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Published: November 15th 2010
Don't forget to click through to page 2 of photos!
To soak up the lovely landscape of Cappadocia, famous for its its amazing rock formations, we decided to do a Hot air balloon ride. A hot air balloon ride is something we had been looking at doing our whole trip, however high costs had prohibited us doing it elsewhere in Europe. The low cost and supposedly wonderful views on the Coppadocia Hot air balloon ride meant we were able to fulfill one of aims of our trip and it did not disappoint.
We were up at 05:00 for this Hot air balloon ride over the Cappadocian rocky landscape (3*+) we hopped into a little shuttle van with four others from our group and the driver zipped along the empty streets at 400km/hr.
We marveled at the balloons as they were inflated and we stood about in the grey light of dawn and watched the many colourful balloons inflating. One guy was running about inside one of the inflating balloons, they are truly huge inside so no real problem doing so, and they were doing the initial inflation with a large fan only so no chance of setting fire to
him! A chap wandered by with a dog and I wondered if the dog might run into the half inflated balloon that was still on the ground which would have amused me.....
To our surprise the balloon baskets we ride in are pretty big with 4 compartments holding 4-6 people each around the small central compartment holding four gas tanks and the driver. Our balloon held 21 and we were bundled into one side with our tour mates. It was cool drifting up off the ground, it's all so quite and gentle it's almost surreal.
The balloon gas burners seems to have two settings: a maintenance burn and a 'get me the heck out of here' burn, they both sound the same so I was often mildly surprised to find us sinking when the pilot was burning away loudly but he didn't look distressed so I guessed 'that's the way it is'!
To our joy the weather was calm with a few wisps of cloud about but otherwise clear and the early sunrise light was very pretty. The landscape of Capadoccia spread below us and the views were stunning with the amazing sharp rocky pinnacles, ridges of
pointy, different coloured rock, and even the hollowed out rocks where people had lived over the ages. Even better was the fact we were in the air with 72 other balloons; including the worlds largest one that holds 36 people. Seeing the other balloons above, below, and around you is fabulous and makes it much better than the already brilliant ride would be if you were up their alone.
I took over 300 photos throughout the balloon experience the landscape below was extraordinary, up to one point 600m below us. It's a great region to see from above and seeing it from ground level just isn't the 'full experience'.
Our tour mates Steve & Mel stepped aside to let us to the outside of the balloon basket for the last bit of the trip and I enjoyed being able to see down the perilous drop of the side of the balloon. After enjoying another 15 mins or so of spectacular views and the amazing scenery, our pilot had a ground crew below who frantically drove to where they thought we would come down.
After one false start that sent the ground crew scrabbling back to the car we came
down in a field.
It was amusing to see the crew grab the balloon tow line and hang on for grim death as it dragged them through a field and gullies and bushes, kudos to them for hanging on and we touched down; according to Alicia very close to someone's backyard.
We hopped out of the balloon, enjoyed a celebratory champagne and got a silly 'achievement certificate' then bade goodbye to our fine pilot Murat and got a ride back to our hotel where we arrived around 08:40.
The next blog entry covers the rest of our wonderful time in Cappadocia.
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Anne
non-member comment
Beautiful
You have to enlarge some of these photos when you return home they are gorgeous so so amazing!!!!!