16th Philippine Hot Air Balloon Fiesta

I brought my mom and brothers to the 16th Philippine hot air balloon fiesta. My dad was not able to join due to stuffs he need to do in Visayas. We left home at 1:30am and when we got there at 4am, there was already a long line in the ticket booth and the parking was starting to get busy.

At 5:30am the jeeps pulling the balloons started to position themselves in the wide lawn of the airport.

The sporadic flames from the burners lit the early morning skies.

There was no flag jump this time from an airplane. Instead there were these powered parachutes that carried the flag to open the Saturday balloon fiesta events.

Then they started firing up the burners to inflate the balloons.

The burners were not turned on everytime. They mix just the right amount of normal air and warm air to control the air temp in the balloons to inflate it and give just the right lift.

Hot air balloons of variety of shapes.

This balloon did not have a gondola. Just a rig to hold the fuel tank and a small chair for the lonely occupant to sit on. No girlfriend allowed.

The rise of Darth Vader - literally.

A couple having their pre-nuptial photos taken.

As the balloons rose so do the frequency of shooting and clicking from the ground.

The Festo balloons were nice. They were the pair of balloons in the upper right that were tied together and where one of them looked like an upsidedown flying balloon.

Tents and picnic mats were everywhere and reminded me of those old Woodstock pictures I see in old music magazines. We left Clark early to catch the morning shows in Subic.