Up, Up and Away...finally!

Setting up at York racecourse

3 other balloons to go too!

First the fill with cold air and fans

We rode in a giant picnic hamper!

The burner for hot air

Sat Nav built in

Great views

Nice seeing the other balloons as we followed

Power stations in the distance

Gavin the pilot giving it a bit of lift

Landing site for 3 of us

Gavin piloted in perfectly over that tree

Opened the top to let air out for deflation

2 passengers braced us for getting off

Clear up time for all

Still cannot believe it all fitted in that basket!

Finally happened! My two gorgeous daughters had bought me a balloon flight with Go Ballooning for my birthday in July 2010. Some 15/16 attempts to fly later and after a number of cancellations on the field in better weather than today's I finally got off. Well worth the wait - it was brilliant. We didn`t go far - 8/9 miles in 45 minutes or so but were some 1400 or so feet up with great views. Hazy at first that soon cleared to give us great vies of the Minster and surrounding York and over to the great power stations in the distance. The silence on the flight was eerie- so quiet except when the burner went on to give us lift. You could hear people calling from below and dogs barking who are evidently disturbed by the high pitched noise from the balloon burners which we barely hear.

 A magical experience which I so nearly missed. Having stayed up last night to call and verify the flight had been moved from Harrogate to York I set the alarm for 5am - or did I. Sue nudged me at 5.37am and it was panic stations as I got to York unshaven for 6.30am.I would have been really sick if I had slept in and missed it after a 2 year wait but all went well and after the softest of landings it was time for a glass of champagne and home again. Great stuff. Not sure ballooning is the right activity with UK weather but it is a magical way to travel. I`d been slotted onto this flight by Lisa, a manager at Go Ballooning who had taken over personal management of my booking to get me flying after so many abortive attempts and she came up trumps. My main regret was not taking my DSLR. Such a smooth take off and landing I would have been fine - trouble is you never know and as you have to stow cameras/bags at your feet for landing it`s always a risk.