Bushwhacker Days 2007

Another Balloons Over Bushwhackers is in the Books, and this year's was another rousing success!

We started with a our traditional dessert reception, with all the pilots (but one) dropping in as they arrived in town. Alot of visiting (you know about balloon stories, right?) and catching up as well as some meeting of new friends made the evening a success. The party had to come to an early end, though, the pilot's briefing was to come very early Saturday morning.

Saturday morning did indeed come early, but the fine flying weather woke all of us up and got us ready to go! All 13 of us got our weather briefing, then drove out to the "apron" of the airport. We all set up and inflated. I launched in the middle of the group, and had terrific views of the balloons in front of me as well as those inflating at the airport.

Gayla was with me, and she took several pictures in the air. I'm looking forward to seeing her pictures, but one of our crew members, a young woman who was an exchange student from Japan, had a camera, and took some great photos from the ground. See my Flickr page for those.

After about 30 minutes, I tried to land to let Shiho (I'm not sure about the spelling) have a short flight, but the winds on the surface had picked up considerably, and it was likely that if I landed, I wouldn't be able to launch again, so I aborted the landing.

We flew for about an hour, and landed about 6 miles north of the airport. It was a pretty straight flight, with a little steerability between altitudes. I used that to cross back an forth over a road several times, and tried to use it to put me in a great spot for a final landing, but couldn't quite get there. The fast winds on the surface made for an ugly landing, one that was a little hard, but we were able to keep the balloon up. David Reed landed next to me (his landing was slightly better), and let us pack up on his tarp. That was a good thing, because otherwise, the balloon would have gone back in the bag pretty wet.

After refueling, I took a trip with Rebekah to Nevada's square (for a train ride and a stint in the bounce house). After going home for a nap, it was time to meet the pilots at the parade lineup place for some visiting, and a slow drive through town. Once we made our way through the parade route, we high-tailed it to the airport for a weather briefing. Storms in the region scared me out of flying, but nearly all of the other pilots made the decision to go ahead and give it a shot. Their experiences with weather forecasting was better than mine, and those storms dissipated before they could be threatening. I had a great time with my family watching the other pilots launch.

Seven balloons flew from the airport, but four headed to another spot to try to fly over the concert downtown. They were successful, and thousands of people were treated to a fly-by. Kathi Wysong, our Chamber of Commerce director took some GREAT pictures, both of the launch and of the fly-by. (Click HERE to see her pictures) After refueling, we met at Greenfields for a wonderful meal, and good company.

Sunday morning felt like it came even earlier than Saturday. We met up and got mixed messages in our briefing. Most of us chose to keep the balloons in the trailers, but four balloons went south of town to try to fly into the airport. They failed, but they all had nice flights. I got to chase one of my favorite balloons, because David Reed flew off with the keys his wife needed to come get him. I drove to where he landed, got his keys, then drove back to where his family waited in the chase vehicle, and gave them to her.

Many of the pilots and crew members stopped at Cowboys for breakfast before loading up and heading for home. Everyone seemed to have fun, and most said they couldn't wait until next year!

Another Flight in Nevada

Another nice weeknight, and I had a passenger to fly! Jerry McBeth won a flight in the Rotary auction last February, so I called him yesterday around noon to see if he was free. He was, so we flew!

The winds were very calm when we arrived at Nevada High School for the flight. A pibal floated straight up, only moving a little bit to the east northeast as it climbed. But, I knew there was wind up there somewhere, so we inflated and launched. The calm air led to an easy inflation, and soon Jerry and I were flying.

It didn't take long to find a little wind, and we slowly worked our way east over the city. The flight path provided great views of the square and a youth baseball game as we flew near the fairgrounds. After about 30 or 40 minutes, we buzzed the future site of the jail Vernon County will build soon. As we dropped in to the field, we took a slight left turn which gave me a great idea: a little altitude should take us south, then we can drop back and head more to the east, right into several nice landing areas along Austin Street. We climbed, got south, then dropped down for that left turn. Just like I planned, except the left turn was gone! the surface winds had shifted and we got a right turn!

No bother, we were headed toward an open lot. As we dropped in to land in that lot, a gust of wind carried us quickly away from it. A look at our GPS track shows we actually flew in a circle. Then another, then another. Finally, we climbed out of the swirling winds, and made our way slowly over 71 highway. Then we stopped. A busy four lane highway is fun to fly over, but parking over can be disconcerting, particularly at the end of a flight, and near the end of your fuel!

We descended a bit, and the winds had stabilized. We flew south into a field next to Champion Diamonds. Our chase crew couldn't find a way into the field, so Jerry pulled the balloon to the parking lot at Champion where we packed up. Our initial crew of Dana, Marty and Tom had grown on the chase. Janie, Gracie and Kali were there to help deflate, and to join us in the post-flight toast!

The map of our flight is below. You can email me at teddmaxfield@gmail.com if you'd like the GoogleEarth 3D track.