Wednesday, August 18, 2021

GOOD TREMORS ON THE GLASS BRIDGE

      Our 6th day (in 2019) started with great excitement as we were going to walk across the highest and longest glass-bottom bridge in the Guinness Book of World Records.

 Designed by Israeli architect Haim Dotan, the sky bridge in the WuLingYuan Forest National Park opened in 2016. It closed 13 days after for upgrading! It was designed to hold 800 people at any one time, but saw crowds of 80,000 per day.        

   Exiting from the cable car, the glass bridge was indeed exceedingly impressive. A "WOW" moment of the cliff-hugging mountains and sky. The bridge is 1,411 feet (430 metres) strung between two mountain peaks. 




The skywalk hangs above the ZhangJia Jie grand canyon at 984 feet, 300 metres.    

 The walkway is just large slabs of  transparent 3-layered tempered glass panels. Thank God, we did not have any fashionista with high heels trying to "wobble" across that day! 
SLOW SOFT steps to test the glass panels first! We were given cloth shoes to wear over our sneakers.
 I saw no shenanigans on the bridge. You know the ones on youtube where people are dragged screaming and begging for their lives across the bridge. Closest to that was a family who gingerly clung to the rails and crossed on the tiled instead of glass panels.
But, most were doing amazing acrobatic acts on the centre panels, 


"pretend" sky diving, 
selfies
and welfies galore.
Our Malaysian group was not going to be "usurped" by the China nationals so we had 
our "menfie" 


and "womenfie." Yeah, Malaysia Boleh!

   Such gravity-defying mega structures however do not come without accidents. In early 2019, there was one death as a tourist flew off a glass slide after rains made the glass bridge extra slippery. Six others were also injured on the same glass bridge in Guangxi. 

This is the view after crossing the mega structure. Newton's third law of motion says "what goes up must come down." Actually this is a derived version for the layman. Issac Newton actually said, "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." So, began our trek down from the sky starting with the "bullet" elevator ride.

These pictures were taken at ground zero when we finally reach descent after 2 1/2 hours of walking. We were those "ants" earlier in the morning. 
It was already almost mid-day. 
Final steps and onto the bus for a Korean lunch in China. 
"GEONBAE!" BOTTOMS UP! 

20 comments:

  1. Wow. What an incredible structure. I would have loved to have been there - but would have been VERY slow and cautious as I crossed. Thank you for the incredible images.

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  2. I wouldn't be anxious to cross that bridge, glass bottom or not!

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    1. Luckily I am not afraid of heights and was so eager to get onto the glass!

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  3. You are so brave, I am scared of heights so would not be doing that, haha!

    Hope your week is going well :)

    Away From The Blue

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    1. My daughter is sacred of heights too Mica, so Thank goodness she did not accompany me on this trip

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  4. Absolutely stunning!
    I would like to walk through the glass bridge.

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    1. I hope you get to visit China Giorgio and walk through this bridge, The feeling is incredible

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  5. benar benar memacu adrenalin kak! 😍, tapi pemandangan di atas memang luar biasa indah...agak deg degan tapi kalau nita yang jalan atau berdiri sambil kihat ke bawah...^_^

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  6. As a fan of any extreme activity particularly on height related, I love this bridge ❤️❤️. Saya bahkan pernah imagine seandainya di sana ada tempat untuk bungy jumping, I'll be in of course 😍😍...

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    1. Yeah Girl, I bet you will even do the bungee jumping from the centre of the bridge! Hope you get there after the pandemic

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  7. That looks very exciting and fun walking, sliding, and diving on the glass panes!! It's apparent how u guys enjoyed the terrific moment. Besides the natural wonder, the human-made structures are tremendously marvelous!

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    1. We are lucky to be living during this time where technology has made human-made structures so available for entertaiment. You are right Jeevan, marvelous indeed.

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  8. wow wow...whine ...i wanna do that. Fabulous photos too.

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    1. Yes, another fan of heights and adventure. Promise you will make a trip there one day and feel the adrenalin, Sandy

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  9. Oh my goodness!! I don't know that I could walk on it.......but what an experience if I did!

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    1. I am sure you can Patsy, you can start on the tile section and then slowly onto the glass and then onto the centre. Blog it when you get there!

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  10. Not sure how excited I would be to walk on it. But if I had chance I would hold my breath and do it.
    Coffee is on and stay safe

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    1. Yes Dora, you would hold your breath as the sky and mountains and valley is breath taking. But you won't be able to have hot coffee on the bridge as thermos is not allowed to be carried in! But coffee from a plastic bottle is OK.

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