Hot Air Balloon Ride

Bear · 16 Aug 2009 at 09:40

wonder_lander said:
Hmm now you've got us thinking!
Just looking at holidays in Egypt for 2010 now, thanks for that

Always wanted to go there, where did you stay? if you don't mind me asking

We stayed at the Sheraton in Luxor, its a nice hotel and sits on the bank of the Nile so had a great view from our room. We did a small tour round Egypt though, started off in Cairo, Luxor then Sharm El Sheik. Basically did all the sight seeing in the first week then the took it easy on the beach on the last week.

Cosimo · 16 Aug 2009 at 12:39

Great post wonder_lander, we shall have a look at doing this as an anniversary treat.

Dark_Angel · 16 Aug 2009 at 12:41

Westyfield2 said:
Nice pics

I've been up twice here in Bath and loved it and will definitely go again - funny thing is I'm not too keen with heights (cable cars etc) but feel perfectly fine in a balloon, think we went something like 1mile high one time.

That is pretty impressive.

Looks awesome. I saw in an episode of survivor man he was taking a hot air balloon over africa... it looks astounding.

digipeep · 16 Aug 2009 at 13:53

Excellent post Wonder Lander.

I had a Balloon flight booked for last Wednesday but was cancelled due to the weather so it is rescheduled now for 6th September. Can't wait.

wonder_lander · 16 Aug 2009 at 17:54

digipeep said:
Excellent post Wonder Lander.

I had a Balloon flight booked for last Wednesday but was cancelled due to the weather so it is rescheduled now for 6th September. Can't wait.

Got my fingers crossed for you!

molinari · 16 Aug 2009 at 20:20

Nice pics

I've got a balloon flight booked for next Sunday morning. We're really looking forward to it so I hope the weather is good.

wonder_lander · 16 Aug 2009 at 21:30

molinari said:
Nice pics
I've got a balloon flight booked for next Sunday morning. We're really looking forward to it so I hope the weather is good.

Where abouts is your flight going to be from?

molinari · 16 Aug 2009 at 21:39

wonder_lander said:
Where abouts is your flight going to be from?

We're going from Guildford, in Surrey.

CaptainComedy · 16 Aug 2009 at 23:36

molinari said:
We're going from Guildford, in Surrey.

sweet - is there anywhere nearer london? I really wanna do this

although I doubt very much they will allow it into london air space lol still would be sweet!

gonna do it next month - gf is really excited

wonder_lander · 17 Aug 2009 at 08:34

molinari said:
We're going from Guildford, in Surrey.

Should be good from Guildford, fingers crossed on the weather though!

wonder_lander · 17 Aug 2009 at 18:19

codec said:
sweet - is there anywhere nearer london? I really wanna do this although I doubt very much they will allow it into london air space lol still would be sweet!

gonna do it next month - gf is really excited

If you could it would be awesome to do it over the capital!

Django x2 · 17 Aug 2009 at 18:21

You missed out. Morning flights >>>>>>> Evening flights

wonder_lander · 17 Aug 2009 at 18:55

Lucero said:
You missed out. Morning flights >>>>>>> Evening flights

My body clock tends to disagree but I would guess from a flight experience this would be true

molinari · 23 Aug 2009 at 10:12

wonder_lander said:
Should be good from Guildford, fingers crossed on the weather though!

Well, anyone in South London will tell you the weather is fine today, but the balloon ride was cancelled because wind tolerances were exceeded :confused:

. Now we have to re-book it (earliest is October) and run the risk of it being cancelled each time as the weather gets worse towards winter

.

Westyfield2 · 23 Aug 2009 at 17:36

molinari said:
Well, anyone in South London will tell you the weather is fine today, but the balloon ride was cancelled because wind tolerances were exceeded .

There's a ground windspeed limit, and if a pilot is found to take off when the windspeed was too much the CAA will have a go at them (court case and license taken away). And if some pilots saw a balloon up when they think it was too windy, tell the CAA, the CAA then bring a courtcase and it'll cost the pilot a few £K to clear their name :rolleyes:

(there's lots of official weather stations they can use as evidence) and ofcourse the CAA wasted some lovely taxpayers money in the process :rolleyes:

. The limits 30knots IIRC.

wonder_lander · 23 Aug 2009 at 18:14

molinari said:
Well, anyone in South London will tell you the weather is fine today, but the balloon ride was cancelled because wind tolerances were exceeded . Now we have to re-book it (earliest is October) and run the risk of it being cancelled each time as the weather gets worse towards winter .

Unlucky and real bummer when you have been plan towards a date.

Fingers crossed for your second attempt!

No-One · 23 Aug 2009 at 19:10

About time I posted some pics of mine. It was a month ago.

The weather wasn't great but stayed dry for most of the flight. We did get wet during the landing though. We took off from Rutland water, flew over my home town of Oakham, and then looped back landing in a field just out of the town.

The basket and uninflated balloon

Didn't get any photos of the actual inflation etc as we were all helping.

Looking down on the launch site

Oakham

Bit warm

And here we all are

secretspy · 23 Aug 2009 at 19:30

Wow that looks great! I'm absolutely petrified of heights but I'd love to do a balloon ride one day.

ThriceNightly · 23 Aug 2009 at 19:34

no one - how was the last picture taken?

tntcoder · 23 Aug 2009 at 19:37

Do you need any kind of license to fly a hot air balloon? Would be cool to have a personal one