Speeds hit 60 mph on 2-mile zipline ride down Mount Mansfield

"Nosedive top to Nosedive bottom,” comes the voice over the walkie-talkie. “Sending riders on lines one and two.”

“OK, on three, two, one....”

Three seconds after that, I’m out over the edge of the Gondolier precipice, dangling 130 feet above the sharply descending face of Mount Mansfield, pulling back on a lever for all it’s worth, straining to allow gravity to pull me down nearly a mile of inch-thick cable, working to squeeze every possible mph out of this mecha-spider-web strand.

Stopped halfway down on the parallel line, photographer Mike Hitelman quickly gets closer and closer, and — zoom! — see ya, Mike!

The operators of Stowe Mountain Resort’s ZipTour Adventure remind you to go to the bathroom before you get on, which is sage advice.

There are other ZipTour rides on other New England mountains — one of them, Attitash, has a 4,969-foot span, which it claims is the longest single zip line in the East — but Stowe must have them all beat when it comes to overall length. We’re talking almost 2 miles of cable-riding at speeds that would get you pulled over if you were driving your car that fast on the way to the resort.

Starting near the top of the gondola, Nosedive Zip — the first and longest of the three legs — drops you about the height of an 80-story building, 803 feet. At top speed, you’re going about 60 mph, but you’re so high above the treetops that the broccoli-like canopy seems to move at a fairly languid pace. That’s an illusion, much like the way that the higher you are in an airplane, the slower the ground seems to slide on by.

The third and final leg, the Perry Merrill Zip, also achieves that 60-mph, top speed, but it seems faster because you’re much closer to the tops of the trees.

In one segment, you’re zooming through a veritable trench, an arboreal version of the assault on the Death Star, jagged branches lingering exhilaratingly, scarily close.

In between there’s the Haselton Zip, a relatively short jaunt at 2,247 feet with a 472-foot elevation drop. Yes, that’s what qualifies as a short zip line at Stowe — almost a half-mile long.

The adventure starts with a wee demonstration zip line, about 130 feet long, a place to learn how to use the trolley system and listen to directions, and learn sign language from the operators at the bottom of each zip: hand signals for slow down, stop, and bring it on.

In the case of one rider who came in hot and slammed into the safety springs at the end (think of the runaway truck ramps common on steep stretches of road) of the Perry Merrill Zip, those hand signals expanded to waving the arms frantically back and forth, followed by a shrug of exasperation.

Red-shirted resort employees load you onto the line at the top and remove you from it at the end; there are absolutely no do-it-yourself aspects to getting on and off the thing. The combination butt and chest harness is comfortable enough; with a little adjusting, your body naturally goes into a sitting position.

Some upper-body strength does come in handy, as pulling down on the lever to more fully release the brake requires being able to hold back perhaps 20 pounds of pressure to make it really squeal. And, boy, do those things squeal.

Hikers on the Haselton trail and other ski trails can hear the zip riders coming in well before they can see them, like a fast-moving no-see-um high in the air against the sky. It’s not as jarring as, say, the F-16s flying over Burlington, or a volunteer firefighter en route to the station, but the ZipTour riders are far from quiet, as they scrrrreeeeeeam past, a pitch-perfect audio illustration of the Doppler effect.

The ZipTour is steep in more than one way. A single ride costs $109 for an experience that lasts about an hour and a half. But included in those 90 minutes are the mandatory instructional zip, the ride up the gondola, the waiting in line, getting on and off the cable and moving to the next one. In actuality, you’re looking at as little as two or three minutes of actual zipping if you really push it for maximum speed.

That’s more than $50 a minute if all you’re seeking is those precious couple of minutes of thrills. We’re talking Rob Gronkowski, Prince Harry-level partying at that rate. Of course, even Gronk might find himself spiking his helmet after finishing the Stowe ZipTour, all pumped with adrenaline.

That said, the ride wasn’t inexpensive to build, and it isn’t a cheap thing to operate. The new summertime attractions at the mountain are estimated to create as many as 60 new jobs at the resort. The trolley systems — the apparatus that you hang from and control the velocity with — are exceedingly complex and cost $3,500 a pop. The brake pads in them need to be replaced every five to 10 cycles.

When the resort’s treetop adventure course opens — any day now — guests will be able to buy a combo-pack for $139 that gets them a trip down the ZipTour and a run through the adventure course, with nearly 70 elements to test their athletic and acrobatic acumen. Throw in unlimited gondola rides that day, and it becomes much more of a bargain, an all-day adventure.

Bottom line: With the old concrete relic that was the Alpine Slide relegated to the annals of a Kodachrome slideshow, the arrival of the ZipTour and adventure course shows the resort is becoming a hot place to be during the summer.