Shakesville - Latest Comments in Welcome to "The Ledge"

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

car — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 10:12:09 -0000

It's openness that bothers me, so I guess I might be able to handle the tower balcony. I'm perfectly fine in planes, a little woozy looking out from windows in high stories, but put me out in the open, where I can feel wind? It's all over. Even if there's a solid concrete ledge as high as my neck, if I can feel wind whipping around me, nuh-uh. Ferris wheels are terrible. Strangely, roller coasters are ok, but mostly because it's moving so fast I don't have time to think about the height.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Sarah from Chicago — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:40:25 -0000

Rana -

I can see how that would happen ... I love flying, all flying. When I was little I am told I used to sleep through take-offs, even in the jumbos. I was actually originally training (going through flight school, etc) to go into the NZRAF, but ended up not because I didn't want to give that many years of my life away (you can be out as gay in the NZ armed forces). I am hoping to get my pilot's licence after I start my career if I have time.

I still adore looking down from whatever plane I am in, watching the land so far below. My utter favourite is up in a glider, banking on a tight turn and there's nothing between you and the ground but the bubble-canopy, and you can hear the wind rush by as there is no engine noise. One time I was up above Omarama in the summer-time, in amongst the Southern Alps, the mountains surrounding us, and we stayed up there seemingly forever.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

KevinBaker — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:31:59 -0000

Okay, that looks awesome...I totally want to go. I'm pretty much like Liss when it comes to heights...it's not that I'm not scared, but I love it.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Rana — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:11:21 -0000

Kathy_A - I'm with you on the glasses thing. I have a reflexive grab for the earpiece when I lean over things like balconies!

Sarah in Chicago - what's funny is that I have no problems with small planes, even in turbulence. It's the big super-jumbos that mess with me. I think perhaps it's because that small-plane kind of motion is easier for my body to understand, while with the biggies, it's this weird yawing sensation that messes with my inner ear. Bleah.

Agreeing with everyone who's saying it's less about the heights themselves and more about the falling.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

LS — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 09:47:46 -0000

I'm with TrabbsBoy -- I have less a fear of heights and more a fear of my own klutziness. Which is kinda weird because I'm not much of a klutz. But balconies, cliff edges, open fire-escape-like staircases, anything where it's possible to fall, and I'm not much good past the 2nd story. Mountains with nice slopes or enclosed viewing platforms like this one don't bother me 'tall. LOVED the London Eye. Also with Rikibeth -- rollercoasters ROCK, but you won't get me to open my eyes on the first climb for love or money. And the ones that take up up that first hill backwards? I'll wave at you from the ground, thanks.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

IanTheReader — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:53:09 -0000

I wonder if there would be a significant difference in the sensation of standing in a glass booth that high and the sensation of watching the ground get farther and farther away while a plane climbs with the door open.

I went skydiving not too long ago, and once the plane hit something along the lines of two thousand feet, they 'turned on the air conditioner'. I was getting a video done, so I was right at the front, next to the open door, and was able to watch as everything got smaller and smaller. Quite the interesting experience, let me tell you. Rather more memorable than the skydiving itself, to tell the truth, but that might just be because all I can really remember about the fall is the adrenaline.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Cactus_Wren — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:37:32 -0000

Oh, I'd love that! I want to go up to the Grand Canyon Skywalk: but I'll have to go on it alone, because my housemate doesn't like heights at all.

I rather like them, but I can't climb a freestanding ladder -- not even a short little stepstool, beyond the first rung. I have a balance problem, and cannot overcome the absolute certainty that the faintest wobble will increase until the ladder simply ceases to be under me. (I was the same way watching that Caminito del Rey video, during the parts where the camera operator walks along the metal support beam.) Heights in themselves don't bother me at all.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

pbrim — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 01:20:12 -0000

When I was a kid, we went to California every summer to visit kin. Most summers we went to Sequoia National Park and climbed Moro Rock. My mother is terrified of heights, but everytime she had to go up with us, eyes closed, clinging to the rail, so she could stand in the middle and yell at us "You kids get away from that railing! Your great-aunt Florence almost fell off of there, you know!*". She had to do it, because dad would be leaning over the rail with us, no help at all. The sacrifices you make for your kids!

* About 1907 or so my great grandparents were touring Sequoia with their family and climed up the Rock, a much more ardous climb in those days. The top of the rock is crowned, sloping away to the edges, and there was no rail. It was a misting, wet day, and family legend has it my great aunt (then 8 yo) slipped on wet rocks with muddy shoes. She was sliding towards the edge when some man caught her by her braids and stopped her.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Kristen - A Moon Shaped Fool — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:54:32 -0000

That would be torture for me. Torture.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Nina — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:44:24 -0000

Ooh, I would go out on that (albeit, slowly to test my weight). My husband, however, gets sick just looking at the Sears Tower from the ground. He's with you, Sarah in Chicago - he has no trouble with cliffs, mountains, trees, anything natural, but is terrified of tall buildings! He explains it as a fear of man-made structures brought on by years of engineering. He knows all the things that could go wrong and can't convince himself to trust the designers and builders.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Rikibeth — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:27:52 -0000

This is me not watching the video! I am TERRIBLE with high buildings and glass enclosures, had to be heavily coerced to go up the Eiffel Tower and couldn't look outwards except through the viewfinder of my camera, and have categorically refused to go on Ferris wheels for several years now. When they dismantled the Giant Ferris Wheel at Six Flags New England a couple of years ago, I was very happy.

Strangely enough, I LOVE roller coasters. I'm a huge fan of inversions and helix turns, and the drops aren't the bad part -- the bad part is the lift hill!

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

TheSeaHag — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:05:11 -0000

Oh, crap. I didn't realize the floor was glass, too! I watched this with my husband, and I will let his reaction speak for both of us: "No. Fucking. Way." I'm not afraid of heights, but I am afraid of falling, and this would, at the very least, trigger a bout of vertigo that would have me hugging the (OMGTRANSPARENT) floor.

Now, gather round, children, and let me tell you a story. Imagine a young SeaHag, trooping off to the (otherwise empty) school cafeteria with her eighth grade band class for a photo. She's just barely chubby, but she's always been a tall, big-boned girl and has been made to feel like she's absolutely huge by some classmates. So when the rest of the class piles onto one of the long lunch tables for the picture, she hangs off to the side. She just knows what will happen if she hops up on that table. Slowly, she edges closer. Finally, she rests her hands on a corner of the table and is about to just lean on it when, under the wriggling pile of a couple dozen overexcited adolescents, it collapses. And, as one, they all turn and yell at her as though she caused it.

Logically, I know that I did no more than touch that table, but I guess the experience left an impression because it was the first thing I thought of when I saw that glass floor. And I'm a lot heavier now.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

TrabbsBoy — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:46:36 -0000

They have one of these in the CN Tower in Toronto, and I really had no problem with it.

As teenagers, my friends and I used to stand on the sidewalks of metal-grate bridges and stare through the roadway of the bridge at the water deep in the gorge below, then jump. It was a four inch jump, but it did make your heart skip.

It's funny that this kind of thing doesn't bother me, because I think of myself as being terrified of heights. But I guess what I'm really scared of is my own clumsiness, so the top of a ladder or a cliff 10 feet away is scary because I think I'm going to do something worthy of CaitieKat's last QOD!

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

DW — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:18:02 -0000

There is no way on this green earth I will ever see that sight. When I saw the photos, I had a visceral reaction I could only describe as part tightening and part shutting down. That glass would have to be, like, four inches thick before I would even consider it. Oh - and three feet off the ground.

Last year, I went to the top of Barnegat Lighthouse and couldn't even step out and onto the caged in walk at the top. I stood clutching the doorway and then I very slowly quickly (if that makes sense) white knuckled my way back to the bottom.

Terra firma, baby.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Kathy_A — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:53:08 -0000

I wouldn't mind this, but I hate looking over the edge of things at a great drop. Not due to vertigo or any fear of heights, but it's a fear of losing my glasses--what if they fell off my nose while I was looking down?

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

BigDots — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:14:43 -0000

@ Constant Comment: My family went to St. Louis when I was six, and as we drove in, my parents pointed out the Arch, saying we'd go there the next day. I was absolutely terrified because I thought it was a giant slide--you walk up one side, sit down, and slide down the other. No way was I doing that, lol!

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

maystone — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:09:41 -0000

Oh, no no no no no no. Not for me, thanks. The funny thing is that looking straight down isn't the problem - looking outward is what freaks me the most. When that little girl was leaning against the window, I actually yelled at the screen, "Get away from there!"

I don't even like sitting in balconies, because they feel insubstantial. A glass booth suspended that high up? I'll leave it to brave souls like Liss. Cool link, though.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

EKSwitaj — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:02:30 -0000

I sooo want to go there now, especially since I never managed to get one of the free tickets to go up the Petronas Towers when I was in Kuala Lumpur.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Mr Furious [not Todd] — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:01:51 -0000

Um...I don't think so.

And I wouldn't let my kids out on it either...

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Constant Comment — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:58:07 -0000

As a former Chicago tour guide, I've been up in both the Sears and Hancock buildings countless times, so that doesn't bother me. However, the one building I got creeped out in was the St. Louis Arch. I don't mind heights, but it felt weird to have nothing underneath me. On top of that, I'm claustrophobic and there ain't much room to stroll around in up there. I was up there briefly with my ex and his family and after five minutes I just said, "buh-bye, see you downstairs..."

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Linkmeister — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:41:34 -0000

Hmph. The Grand Canyon Skywalk got there first (caution: Flash and music embedded, but you can turn the audio off).

I dunno which would give me more vertigo, but it's academic since I'm in no position to try either at the moment.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

trifling — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:30:26 -0000

Well, at 525ft, the Calgary Tower is less than half the height of the Sears Tower, but they too have a glass-bottomed viewing gallery and it did indeed take me a full 10 minutes to plant my foot on it, and about another 2 or 3 minutes to transfer all my weight and bring the other foot along. But it was totally worth it, in the end. I would budget myself a good half hour of contemplation time to work up the courage to go on the Sears Tower balcony.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Sarah from Chicago — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:22:24 -0000

shoutz -

Funnily enough, planes don't bother me either ... I used to pilot a bunch of stuff when I was in my teens (small cessnas, gliders, etc) and I adored them ... still do today with the flying buses I am often on.

So, I'm cool with mountains, cliffs, and planes ... just really really tall buildings give me the willies (have to be REALLY tall mind you).

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Icca — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:21:52 -0000

Oh I just wanted to add, the elevator for Building 63 in Seoul was glass and I actually cried on the way down.

Re: Welcome to "The Ledge"

Icca — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:21:08 -0000

Wow! I shouldn't have taken that warning lightly. I inherited a not-quite-phobic fear of heights from my dad (if my dad, the strongest most protective, most awesome man in the world is afraid of it, it must be bad!) and when it showed the glass floor I gasped aloud and turned the video off. Scary! I did something like that in Seoul, but the floor was opaque and I didn't go anywhere near the ledge. Eek!

That would be so so neat for people that like that kind of thing though! I hope you get to do it soon :)