Cheltenham Racecourse

Slightly windy launch from the racecourse on Monday night with a Northerly track to the West of Evesham.......landing two fields from the nearest road, friendly natives and a lovely set of passengers. The farmer could not remember the code for the gate lock!....so he led the rig in from the other end of Worcestershire to gain access :-D!!

Long Flight

Windy launch from Royal Victoria Park saw the evening flight wiz off towards the South West......eventually landing on the Southern outskirts of the cathedral city of Wells... a glorious evening and happy passengers and a crew member with severe stomach cramps( I won't go into details! ).......bloody wind picking up again for the weekend.

Glorious June!!!!

Wednesday evening had us whizzing over to Raglan for a grand flight over the castle and then heading slightly South East before landing in a hay field(not ideal but sunset was fast approaching!..........Up with the dawn on Thursday morning for a misty meet in Bath.....laid out and waited til just before 0800 when the Lord of the Mists disappeared allowing a gentle flight to the outskirts of Coombe Hay to the South of Bath.

Weather Window

Bank Holiday Monday.......take a chance on the weather coming good and cross the Severn to Pandy in the rain! Forecast is for rain to clear through with the odd shower remaining. We rigged in light rain, found a large gap in the clouds and launched for a lovely flight landing just north of Monmouth.....lovely bunch of passengers and great landowners!.........Tuesday night and we were expecting the wind to drop so we could launch from Bath........having won the gamble on Monday....we lost on Tuesday.....Hey Ho.....only 4 flights in the whole of May!!...worst launch record for 12 years!!!!........June will be better......pleeeaase!!!

Two in one day!!

Thursday morning ....bright sunshine, cloudless and gentle launch from Royal Victoria Park in Bath.....landing in North Bradley near Trowbridge where the balloon was greeted by loads of school children on their way to the local primary!....The evening flight eventually launched from Pandy, having moved from Raglan because of a change in wind direction.......Nice calm landing in the Welsh borders....with another warm welcome from the locals!...

Friday the 13th!

Unlucky for some.......Flight from Raglan on Friday the 13th on a lovely clear morning...1st launch since Easter Sunday!......Safe landing but awkward access for retrieval!....Farmer demanded 250-300 pounds to be given to a church charity (we had offered a reasonable 60 pounds) before he would let us on 'his' land....turns out he was only renting the field from his neighbour. Said neighbour escorted us to the field and demanded a couple of bottles of red wine for his trouble! He was offered a cash landing fee which he refused...."My wife likes a glass of red occasionally".....Good things happen to good people!...

Wind

Bloody windy for days and days and no sign of dropping out and I am getting no money....