Nothing but blue skies and hot air balloons
- May 17, 2025
- 2 min read
Wednesday 7 May
Early morning start again - we gathered outside the Hororata Hall for the morning briefing as this was the official launch for the Hororata Glow.
Eleven of us laid out the balloons in the race paddock and Mike & Nick Oakley from Ballooning Canterbury set up their two balloons on the main part of the Domain. The press had been invited to cover the launch and would fly with the Oakleys - photographers in the first basket and more press in the second.
We all had a target to get our balloons standing and heated by 7.45am ready to lift off after the press corps. After a live crossover to TVNZ Breakfast News where Mike launched the Glow, all thirteen balloons including two single seater hoppers rose into the skies and floated off in a generally south easterly direction.
Louis was crewing with Josh & Annabel and got to fly. Mario and I were crewing & chasing for Dutch 🇳🇱 Oven which Jeremy, Abby & Esther were flying as a family.
Once they had all lifted off, Mario and I set out on the chase - using a combination of yahoo maps, the Flightpack Tracker app, walkie talkies and my Canon camera’s lens, we kept them mostly in sight and caught up with them just after they landed in the same field as Nick and the big BC balloon.
Unfortunately it had recently been home to a herd of cows who had left a large number of cowpat mines for us to tread in! With great speed we deflated the balloon envelope and collected it together carefully to avoid the 💩 bombs!
Esther towed the balloon trailer and drove us back to the Hall for breakfast - yum!
We retired back to Banjo and packed up quickly to tow her down to Design Coach & Body to fix the last of the leak issues and tighten up a window frame under warranty.
While the work was being completed, Louis swam and I went to Sallies Op shop (oops). Lunched at Coffee Culture (again!) then swung back to collect Banjo and head back out to Hororata. No afternoon flying as the wind had got up so we pottered a bit before joining the ballooning gang at the Hororata Cafe for a delicious home cooked dinner. Dessert was to die for and after seconds we got given more to takeaway!#manykilos
Comments