No School Bus? Then Ride a Zip Line to School

By John Farrier in Baby & Kids on Mar 22, 2010 at 11:49 am

Transportation is challenging for people living in the mountains around the Rio Negro in Colombia. For more than two hundred years, the only way in or out of this area has been by zip line. Even school-age children ride it a half-mile every day to attend classes:

More than 1,300ft above the roaring Rio Negro in Colombia, nine-year-old Daisy Mora prepares to throw herself over the abyss.

Attaching herself to an old and rusted pulley system she drops over the edge before plummeting at 40mph along a zip wire to the opposite bank half a mile away – a vertigo-inducing journey she has to take every day to get to school.

Link via The Agitator


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  1. Edward
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:01 pm

    Am I the only one who wants to know how they stop on the other side?

  2. MadMolecule
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:07 pm

    This article really could have used some video. I’d sure like to try that.

  3. GrouchieGrumbles
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:12 pm

    Am I the only one who thinks that if this was in America, the lawsuits would be crazy insane?

    As for how she stops, looking at the picture and making an assumption, her right arm is holding the brakes.

  4. clynch
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:24 pm

    How does she get home?

  5. Gauldar
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:45 pm

    At least they are getting a proper education in risk management. Kids are bat shit crazy anyways, and this is probably the least of your concerns for your child in Colombia with drug wars going on.

    @Clynch

    Probably takes a bus to a certain point, and then walks the rest of the way up.

  6. Michael S.
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 12:51 pm

    Here is a youtube video detailing it. It is actually pretty interesting http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KeBJZGSIa0

  7. Arielle
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 8:50 pm

    Umm…
    Why don’t you mention the fact that that sack she’s holding contains her 5 YEAR OLD BROTHER
    That was seroiulsy the most shocking thing I read in this article!
    haha jeeeeeeez. I think being in the bag might actually be scarier!

  8. Arielle
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 9:08 pm

    Wait a second. When you watch the video that Michael S. posted (which was uploaded in 2007) it says that Daisy is 11.
    You’d think that the article would mention that the pictures are 4 years old.

  9. vik407
    Mar 22nd, 2010 at 11:06 pm

    This kind of transportation is called Tarabitas, google it and you found many many information.

  10. vmos
    Mar 23rd, 2010 at 2:56 pm

    am I the only one wondering how they get back up?

  11. w.c.camp
    Mar 23rd, 2010 at 8:34 pm

    I am not convinced that this is the REAL way these kids get to and from school. I guess it is possible but parents even in third world countries would have a little bit of concern about bagging their kids up and flying them a quarter mile up in the air. I wrote on a real Zip line I made:

    http://pjmonolog.blogspot.com/2010/03/just-zip-it.html

  12. Iosif
    Mar 24th, 2010 at 11:15 am

    Scared me when I watch …. but I would not climb there even if I know you never write!

  13. neatodev
    Mar 28th, 2010 at 12:29 am

    When I was a schoolboy, I had to ride a zip line uphill–BOTH WAYS!


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