4-flight Ballooning Club information on hot air balloon rides ...

We drove from Bristol to the Welsh countryside near Chepstow and set up at around 7.00 pm ish in a field where we knew the owner. We took longer than usual to set up this time as our crew consisted of Pilot and two teenagers, including myself. Phil however, who was retrieving, was also on hand to help!
Rigging the balloon and getting it ready to fly was fine, no problems as such, it just took a lot longer. It was my first ever flight and I was really nervous because I didn’t know what it would be like, but I was also really excited!

7.50pm soon came and as I got myself into the balloon Tom began to fire up the gas burners, we were taking off! Steadily the balloon was rising off the ground and we reached about 1500ft at the most. We kept in contact with Phil via radio to inform him of our whereabouts. We were planning on flying for about an hour and then landing in a field accessible by road. (This would make it easier for Phil to find us and pack up.)

We knew it was time to land when the fuel had dropped to a 1/3 rd and we could see a field coming up on the left hand side of a river. On the other side was another field which happened to be inhabited by livestock. Further on from that were miles of forest. We planned to land in the first field and radioed in to Phil to let him know of our whereabouts. However, wind speed dropped from 5 knots to less than 3 knots and we were about 3000ft above the ground and slowly creeping towards the river. The pilot tried to lower the balloon down with the rope but he could quite do it and before we knew it we were going towards the river! Shit, we thought! The pilot had to fire up the gas burners some more so that we could rise a little higher. We slowly flew over the murky looking river and gently passed over treetops. The balloon was descending and we had no option but to land in the inhabited field.

The landing was gentle and the balloon didn’t topple over – it just bounced up once and landed smoothly. We didn’t like the surrounding area, it was un-accessible by our jeep and the locals, (who consisted of cows and bulls) didn’t look very friendly! Adam jumped out the basket and ran back about 20 metres with the guide rope. He had to pull the balloon to the ground (with the help of Tom). Once this was accomplished we then had to roll and pack the fabric balloon into its case. We made sure we did this quite quickly because the cows were very inquisitive of what was going on and were very curious. Apparently cows are attracted to bright colours and it just so happens that the balloon was multi-colored!!! As soon as the balloon was back in its bag we started to tidy the rest of the items up, putting them back into the basket.

Then it all started… the cows were approaching us. They were getting closer and closer to us and there was nothing we could do. I ran and hid behind the basket as I saw my whole life flash in front of me. Tom managed to distract the cows and they soon lost interest in us and returned back about to 30 metres away to graze on grass.

You think that was bad enough, wait for the next bit! We had landed and Phil had no idea where we were! We had landed in a field which was inaccessible for cars.

Anyway, after about 45 minutes of Phil driving up and down country lanes (getting Tom’s jeep muddy) we decided that we should try and get out of the field. It was about 10.30pm and it was getting dark, and with no sight of Phil we had to try and find the way out of the field and try and shift some of the gear. Tom and Adam grabbed hold of the burner and I was carrying the camera bag and radios.

We walked for about 30 minutes until we got out of the field. We were all relieved as we had found a footpath. It was even better when we looked around the corner and saw Phil in the jeep!

It was now approaching 11pm – it was pitch black and the balloon was hiding somewhere in a deserted field inhabited by angry cows! After getting permission at the farmer’s house we moved to plan B. We had to get the torches out so we could open the gate and once we clear the way we drove the Jeep down the 3 km muddy track and into the field. The Jeep was rather muddy by the end! With the fog lights blasting out of the car, no cows would come near us and we were able to locate the balloon. We packed everything into trailer and drove back out of the field – putting the gate back on its hinges so the farmer would be none the wiser… well the tyre tracks in the field might give it away!

We then traveled back home to Bristol, a trip which took us around an hour. Obviously we stopped for takeaway on the way home as we hadn’t eaten since lunchtime!! Everything that could have possibly gone wrong on this flight had gone wrong! It was definitely an experience that we are not going to forget in a long time, but we liked every minute of it.