gently up into the sky

Juanita wanted to go Hot Air Ballooning for her birthday (she likes to do something special every year!) & my Mum loves being up high, so they got some tickets for a dawn flight with friends. Hot Air Ballooning requires good weather... Our first scheduled flightdate, near Juanitas birthday, was cancelled because of rain. Our second flightdate would have been near Richards birthday, but it rained. A new date near Michael & Mums birthday... rain. Commander Mom got a ticket, too, but it even passed her birthday in winter and we couldn't find a date that we could all be together and fly in nice weather! It took a whole year, but finally, after Juanita & Richards birthdays and before Mike, Mum & Commander Moms birthdays, we found a nice morning!! The day dawned lovely, and we got our call to fly!

First, the balloon was brought out and a huge fan blew air into it while Juanita & Commander Mom held the edges. Mum & I could actually walk right inside the balloon as it was filling! The air was heated and the balloon started rising. We all climbed into the basket. It was tiny, and there were a lot of us. There was the pilot, two nice ladies we didn't know also having birthday flights & us - me, Juanita, Mum, Commander Mom, Michael, Richard, Sam, Monkey & my good friends Lumpy & Donkey. Up we floated, gently into the sky.

Sam, Monkey & Lumpy must have been afraid of heights, because they stayed low in the bottom of the basket the whole time, but Donkey proved to be a bit of a daredevil! It was a beautiful and cool and fun to watch the cars and houses grow tiny, listening to the traffic sounds, and watching folks get ready for work. The sun rose hazily, and the most amazing thing was watching the world curve away under us. Way high on the horizon, from where we were in Kitchener-Waterloo, we could see Toronto and the CN Tower as a tiny silluette on the very edge of the world. It was pretty spectacular!