Hello ~ I’m Scott and welcome to your 5-minute vacation for April 9th. I share these snippets of our travels in the hope that my photos and stories will allow you to go on a vicarious vacation and “get away from it all,” if only for a moment. I appreciate you inviting me into your inbox today.
At this altitude, we could almost see forever. According to Wikipedia, the name “Serengeti” is an approximation of the Maasai word “siringet” which means “the place where the land runs on forever.” Quite appropriate.
I was almost penny-wise and pound-foolish.
One of the activities available at Ndutu Lodge was a morning hot air balloon ride. I had never been on one before, so I had no idea if the ride would be worth it. I thought the per-person ticket price was a little much and with the thought of our new home construction project in the back of my mind, I didn’t want to go.
Fortunately, Rosemary knew better.
In the pre-dawn darkness the next morning, we piled into our Land Cruisers and bounced our way down the dirt roads to our rendezvous with the balloon. Arriving with the first glimmers of daylight, we saw that the crew was already there, working by headlights and flashlights to get our balloon flightworthy.
When it came time for us to board the balloon, I thought we’d just walk into the gondola or, worst case scenario, climb over the side. Uh, no. When it came time to load up, we discovered that the gondola was lying on its side. We slid into our seats much as those Apollo astronauts did in those videos from oh-so-long-ago, and buckled into our safety harnesses.
The gondola, lying on its side, waiting for us to slide in. This gondola seats thirteen plus the captain, making it the third-largest balloon in the world.
Another of my hot air balloon misconceptions was that we would just float up into the air, easy peasy.
Our ballon’s quad burners.
Prior to liftoff, the balloon was mostly inflated by a large fan as we were still lying on our side. To achieve liftoff our pilot, Capt. Mo, turned on the burners. They made a loud whooshing noise. We began to move. Horizontally, not vertically. With the gondola still on its side, we bumped our way slowly across the Serengeti bump bump whoooosh bump bump bump whooooooooooosh and so on. I didn’t count the bumps or the whooshes but eventually we were airborne. And it was beautiful.
We weren’t the only lucky souls in the sky that morning.
We had luck that morning. The sky was cloudless, the sun was golden and the breeze was slight. A perfect morning for a balloon ride.
We flew across Lake Ndutu and hundreds of flamingos took flight, just like a National Geo special.
While a balloon’s direction is at the mercy of the wind, its altitude is controlled by the pilot. Capt. Mo took us very high, where the zebras and wildebeests began to look like dots.
Even with the thousands of miles of space available, the zebras and wildebeest travel in a winding column.
And he took us low enough where we probably could’ve safely jumped to the ground and joined the parade.
While we were toasting the success of our morning ride with champagne, Capt. Mo told us about the connection between champagne and ballooning. I don’t know if balancing a champagne bottle on his head while talking for 15 minutes is a requirement for a balloon pilot’s license or if it’s just an extra skill he has. Either way, it was impressive.
The grand finale of the excursion was a hot breakfast on the Serengeti. I had the full English and Rosemary had the avocado and spicy chickpeas on toast. Both were yummy.
The day before, after we had seen a cheetah, lions, secretary birds and oodles of wildebeest with calves, I had wondered how this safari could get any better. A dawn hot air balloon ride was how it got better.
Next time, we’ll go farther into the Serengeti where we’ll find lions and leopards (o my!).
Until then ~
Tschüss!