My family aren’t ones to sit around all day while on vacation. Every day there’s a new activity, from tubing, kayaking and swimming to running, volleyball and singalongs (yes, really!).

One of my favorite activities during our reunion was when we went zip lining at The Gorge. The Gorge has the steepest zip lines in America, and you descend 1100 feet on zip lines spanning 1.25 miles.

Only the bravest in the family went zip lining! We went in two groups, the cousin group and the adult group (I know technically we’re all adults, but it really doesn’t feel like it!). The cousin group had Michaela, me, Julia, Robby, Blair, Paul, Andrew and Colin.

And the “adult” group had Aunt Colleen, Uncle Steve, my parents, Uncle Vic and Aunt Elizabeth!

They had a lot of fun.

But we had more fun!

The adventure featured 11 zip lines, which started off smaller and gradually got more intense. My cousins were cheering me on before the first one, and kept teasing me with “Crashley” and “Smashley” nicknames. Our guides thought it was hilarious, and kept calling me Crashley the entire day! Thanks family!

One of the things that I loved about this zip line experience is that the guides brought a camera with them and took amazing pictures throughout the entire day! So we didn’t need to worry about bringing and dropping our phones, and we still ended up with great photo memories. And you know that I’m all about the photo memories!

In addition to the 11 zip lines, The Gorge adventure has 3 rappels.

All of Julia’s pictures look like advertisements for The Gorge, don’t they?!

There was also a swaying, rickety bridge, which wasn’t scary until Robby started jumping on it while I was walking across!

After a crazy, exhilarating day, we had one final rappel. The guides joked that if we didn’t hit the bullseye then we would have to walk back to the base. Everyone made it except for Andrew. Enjoy that walk, Andrew!

The Gorge zip lining was SO much fun, and our guides were phenomenal. I highly recommend it next time you’re in North Carolina!

To find out more about The Gorge, click here.

…and for the record, I neither smashed nor crashed!

~A