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Balloon Tour of Wine Country

On Friday morning, dark and early, we drove up to Santa Rosa in Sonoma County for a Balloon ride over the vinyards in Sonoma County. Riding in a balloon is a lot of fun. The only problem with it is that the view from straight over vineyards looks pretty much like the view of any agricultural enterprise: row after row of row after row broken up by the occasional orchard which has bigger rows. Wine country really looks better from the ground.

Helping to inflate a 250,000,000 cubic feet balloon. Gas powered fan on other side of gondola.

 

Flame on! After the balloon is inflated by the fan, the heat is applied by three 250,000 btu burners.

They went through a 25 gallon propane tank in about 90 seconds.

 

 

Me and Sherry just before takeoff.

 

A vineyard from the air.  One of the Kendall Jackson properties.

It looks like a cotton field a few days after the defoliant is sprayed doesn't it?

 

The Sonoma County airport where we landed. At the bottom is the roof of one of the Kendall Jackson production facilities.

 

The crew preparing to deflate the balloon.

After the flight, the captain treated us to a champagne brunch before our drive into San Francisco. Then it was San Francisco or bust.

Driving across the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco.

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