I was an air cadet for a few years, did a fair amount of flying between '07 and '10. Every time we went they'd show us this shite training/safety video that started with Harriers and Tornados and Hercules flying across the screen, before telling you that all these pilots have something in common, they all learnt to fly in this. It was kinda sad, kinda funny. Anyway.
The end of the video goes over what could go wrong, it said in the event of an emergency you might have to bail out. The pilot would say jump three times and you'd have to swan dive off the wing. They follow this up with the worst fucking green screen effects I've ever seen, with some kid being lowered to the ground in his parachute harness by someone up a step ladder off screen. Probably.

I know this sounds like some ridiculous, pointless ramble, but it's relevant I swear.

Even if we didn't end up flying on any particular day, we still had to watch that video. I saw it a few times and I always thought it was dumb. I also kinda hoped something would go wrong on my flight. I don't know whether it was because of how bad the end of the video was, or because I just wanted to know what it was like to jump out of a plane and parachute down to earth, but that's where my head was at.

Nearly 5 years ago to the day I went skydiving in Cairns, and it was the coolest fucking thing I've ever done. I'd spent so many years wanting to jump out of a perfectly functioning aircraft, and I got to do it.
The guy I was harnessed to was called Ben, and he was pretty cool too.
I'd been bungee jumping two days before, which was without doubt the most scared I've ever been. I bungee jumped from about 50m, skydived from 14,000ft. I happen to be scared of heights btw.
There's a weird disparity between the two activities. Bungee jumping, although over water, felt much more tangible a thing. The distance I was falling made much more sense in my head. I could see people below that looked like people.
When I went skydiving I was in free fall for about a minute, and then maybe 5 under the canopy. It was sort of surreal, but so bloody exciting, so god damn fun. But at the moment you leave the plane you've got very little reference for what you're doing. You can barely see vehicles for most of the fall, let alone people. But it's so exhilarating, I can't recommend it enough and i desperately want to go again some time.