Further to yesterday's conversation about New Zealand as a hot bed of social reform...The 1980's was also a period of major reform in New Zealand. In 1984 a fourth Labour government came to power and adopted an anti-nuclear policy that was in contrast to established Western wisdom at a time when the Cold War was still very much a reality. The government of New Zealand was indeed a contrast between left and right wing policy as it was also the home of market driven economic reforms.

Any middle class concerns over the anti-nuclear stance though were ended when the French sank the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland Harbour. This act of international terrorism against the anti-nuclear movement galvanised national support behind the governments' policy.