We always made headlines in the newspapers, sometimes for the wrong reasons; it was all promotion. On this day we took up Liberal hopeful Don Pennell, and landed in Burlington Bay under the Burlington Skyway. Liberal makes big splash. The coast guard made the rescue, the pilot and the politician went off to have ho toddies, I had to pull the balloon out of the lake. We ended up on the shores of this huge mansion, I walked up and asked to make a phone call. The house was filled with cats, hundreds of cats, and this interesting older lady. She let me use the phone. Later that night, Suzanne asked me what kind of day I had.
There's more to the story, the shore was covered in big angular boulders, the balloon was draped over them. It took hours in the freezing water diving down and freeing it up. I couldn't take a chance just leaving it there. Next day our beautiful yellow balloon was rust red from Burlington harbor. Then there was the coast guard, they tried to pull the balloon along like a giant sea anchor, wouldn't budge. Then the guy backed up and took a run at it. The gondola broke apart; designed to do that on impact to absorb fast landings. It was one of those days.
No comments:
Post a Comment