Up, Up and Away

Captain's Log,
Earth Date 2014, July 2nd

Today was Commander Damien Martin's birthday and for this occasion I scheduled a sunrise ride in a hot air balloon. The gift was supposed to be a surprise; however, while planning our epic trek together on evening, Commander Martin happened to notice the "hot air ballooning" event listed. Truth be told I was a little disgruntled that I had not been more surreptitious, but after a minute I experienced relief that I did not have to keep a secret (one of my weaknesses, mind you).

Finally the day before arrived and I was happy to received the "good weather" prediction from the air ballooning company. So after relaxing all day and binge-watching The Killing, we eventually decided (at 12:30am) to start packing, since the original plan had been to leave for Elk Grove from Perris Airport. At around 2:30 am we went down for a brief nap and woke up at 3:45am for the day. At Perris Air Port, which is about and hour and a half from Whittier, we met our fellow passengers, some quiet, some obnoxiously loud for 5:30am and others who stood militarily with aviator glasses, thigh tattoos and hair neatly cut/stowed away. But my favorite moment of the morning was when the slavic-speaking couple arrived, late and the lady was asked by our guide if she had brought her, "off-roading shoes." This was after she teetered out of the red sport car and daintily clomped over to join us at the round up site. I exchanged judgmental looks with Commander Martin about this woman, and we quietly scoffed together.

Turns out there were to be two "hops" that were to go up in the balloon and we just so happened to be in the first "hop." Quickly we loaded into the white van, that not too long ago had belonged too a church (apparently) and had several gumby Jesuses stashed about, disregarded. It was made clear to us that our guides thought this was hilarious and proceeded to explain that they needed all the other gumby religious prophets so they could be respectful to all religions. We all proceeded to make jokes about prayers and about Jesus taking the wheel, etc.

Just as the sun was peeking through the San Jacinto Mountains, we arrived at the open field which was to be our launch site. The crew had already arrived, unrolled a blue tarp, unloaded the basket and had commenced unraveling the balloon when we pulled up. Both Commander Martin and I were amazed at the enormity of the balloon and proceeded to take copious photographs of the "Wild West" hot air balloon. It was filled with large fans at first and we all reveled in watching the belly of the balloon swell to capacity. Eventually the captain of the balloon-ship started to blast fire into the center of the balloon and the balloon began to rise into the air, and to keep the contraption grounded we had to hold on to the basket before climbing into the compartmentalized vessel.

With more fire, the balloon lifted the passenger-heavy basket off the ground and we slowly ascended skywards. The ride was peaceful, until the captain pulled out a bunch of snakes and made a joke about snakes on a balloon, to which someone retorted, "get these mutha fucking snakes off this mutha fucking balloon," which was quite rude, but also quite funny. Then for to further our riding pleasure, the captain expertly folded a paper plane and released it into the air. It floated around us, never fleeing too far, riding the same air streams as we did. Amazingly it landed at about the same time (a half hour later) as we did.

After the ride back to the station, we were all served mimosas and initiated as "Aeronauts," for which both Commander Martin and I have the certificates as proof.
As far as we can tell these peoples in Perris are peaceful, despite the dessert climate they live in.

This concludes the first transmission of this log. For pictures of this interesting adventure, please stand by.
Amanda, Out.