Nice Saturday over Central Arkansas

All last week, I watched Saturday's forecast, and it was looking good. Saturday came and I was not disappointed! Our friend Alex has crewed for us pretty often, so we asked him if he wanted to designate a passenger for us. Lucky for us, he chose his friend Jason. We met up with Jason and his girlfriend, Renada in Gravel Ridge. Then we headed to Bayou Meto Elementary for an easy inflation and a nice lift-off.

The flight was beautiful. We got some good views from up high, and we rode the treetops (Jason also got a video of us flying through a tree, but I'm not posting that here!) and the ridges down low.

The winds aloft were pretty quick, with us reaching speeds of over 30 mph! Most of our time, we stayed down low so we didn't get too far from our crew! We did get much farther east than they expected us to be, so we called them when we landed and told them how to find us.

The landing was a good one. The winds were a little quick, and I had to make a decision; either vent hard on landing to keep from dragging a short distance (but risk not being able to keep the balloon inflated) or vent less aggressively, and let the wind blow us around a bit on the ground. I think I found a good balance, dragging only a few yards, and staying nicely inflated.

We tried to move the balloon across our landing field, near the gate, but the winds kicked up, and we were forced to deflate it where we were. The landowners were very nice, opening the gate and letting us drive the truck right in to the middle of the field for an easy packup.

We drove back to Gravel Ridge for the standard celebration, and went on with our weekend! Thanks to Alex, Jill, Jason, and Renada for kicking off my Saturday very nicely!