Dec 12th

Dec 12th,
Briefing at 5.30. Good day for flying, but a little windy at 10mph. Most of the pilots are going to fly. Met up with Akio, our friend from Hokkaido, Japan in the car park.
Once everything is loaded in the truck, we cross the road to the launch field.
This is the field Derek landed in last night at 14mph. As we came down the road, we could just see the top of the balloon deflating. Good job, as once the balloon was down, everything was covered by the tall wheat. The farmer lets it grow high, as this is fed to the cattle.
This is the farmers cattle, whose food we ploughed through.
On the way home, we came up behind this truck. How many bags of potatoes can a pick up truck hold??? We expected the truck to topple over at every curve, but it seems they know how to stack these bags.
In the evening, some more special shapes inflated. The Levi jeans balloon is 32 years old, and is the 2nd special shape ever made in England. It originally had 2 baskets and burners, but there wasn't enough lift to lift 2 baskets, so they capped off one leg and now have 1 basket. The Robinson Golly was the first special shape to be made in England.
Our friend Frank, from Albuquerque has the white shopping bag. This is the worlds biggest shopping bag balloon.
We walked over to see the Airship, which is owned and operated by Joe, from Germany.
Derek got a ride, along with some paying passengers.
Self portrait, with our hotel in the background.
Ariel view of the hotel and small lake behind it.
Gold Buddha, at the top o f the hill by the gold course. Want to hike up there before we go home.


Derek landing on the launch site.
I get the last ride of the day, with 2 of the balloon fiesta organizers. As the guy reaches up for his earphones, he elbows me and nearly knocks my glasses off, of course Derek snaps a photo and cracks up laughing!
We're off, as the pilot takes one last drag of his cigarette.

Coming in for landing.
This is Pattaya beach. The beach is full of these deck chairs , despite the fact that the beach is only about 10 wide at high tide. Out in the ocean, there are numerous barges doing parasailing. We counted 20, just in front of us.
There are no chairs here, as the steps lead to the busy high street. Pattaya is known as the sex capital of Thailand. All along the beach are numerous girlie clubs and the areas behind the main street, cater to whatever perverted thing you can think of! Numerous old men in their eighties or so, with young girls draped over them! At least I think they were girls! Didn't realize that there are sex package tours here, but looking around you realize that this is a sleazy place. Went back to the hotel and took a hot shower and tried to forget what I've seen here. Back to ballooning, we are doing a Night Glow tonight, so I hope it's not too windy. The afternoons tend to be windier that the morning, so we'll see.