Sunday 1^st November 2009 – Officially listed as a day off on the itinerary….

however anyone who knows me will also know it’s never a day off…so when Julia (the fantastic lady who organises everything to do with my itinerary back at Tourism Queensland in Brisbane) told me I instantly wondered what I could fill it with.

Maybe an ATV session, some white water rafting or even a bungee jump – hold tight on those for now, how about something I’ve never ever done before – a ride in a hot air balloon. Perfect…almost.

I say almost after dragging myself out of my bed at 3.30am to make the manically early start (especially as I didn’t get to bed until 1.30am after the Tropical North Queensland Tourism Awards the night before) needed in order drive the one hour inland to the Tablelands where we’d be taking off from.

Browney from Hot Air Cairns was there to meet Bre and I and whisk us west from Cairns to our likely launch site, around Mareeba 80kms away.

The first sign of light on the horizon signalled our arrival at the ‘chook sheds’ (An Aussieism for chicken in case you’re wondering) our launch site for the morning’s activities. Three Land Cruisers, trailers with baskets strapped on board and crews were there already talking about the weather – how very British! The wind had just dropped off in the half an hour we’d been there, luckily as I thought at one stage the entire thing may be cancelled – thank you oh god of wind!

The usual setup for a morning flight involves a pretty big balloon, in fact the largest one in Australia holding a huge amount of hot air and suspending a basket with 25 people beneath it. Our experience was going to be even better than this though…Bre and I had our very own balloon with one other person aboard – our pilot Jay of course.

Jay’s a cracking South African chap so we instantly hit it off and chatted loads about our time in the dark continent, he left there a number of years ago after flying balloons for years across the African savannah, viewing elephants, lions and every type of game from the air…with some pretty intense stories about close shaves he’s had in the past!

With the vast balloon filling quickly with air supplied by a massive fan it started to billow in the light breeze and take shape, the next job was to fire up the powerful twin burners mounted on the framework at the top of the basket. With a roar and blast of flame the balloon…well ballooned I suppose gradually standing upright until it was tugging at its mounts, desperate to climb into the heavens above.

The basket was now stood upright and as I climbed into it I fired up my gps to try and track the route which you should be able to see at the foot of this blog post, click on the Triptracker logo to have a look.

Pre-flight checks completed, Jay sent up another rush of hot air into the vast spherical void above us and the basket said its temporary goodbye to the ground beneath. We silently climbed up into the cool morning air , the clouds above us swirling and opening to allow the sun’s rays through…this was going to be pretty special.

Bre could hardly control herself, big smiles and giggles all over her face signalled her outright enjoyment and I wasn’t far behind I can tell you. The fear of heights which I had two years ago has got so much better now – but that is after:

• Climbing five of Africa’s highest mountains last year
• Throwing myself from the world’s highest bungee jump
• Taking up rock climbing as a hobby
• Learning to fly a helicopter and
• Flying in a few seaplanes

There’s nothing like taking on your fears is there….?

As we gained height it was easy to see why the pilots love what they do (another person here in Australia claiming to have the Best Job in the World), the vastness of the land below stretching out far into the distance.

As we entered the cross winds above us the balloon was pushed along gaining speed as we gained altitude until we were literally up in the ceiling of cloud and feeling the cool of the mist on our faces – we were at the maximum height allowed for balloons before entering restricted commercial airspace. WOW.

The features on the ground below were breath-taking; long roads stretching off into the distance, the lush water courses and creeks breathing life into the parched grasslands around, fruit and nut plantations systematically laid out in uniform lines with the odd Kangaroo bouncing around, – their shadows in the early –morning sun clearly visible.

As the flight drew to a close Jay identified a likely landing spot in the distance and as we dropped down in altitude and out of the wind we entered another windstream taking us in a very different direction. It’s amazing how these pilots can read the wind using tell-tale references such as smoke on the ground or simply spitting over the side….pure genius!

Our final few metres before touch-down slowed the balloon sufficiently and after a couple of light hops, we came to a standstill, our ground crew were there to meet us and pull the ropes atop the balloon to release the hot air inside, effectively depowering our graceful machine and in doing so rendering the vast bird flightless.

Suddenly it was just a heap of material on the ground attached to a basket…

Together with the team we folded it all back up into its bag, rolled the basket onto the trailer and hit the road back to a huge delightful breakfast at their HQ. A full on feast for the hungry flyers was laid out and everyone else who’d been lucky enough to have their own ‘first flight’ chatted enthusiastically about the experience.

A magnificent time and so worth doing! Thank you to all at Hot Air Cairns for the morning.