[September 04, 2011] Volunteer gig turns into high-flying fun at Ripon festival Tweet RIPON, Sep 04, 2011 (The Modesto Bee - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- If you think Highway 99 is a challenge during Friday evening rush hour, try looking down on it from 1,100 feet in a wicker basket suspended from a hot air balloon. That was the view I had Saturday morning after unexpectedly finding myself a passenger in one of the many balloons that ascended from Mistlin Sports Park in Ripon during the Color the Skies festival. As a reporter, I should have been able to give you the exact number of balloons that took off just after dawn in the cool morning air. But I went to the festival as a volunteer, offering to help prepare andinflate the balloons and ride in one of the chase vehicles to help them land. Story continues below video; Scroll down to see video of pilot searching for a place to land I never got the chance to count. The two-man crew aboard the balloon I was helping needed another body in the basket, and I was about the right weight. "Climb into the basket," pilot Dale Stroble said, and I clambered in. After a minute or so during which bystanders were busy snapping pictures, Stroble blasted hot air into the balloon and we gently took flight at 7:15 a.m. "Goodbye, Dorothy!" I said in homage to "The Wizard of Oz" as we waved to the receding crowd. The ascent was quick. Stroble, chief pilot for California Ballooning Services of Woodland, checked his instruments and said we were going up at a rate of 400 feet per minute. The forecast was for light and variable wind, and that's what we got. Stroble spent much of the flight going through the fine points of maneuvering the balloon with Angel Infante, the student pilot who was also in the basket. We drifted south of Mistlin park, over houses and toward Highway 99, teeming with traffic. We kept a wary eye out for other balloons (I never did get a count; event organizers were expecting 17) and for power lines, the mortal enemy of balloonists. The balloon went gently this way and that, then stalled for roughly five minutes, giving us ample time to take in the traffic on 99 and gaze toward the orchards and vineyards beyond. After taking the balloon up to 1,100 feet, Stroble dropped it several hundred feet to try to land east of the freeway. But with no suitable spot available, we caught a breeze and drifted quickly over the noisy highway. After we crossed the Stanislaus River, the freeway noise faded away. The balloon drifted over the trees at 2 to 3 knots, which Stroble said was good for a balloon -- a jogging pace for a runner. The remainder of our ride, quiet save for occasional bursts of birdsong and the whoosh of the burners, was spent scouting for a place to land. The water treatment plant was unappealing on several levels. The metal roof on the nut processing yard didn't look inviting, either. Onward we drifted, eventually crossing diagonally over a plot of newly planted olive trees. As our chase vehicle caught up with us, a shift in the wind aligned us between two rows of trees. Stroble pulled a few ropes and suddenly we were on the ground, near the intersection of Bacon and Wil- liams roads near Salida. We'd gone about four miles as the crow flies. Stroble plans to take his balloon up again today, the final day of the Color the Skies festival, a benefit for Children's Hospital Central California in Madera. The event resumes today, from 6 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Mistlin Sports Park, Jack Tone and River roads, Ripon. Admission is free, parking is $5. www.colortheskies.com Dan Day, director of interactive media at The Modesto Bee, can be reached at [email protected] or (209) 578-2332. ___ (c)2011 The Modesto Bee (Modesto, Calif.) Visit The Modesto Bee (Modesto, Calif.) at www.modbee.com Distributed by MCT Information Services [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]