Zip Lining

Juju & Leela’s field notes land here soon — this one’s still around the campfire. 🔥

THE DEEPER STORY ⚡

A zipline is gravity doing all the work: you climb the height, clip onto a steel cable, and trade that height for speed the whole way down. And here’s the fun part — heavier riders go faster. More weight means more pull from gravity against roughly the same air resistance, which is why Dad kept arriving first.

Modern ziplining was invented by scientists. In the 1970s, biologists in Costa Rica strung cables through the rainforest canopy so they could study the treetops without disturbing them. Word spread that flying through the jungle was the best part of the job, and the canopy tour was born.

Georgia turned it into a world record: Historic Banning Mills, southwest of Atlanta, holds the Guinness World Record for the longest continuous zip line canopy tour on Earth.

TRIP FACTS 📍

When: August 23, 2024

The physics: heavier riders go faster — same drag, more gravity

Invented by: 1970s rainforest biologists in Costa Rica

Georgia’s claim: the world’s longest zip line canopy tour, at Historic Banning Mills

IF THIS GRABBED YOU… 🐇

How zip lines actually work → adventure.howstuffworks.com/zip-line1.htm

The whole history of the zip line → en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zip_line

Historic Banning Mills, the record holder → historicbanningmills.com