Lining up at Henley Lake in the early morning light, letting off pibald after pibald go to try and judge the wind, it became obvious that not everyone was going to fly today. So it proved, with a brave few taking to the conditions, including one pilot who took out a fairly substantial chunk of his envelope on a tree. While he was able to safely fly on, it did put a few off taking an early morning dip. After a bit of wandering around, Denis decided to inflate Welly. I was sceptical to say the least, but when the wind dropped during the inflation, I was beginning to think I should start calling him Nostrodenis for being able to pick the conditions. However, there was still too much wind up top, so once more we ripped out and packed away, agonisingly close today.
For the organisers it was a big fingers crossed for the Nightglow. This had to succeeed, otherwise they were staring down the barrel of a lost event. The weather cleared, the wind died and it was a successful event. Nightglows are a funny thing for Balloonists, it is quite a removed experience sitting on the ground firing the burners slightly off-cue and watching everyone else do the same, staring into the darkness where it was assumed there was a crowd. From a distance it must look marvellous, but close-up it's just hard work. But the organisers would have breathed a sigh, and all in it looked good (by the way, if you check the link, we're the balloon just to the left of the winking daisy).
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