Hot Air Balloon Flight Record - 21-23Sep2007
Adirondack Balloon Festival, Glens Falls NY

The photo album can be seen here.

This was the first year with our own balloon at the Adirondack Balloon Festival. Bob Martel and I were both sponsored by The Northeast Hot Air RV'ers.

Friday night the wind was from the south, toward Lake George. A very very large and wet area where you don't want to be looking for a landing site! Upper level (about 6000) wind is forecast from about 270 which is a good direction, but a long way up. Since sunset is a hard limit on the available flight time, Bob and I launched from the very south end of the airport property, behind the RV parking area. We made a low pass over the RVs, down the hill to the main airport area, across the spectators and few remaining balloons, and landed just before crossing the airport boundary fence. A short flight, but we covered the primary areas!

Saturday morning was hazy, but I think the airport AWOS was coming up with lower than actual visibility readings. Regardless, we couldn't take off until the machine said we had 3 miles. Wind was still SSW down low and turned W up about 3000 feet. When we finally got the all clear we stayed low to play with other balloons in the open fields. There was just enough shift east to keep us clear of the Lake. Even so, when we were approaching 149 it looked like it turned to all trees north of us. Bob landed before crossing the ridge at 149. Turns out 6 other balloons followed him in and the landowners fed them breakfast! Well, we had a longer flight, played in the stream, and finally landed at the home of a Jewish couple. They were very nice and happy to have us, and we found out about not working on the Sabbath.

Saturday evening was windy and a storm front went through near flight time, so no one flew. One balloon inflated for about 60 seconds to show the spectators why no one flew (after 35 years of this festival, most already knew).

Sunday morning was the best. Clear, surface winds light and out of the west so we all avoid the lake. East is a lot of open farm land. We initially stayed low and played around in the open fields with other balloons. Then climbed higher to turn toward the SE and a large cluster of balloons. Watching the lower balloons, I noticed the surface was moving north, so after crossing Rte 4 we dropped low, turned north, and headed on an intercept with Rte 4. After flying over some farm fields and spotting a deer that had not already headed for the hills because of all the other balloons, we came to a small group of homes and landed in a nice large front yard. Two other balloons landed across the street and up a couple of houses. The house had a large paved area at the garage and we got permission to use it for deflation.