Cloud9 Trampoline Park: We're All Jumping Fanatics Here

"Always remember that you are absolutely unique, just like everyone else."--Margaret Mead


Jumping fiends hear ye hear ye! There's a place where you can jiggle, wiggle, jump, flip, flop, cartwheel, and much more! Fitness over the years has taken a rather odd turn with runs where you throw color at each other, climb military inspired obstacles, jump into mud pits, and even
run in total darkness. While I love all of these, one of my favorites are trampoline parks.

We have one near me called Cloud9. I've been there 3 times now and absolutely love it. The military discount doesn't hurt either ;-)  We've always had to sign up hours in advance because they all sell out! Luckily this place is enormous so you can jump as crazily as you want without fear of round housing a kid across the room. At least their fall would be cushioned if the worst case scenario happened to you.

That being said, the whole floor is a criss cross of different sized trampolines with little cushioned walkways in between so you can maneuver without flopping around. Whatever you do DO NOT land on one. They look like they have some give, but my ankles and butt will tell you they feel like smashing on to cement after the soft, flexible wonderfulness that is the trampoline itself.

If simply jumping for 30 min or an hour depending on which session you chose is not your cup of tea never fear! There are foam pits you can jump into from varying heights and perform super amazing stunts on your way in. I'm pretty sure I looked slightly like I was flailing around while fighting off an army of bugs whenever I tried to do stunts, but it's the experience that counts. There is also a trapeze you can launch yourself into the pits with. They are surprisingly slippery, especially when you have no idea how sweaty you actually were until you're halfway through the air and falling. It might sound like I had a horrifying experience, but honestly it is fun beyond compare.

They even recently added a "parkour" esque like attraction where you can climb walls, heave yourself across rope walls and swing from tires across more foam pits. There's even a slack line!  I've gone with several friends and my boyfriend and we had a BLAST. I almost forgot! They have basketball "courts" where you can play extra bounce basketball, and you can also sign up for a dodgeball league. You really can't beat this place.

 The last time I went, I was with my former college roommate, Ellie. She was a closet trampoline expert and showed me up 1000% with all her fancy flips and donkey kicks. All the early times were sold out that day so we did a 9pm flight. We lucked out because it was the first adult only session of the night! They turned off all the lights and played essentially club music so we jumped around like crazies for an hour and had one of our favorite nights together this year!




 "I'm an idealist. I don't know where I'm going, but I'm on my way."--Carl Sandberg

Parkour

For those of you who have no idea what Parkour is, it is a sport invented in France and is basically street running and stunts.  Here's a video I found on youtube of the guys who do this in Leicester.

LPA (Leicester Parkour Association)

I met a friend in the dance program who was telling me he taught parkour classes. I, being slightly mental, had this thought process:

1. Sounds like a great workout
2. I liked stage combat so this could be cool
3. I've always wanted to feel like a ninja
4. Jumping off of objects is pretty cool

I'm sure my parents are going to add this to the ever growing list of things that is making them prematurely grey. Whoops.

I arrived with other beginners via taxi and hung around and watched the kids class. Kids don't really have fear. They hurl themselves at walls for fun so they made this look easy. After we paid, we (25 of us) were taken outside for a warm up. We ran around the basketball court, did sprints, jumping jacks, squats, stretches, more running and more squats. That was just the warm up...

We were divided up into skill level and then taken to our first station. It consisted of gymnastics equipment and benches. I can't find a picture on the internet so you guys get to view my amazing drawing skills.

 I feel like this needs some translation. The brown thing is a hurdle and the red creature looking thing is a stool behind it. The green is another large hurdle. We had to run at the brown hurdle put our hand on the wall and scrunch ourselves to make it over. Then we jumped on the floor once and onto the red stool and then directly onto the green hurdle and down to the floor. This was supposed to be fluid... I was not fluid. I jumped directly into the middle of the green one, but managed to drag myself over.

Station 2!

I loved this one! By far my favorite and the one where you could even say I excelled. There were 3 hurdles of various heights and we ran at them and jumped over in random ninja like ways. My butt didn't want to cooperate completely and decided to skid when it was supposed to fly over the hurdles. This was the only station where I didn't wipe out or faceplant.

Station 3... *Sigh*

I felt like I was in one of the movies that makes fun of people in gym class.... Here's a visualization of the stunt set up.

The ladder was attached to a wall with a yellow stool in front with another long bench in front.

We had to jump from the green to the yellow, which was easy enough. I'm pretty short so the distance was rather large... Then we had to fling ourselves at a ladder (there was a padded mat on it) and grab on and hold ourselves there.

Attempt 1: Bounced off the padding and landed on the floor

Attempt 2: Manged to grab with my hands and took the entire mat off the ladder and had it fling out across the floor

Attempt 3-5: Managed to grab on but with awful form

You may be asking yourself how the other beginners were doing?

They were ninjas.... I was the only person to wipe out on the majority of the stations. 

By the end of the hour and a half we spent rotating between stations my legs felt like jello. Were we done? Oh NO we were not...

For the next 30 min straight we did lunges, 10 min of squats, more lunges and then moved on to working out our arms. After that we got to have fun in the gymnastics room.

There was a giant squishy pad we were all trying to jump on and over. I managed to wow everyone again with my incredible falling skills. Man I'm talented.

After all of that I walked home and knew the next day was going to be a bad one for soreness. I went to bed barely able to sit down and woke up feeling like an 80 year old woman. It took me 3 days to be able to sit down without grunting loudly and to be able to dress myself without feeling like my muscles are trying to turn into the hulk. 

You may think I'm crazy, but I'm going back! 

I want to progress from the parkour equivalent of this:

To this:

 (I do not own the last 2 pictures)

While providing prime entertainment during the process. 

"An adventure may be worn as a muddy spot or it may be worn as a proud insignia. It is the woman wearing it who makes it the one thing or the other." -Norma Shearer