Men demonstrate their virility by jumping off towers with vines wrapped around their ankles.

Photo: Vanuatu Tourism Office

Located one hour north of Efate by air, Pentecost Island is best known for it's 'nagol' or 'land diving' ritual, which inspired modern-day bungy jumping.

Between April and June, men and boys as young as seven leap off 30-metre-high wooden towers with vines wrapped around their ankles as a show of virility and to bless the new yam season. It's a dangerous show of bravado that's claimed lives. If the vine is a mere 10 centimetres too long the diver could hit the ground and break their neck.

The towers are constructed from wood from the forest and take five weeks to complete. The liana vines are chosen for their elasticity and each diver chooses his own vine, knowing he holds his life in his hands.

Legend has it a woman running from her abusive husband initiated the ritual. She climbed to the top of a tall tree after a beating and refused to come down. The husband climbed the tree and when he was about to grab her to teach her a lesson, she jumped. He jumped too, some say because he was suddenly overcome with grief that his wife had killed herself, or because he was crazy with anger. What the husband didn't know was his clever wife had tied vines to her ankles and survived the fall, but he died.

A number of tourist operators depart daily from Port Vila to Pentecost Island during land diving season and organize flights, accommodation and permission to view the ritual.

Nagol only happens on the south of Pentecost Island as villages in the north have left their traditional ways and converted to Christianity.