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July 15, 2006
Hot Air Balloon Riding
Today is a beautiful day, you can see for miles.
It reminds me of the first time I rode in a hot air balloon. My friend Julian has one, and Louie and I met him on a day like today - and took off (launched). We ascended to a couple thousand feet, and just drifted with the wind. Beautiful, is all I can say...Peaceful...Quiet...until...
…we started floating over populated neighborhoods - and the damn dogs were barking like crazy. From one neighborhood to the next - bark..bark..bark.
Hot Air Balloons drive the dogs fucking crazy. It was strange.
Anyway, we'd been aloft for about 5 hours and Julian decides it's time to set her down. We'd covered, as the crow flies, boo coo miles - and dusk was approaching fast.
We were crossing the river when we spied a field that looked promising for a landing controlled crash. Problem was: there were power lines between Earth and us, and it was almost dark.
Let me say - we had a radio, and had been directing the chase vehicle (full of some other friends) all day long. They were toe (lift leg) up - I'. Right.. Right.. no no I meant left.. OK OK good...we see you loud and clear. See not hear - whatever.
The Balloon Driver says - "I see a place where I think we can set down, but everybody get down in the basket - I'm going to go through the top of those trees to bleed off some speed." WTF. Man - he did exactly what he said - we hit those trees and wood was flying everywhere. I shit you not; we went those trees like a bolt of lightning.
We fucking slammed into the earth, and bounced sideways almost upside down for about 100 yards.
It was GREAT!!!
Posted by Yabu at July 15, 2006 11:25 AM | The Past
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You rode FIVE hours on one flight? How many fuel tanks were you carrying? The longest I ever went was three and the only other time the balloon went longer, they had to set down on an island in the middle of a freaking river. I was on crew that day, (my daughter was in the basket) and I had to swim across with a new tank so they could get out and land somewhere where we could actually retreive it. It turned out to be a cool flight though cause they managed to get back to the field they started from.
Posted by: Libby at July 16, 2006 08:52 AM
Well, that's you, calm in the face of absurdity. Heh. If I'm ever with you - in ANY situation - and you actually panic, I'll know it's over for all of us. ;)
Posted by: Key at July 16, 2006 12:12 PM
