Oh Look, a Segue ..er.. Segway

Just before Christmas, Bear and I went to the Dominican with two other couples. While there, we took a one-hour tour on a Segway. I absolutely loved it. I took to it like a duck to water. When we first started out, they had us on "turtle" mode -- meaning it had a governor and it wouldn't let us go fast. After about five minutes, we all got off the machines and they set them to a faster mode -- but not the fastest, I'm sure.

Bear and I loved going as fast as we could make it go. But the rest of the group wasn't really into that. So, Bear and I stayed at the back and we would go very, very slow to let everyone get ahead of us and then we'd open them wide open and catch up.

On one such maneuver, I was catching up to the person ahead of me. I didn't realize how quickly I was catching up until it was too late. There are no brake lights on those things and the person ahead of me slowed down almost to the point of stopping, very quickly. That wasn't hard because she hadn't been going very fast in the first place. I, on the other hand, had been going very fast (for a Segway).

There was no way I was stopping. I tried and I slowed down considerably. And I tried to turn to pass her instead of hitting her. As a result only one of my tires hit her tire. She was fine. She only felt a little bump. Had she been moving, it might have been worse for her. Me? I was moving.

I'm not sure exactly what happened then. But it all happened very, very quickly. I know one of my feet flew off the platform. Instead of trying to put it back on, I tried to jump off. But I couldn't jump off because my leg was wedged between the inside "hump" on the platform and the wheel hub. I was completely out of control. I saw myself heading for the bushes and a ravine (about six feet deep). Suddenly, I was airborne! I flew headfirst over the handles and into the ravine. I must have summersaulted because when I can to a stop (about four feet down) my head was facing up toward the road.

As soon as I came to a stop and took a breath to assure myself that I was indeed breathing, I yelled as loud as I could "I'm okay. I'm okay." I knew Bear would be panicking and I wanted to let him know that I was at least alive. Beyond that, I had no idea.

Suddenly, a bunch of Segway guides showed up, lifted me to my feet and hoisted me out of the ravine. I was okay. Nothing broken. I had a few scrapes on my lip and chin. I had a minor cut on my hand. My leg (where it had been wedged by the wheel well) had a goose egg sized lump on it. I had a half a missing baby toe nail and I had a little cut on the top of my foot. I think I got off really lucky.

When I thought about getting back on the Segway, I was terrified. For that reason, I said "Get me back on that thing while I still can". I got on. I was shaking and I was a little bit teary. But as I got going, the fear receded and I started to enjoy myself again. I even rode one the next day without a bit of fear.

The story does not end there. Our guide was maybe 20 years old. He was very, very sweet. He kept asking if I was okay and he kept apologizing. We stopped to take some pictures and again he kept apologizing and asking if I were okay. He also got out a first aid kit and was putting anti-bacterial something or other onto a piece of cotton as I was assuring him that it was not his fault and I was okay. I held my arms wide and said "Look at me. I'm fine." He smiled and took my hand. "See" I said, "It's just a little scratch. Doesn't hurt at all." He dabbed it with the cotton. I drew my hand back quickly and screamed,

"OH MY GOD! THAT HURTS! IT BURNS!"

He was horrified. Until I started laughing. "I'm just kiddding. It's fine". Thankfully, he also had a sense of humour. He laughed as well. But I think he may have pushed just a little bit harder with the cotton after that. GRIN

So, now the scrapes and cuts on my chin, lip, hand and foot have healed. My baby toe nail is growing back. The bruises from my leg have faded to almost nothing I only have a bit of pain if I roll over on that leg, but that is fading more and more each day.

But I have some great photos and a wonderful memory of my very first Segway ride.