wild? i was absolutely livid

You can't just sit around in the pub on a Bank Holiday Monday, can you? Well, obviously you can, if you want to, and good luck to you. But as we were over near the M50 corridor on Monday lunchtime we decided that we should indulge in some outdoor activity in the way back to Newport. And what better way than by visiting Go Ape! in the Forest of Dean?

For the uninitiated, Go Ape! is a high-wire-based forest adventure site (well, sites, there are 20-odd of them) where you clamber, swing, plummet, etc. through the forest canopy over a series of obstacles (and via a series of tree platforms). Their home page has some embedded video, but more clips can be found here, including one of a trip down the UK's longest zip wire in Aberfoyle in Scotland, which looks pretty awesome. All perfectly safe as you are harnessed and karabinered on at all times (well, at least, you are if you're following the instructions in the safety briefing you got at the start).

I hadn't been down a zip wire since I was about 11, but they're pretty easy, especially as you can feel the tension in the wire before you step off the platform - that's me in the picture executing a textbook high speed sliding two-heels-one-buttock landing at the bottom of one of them. The swing into the big cargo net requires slightly more bottle as you do get a second or so of free fall before the wire goes taut and you twang face first into the net. I recommend the whole experience highly to anyone who doesn't instantly get the screaming abdabs with heights; if you do it's probably best avoided. There's always the pub.

Anyway, you can take your camera with you, as long as you attach it round your neck with a lanyard with a safety release thingy so you won't get strangled if it catches on something. Photos can be found here, if you want them.