11. Argentina Boogie Time!

my first south american boogie!! i never imagined when i was little that i'd get to go to south america... or be a skydiver... or get to skydive in south america... or a boogie in south america. in skydiving a boogie is where a drop zone organizes a skydiving event where people come in from different countries, they hire pros to organize jumps and there is always a lot of celebration…and champagne. i had been to a lot of boogies at home in the U.S. but never one in such a foreign place.

friday night a group of us met for pre-boogie drinks. dasha and ale are very talented wingsuit fliers so they flew in the pro sebastian alvarez and his super, super badass, very successful skydiving/proximity flying/all things amazing girlfriend roberta mancino. they joined us that night and it was inspiring to hear about their accomplishments- like flying over active volcanoes in their wingsuits. once again i immediately felt welcomed by the skydiving group in argentina. dasha had us into her house for dinner – and lots of wine- and then the 5 of us slept over for a quick 4 hours of sleep.

i drove to the skydive lobos that morning with juan who taught me how to dance to mr. roberto music and be ridiculous with our lack of sleep. the drop zone was in stunning countryside of argentina- many fields, horses, open space.

walking into the lobos dropzone i realized it never occurred to me that spanish boogies would yes, obviously, be in spanish. the manifest person announcing the flights only spoke spanish and i laughed that i never thought of that part. she was such a sweetheart and we became friends over laughing at my spanish.

despite my nerves about the language, i felt so excited as people welcomed me in as the only american. i love you all for putting up with my limited spanish and working your brains to speak your second/third/fourth language with me! everyone worked hard to explain in english the parachute packing system, the manifest system, food system- all of which is different than in the U.S.

that night 10 of us stayed at this tiny family run hotel near the dropzone. we all crashed hard after a late friday night and amazing jumps all of Saturday.

once again that peace of being in the sky made me feel so at home even though everything was so different. finding those friends at the same skill level, someone buying me a bottle of red wine to have at the boogie, playing under canopy over the beautiful views, sunset free fly jumps, those high fives after jumps, blowing kisses in the plane, learning from the best- i'll remember forever.