We headed up the island to Tiki Beach and the Red Sail Sports where we rented a couple of Wave Runners. The chaps gave us a quick ‘safety briefing‘ which was more about keeping other people alive as opposed to us.

He pointed out three large buoys about 1/2 a mile from the beach. One marking the north end of the jet ski run, one the middle and the other the southern end about 1 and a 1/2 miles apart. Three miles in total, running from the top end of 7 Mile Beach down to the Westin Hotel.

We climbed onto our boats and at five miles an hour headed out from the beach to the appointed area. Once out in the designated channel we opened up the throttles.

The things moved like rockets. Torpedoes. Totally mad just zooming along inches above the surface of the water the slightest waves sending the wave runners jumping into the air.

I clung on each time the machine jumped it nearly threw me off. It was everything I could do to hang on.

I was not so much riding as hanging on for dear life. Griping the handlebars just held the throttle down causing the machine to go faster and faster. The wave-runner shot over the water at 25mph, 35mph until we hit 45mph. 

The three mile course took a little over four minutes to cover, running out of road, I managed to force myself to let go of the the throttle.  I eased it back and managed to slow down! It was a total act of will it went against all instinct.

After a couple more wild runs I relaxed enough to be a bit more in control. Turning was a case of leaning to one side or another rather than steering. Steering just led to wild overstear!

By the end of the half hour we were racing each other, zig-zagging across each others’ wakes to catch waves and jump, skidding into turns and spinning around doing doughnuts!

It was great fun hurtling along Seven Mile Beach, completely crazy, I spent the whole time giggling like an idiot.

When we finished our legs were like jelly and they ached so much from hanging on! We hobbled around like old farts for the rest of the week.