Do you even believe me anymore?

Well, if it wasn't for the two pictures that I've already posted, I'd wonder if you even believe that I went on a hot air balloon ride!!! Here's the deal...I so desperately want to post pictures, but I just have not had a weekend available where I had time to organize them for a post. I started working on it tonight and it took me eons to load eight pictures. In order to keep a right spirit about me, I've decided that tonight is not the night to make an attempt at this.

The sad news? My next chance probably won't be until the end of next week. Trust me, I kind of feel like a loser as it is, but I want the post to be in order and...well...perfect. So, it will take some time. I only recently got pictures organized on my snapfish account from my parent's trip here in July (ask my dad...he'll let you know how long it took!) and the same with the balloon trip. So, I have them in an order somewhere, but just no time to load them onto my blog.

I've been wracking my brain on what to do, but I finally decided that maybe if I post some pictures tonight, I can appease the crowds...at least until next week. At that point, it will be officially one month since the trip and I promise that I will post the full post. Until then, I hope the following pictures make you smile...and feel not so frustrated with me. :o)

In this picture, we (my friend, Keith and I...the guy in the white shirt is the pilot) are in the basket and READY for take off!! :)

It was at the point of the first picture in the next group where I wondered, "Have I made the right decision?" Too late now!!! You see, I have a small fear of heights, but since I fly on airplanes all the time, I thought I'd be fine. Well, in an airplane, you are sitting, not standing. Luckily, a couple minutes after take off the pilot said, "You're welcome to sit on the bench if you like." Yeah. I think I almost pushed Keith out of the basket to get to that bench!! After that...all was well! Keith sat for awhile, too, but for most of the trip, he ended up standing. I, on the other hand, sat the entire trip and was A-OK with that. It made the rest of the trip quite enjoyable for me. You see, any movement from us moved the basket (aka, it would swing a little. Not a lot, but enough for me to notice.) and I was not okay with that. Seriously, I never even thought about the movement of the basket being an issue, but I learned VERY quickly that it was.

These pictures are a comparison for you. In the first picture, taken seconds after lifting off, is the crew that helped us set up and take off. The white building behind them in that picture was where we parked our cars (next to it). In the second picture, you can locate that same white building in the center (almost!) of the picture. We were that high up in the sky in a matter of minutes.

After being up in the sky for awhile, I took a picture of the other team. You see, after we arrived at the take-off site, we learned that there would be two balloons in our group flying that day. One would be a group of five people and then the other would be our balloon. Keith and I lucked out and we got a smaller sized balloon and basket and it was just the two of us with the pilot. As was already explained above (with the bench in the basket), that smaller basket proved to be my saving grace. If it wasn't for that bench, I'm not sure how the trip would have gone. The other bigger basket that held five people (plus the pilot) all had to stand for the entire trip. In this picture, they are in the balloon on the right. The balloon on the left is a completely different company.

This picture was one of the few pictures that I took while we were landing. You see, if you look closely right in the center of the picture is an oval opening in the wall of the balloon. In order to land quicker, the pilot opens that slit and lets air into the balloon which causes the balloon to drop at a faster rate. I'm not sure if it's typical to do that, but this was our second attempt to land and I think the pilot was feeling like we had to land now or we could be in trouble. We came down fast and it was kind of a shock to me how hard we landed, but when I look back on it, the pilot really did do a great job in making it work and keeping calm. I was quite impressed!!


Here are two pictures of our first attempt to land. The first picture gives you an idea of how close we were to actually landing! Plus, you can see our shadow on the roof of the building! :) The second picture is another comparison picture. It was taken just a minute or so after we went back up in the air to search for a place for our second landing attempt. I am putting these side by side so that you can get an idea of height variances during the trip.

And, lastly, do you ever wonder how to stop the balloon once the basket actually is on the ground? Yeah, I didn't either. :) Well, obviously, the balloon is still moving with great strength. After all, when the balloon (our balloon...the other team's balloon was bigger!) is fully blown up, it can house the interior of a 1200 sq. ft. home...ten times over!!! Crazy to think about, huh? So, this picture shows what the team does to slow that balloon down (Keith was helping out here, too. He's in the red shorts in the middle of the group). In the meantime, the pilot is inside the basket, opening up all the various openings through the balloon to let as much air in as he can so that the balloon will collapse. The stages of collapse WILL be posted in the full post!! :)