It was all around ballooning.... wow.. hard guess there.
It also had a lot to do with photography.
Three cameras today... but first let me get it all in order.....
TUESDAY... Took a bit of time off in the morning to go see a Lindstrand basket...which should not cause me undue excitement as I have a Lindstrand basket myself.. only this one has an acrylic bottom.
Yep. Bloomin clear all the way through. So in the air it would seem you were standing on nothing at all... and it looks that way too. Does that bother me as I am slightly afraid of heights? Naaaaaaa.
Standard excellent Lindstrand build basket... just the flat solid marine plywood is replaced with clear acrylic. There is a framing around the border to staple the kick leather to ( leather at the bottom of the basket to save the wicker from scrapes and bangs or where people kick it ) securely. Nicely. Not very thick either .. which worried me but even with the four 15 gallon tanks resting on little foam pads there was no flex on the floor.
Since John was taking Sam for another training flight I had to get some quick pictures, quiz John as he followed Sam around making sure he did what he was supposed to do while not getting in the way.
Tops.... Not too much more expensive than a normal wood floor. It can be replaced as easily as mine could, It will take some damage but it's probably best not to land on rocks as much as we do in New Mexico. A larger basket would probably be more interesting as with four tanks and two people it made it hard to look down through the floor. I expect if you ran to two tanks and two people it would be better. I thought it was awesome.
Here are some shots and comments as we went.
Flat topped Lindstrand awesome Ascot basket.
Refer to this site:
http://lindstrand.com/products/accessories/baskets/
Hard to keep that clear floor clean. If not dusty from the desert it's got grass on it. I could never let it leave my living room.
Inside with three of four tanks. Soft dense foam floor which is really cut out around the tank bottoms. I think they should make booties for the tank bottoms so the pads don't drift away from the rings.
This basket has an added metal step hole support on each side. I like it but I don't think I will see any problem with my steps for another 20 plus years.
My finger in the weep hole. There are two holes in the bottom to let water and stuff out. Its thin!!! You can also see the wood framing on the edge where the leather folds over. You can also see part of the tank ring that is not resting on the pad. You can also see me as with the 10.5 fisheye lens I am using you cannot get out of the picture unless you use a tripod I didnt have and time I didnt have.
From the top down it looks so cool. Not a lot of space to look down though. Pad for active mapping on the side. Me again in picture. Sigh.
So... how do you take a picture of a reflective surface and not get yourself in it...... again.. no tripod not time... so.... You edit yourself out. Way fun. Not. But this is a wonderful look. from the bottom.
Up and off with a bit of editing.
Along with the speed of which I had to shoot and very limited time it was a demanding run to keep myself as much out of the shots as I could. I did have the 18 to 200 mm but it was basic shots and meh.
So that was a lot of fun and I would love to own one but would hate to clean it every time I flew it and I would have to clean it every time I flew it.... really.
Zipped to work after, an hour earlier than I thought. Well worth the time and thank you John and Sam and Sams dad.
Next off... wow.... it was super busy.... Saturday flying romp at Unser and Westside. Yeah.... so didnt happen. We stood there kicking the dirt and hoping but the pibal went so fast South that it didnt climb much at all. So we bagged that and got breakfast at Wecks. Okay but slow service that time.
We made plans to come out Sunday and try it again......
That didnt happen.... as we got some major peer pressure to crash a local St Pats rally going on. Day 2 really... I made a few connections to the meister and we got up an hour earlier to drive the 45 mins down. Made it for the brief easily and we set up next to the Smokey bear balloon and next to the troublemaker who forced us to sneak under the wire and fly.
We delayed our inflation a bit because I wanted to launch with the group but that turned out to be very hard due to the amount of balloons launching over us. Since we were told to play nice.. we did as we always do and let them get going before we lifted off. As we started up we went towards Black Magic Woman so I kicked it up a bit and added a good 360 degree spin to the envelope. We cleared her nicely and then vented to level us out about 40 feet above and right in the wind stream heading south and that let us clear the field.
Some great maneuvers to move about. One try at an irrigation ditch ( micro splash and dash ) but a bit of power line avoidance there and a soft landing in the middle of a field. Lifting off again and floating over the nearby highway we landed over a little lamp post and onto the roadway of a little housing area.
A great day all in all....
Some shots from the video cameras and the main cameras....
Pre launch picture taking. Ted points at things.
Up and over Black Magic Woman. Looking at the traffic.
Over the highway after playing with some free range rabbits in the field. I am sure we were not one of the things the rabbits wanted in their field. We left before the enforcer rabbits caught us.
Right past the lamp post and down on the road. Tight place to land but the crew were right there and took us out of the sky.
Camera 1 of 2 GOPros. Looking back towards the launch field. Robert in Phobic cruises down the highway. No such North available today but some North East, heavy on the East.
Up over Black Magic Woman. Smooth.. very smooth!
All those lines. Got my camera cover caught up twice and myself once. Seriously need to move my GTA radio and blue radio to the other upright.
And a bit of tailgating after a 40 minute flight which was also a lot of fun and wonderful to be hanging with all the friends.... Juice, chips and some tasty cheese and racing back up to Albuquerque before I run out of fuel.
Something like 170 shots. Three video cameras dumped and verified.
Some very tough shooting but almost all of it off eye camera shooting. We did get becalmed and I got to take some time but I had Ted there to keep an eye out also. It was fun to have him with me. I got to fly with him in his balloon in Taos and that was also a lot of fun. He has a lot more experience than I do and is a complete laugh to have in the basket.
Now off to another weekend and some fun. Don't know if I will fly this next weekend but I do really want to get in Highperactive and get more time feeling how she moves in the air. Strangely my 6040 GPS did not work and I don't know why. Frustrating.. But I did have my little Fiesta GPS running and Ted had his running as well.
See ya next weekend!
