The Leisure Inn was the host hotel of the festivities such as pilot sign in and party. It was also the site of the Barbecue on Saturday. Once again the Old Timers Committee did a great job of rounding up sponsors, crew, and FOOD. Bill Glenn, an extraordinary fellow, put a lot of labor into this rally as he does each year.
My sponsor this year (Scotty's Pit Bar-B-Q) provided me with crew for both days.
Saturday morning I walked out into the parking lot and found light fog and generally calm. Reported from the airport was low visibility and wind at 6mph. The weather forcast from Friday made Saturday's flight iffy. Upon arrival at the NMMI sports field I found excellant conditions. Wind was calm and we appeared to be in a hole with no fog. That hole made the balloon meister apprehensive so we were on a 20 minute hold. I used the time wisely to start setting up my balloon. On second briefing we got the go ahead and we finished our setup and launched. We had a beautiful flight going mostly South towards the airport. We flew over Scotty's Pit Bar-B-Q and I found a nice spot to switch out passengers. A few hundred feet up there was some fast air so I played around with the layers to steer. After swapping passengers I found most of the air going toward the airport with no chance of missing it. We were given instructions to fly over and not land so I chose to land before I got there as I didn't know if my fuel would stretch that far. Great flying today.
On Sunday morning I stepped into the parking lot at the Leisure Inn and discovered calm wind, cool temperature, and clear skies. Upon arrival at the NMMI sports field I found the same conditions. We had our briefing and we left much earlier than on Saturday. I had 14 crew on Saturday and got 6 in the air. On Sunday I flew another 6 on two hops. We flew Northeast to Southeast with Southeast being the faster air. The crew was great and we even stopped by Scotty's on Saturday morning for breakfast. Sunday we ate on the field Thanks for all the food Scotty's Pit Bar-B-Q.
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Last Updated May 15, 2005 by Jim Hoidahl
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