If you’re reading this then I’m guessing you’re toying with the idea of hot air ballooning. Many people purchase a hot air ballooning trip for themselves as a sort ‘life ambition gift’. Most of us dream of hot air ballooning one day and sadly a great deal of those will never actually fulfil the goal; it gets put off and put off until frankly, it’s just too late. Those of us who take the leap and join the world of ballooning then realise just why so many of us Brits dream of taking to the skies in this way. It is an experience like no other, exhilarating, breathtaking, relaxing, inspirational, euphoric, tranquil and emotional even. Why put off until tomorrow what you can do today?

Ballooning is also a gift given to others. This could be as a birthday present, anniversary surprise, congratulations or reward gift, a romantic gesture, a Christmas present; for many their doesn’t have to be a reason! To receive those ‘golden’ tickets that will allow you the life time chance of taking to the skies in a hot air balloon, is in itself an exciting thing. Just picture the look on their face when they realise what’s in store for them!

At Adventure Balloons we cover various flight locations across Britain, for example Oxford, Reading, Hemel Hempstead, Stevenage, Watford, Tring, London, Basingstoke, Hartley Wintney, Guildford, Farnham, Godalming, West Meon, Alton, Winchester, Kent, Sussex and Essex.

Our south Hampshire area is one of our most popular spots. Flying from Anstey Park in Alton, from West Meon, from Micheldever near the railway station and from the City of Winchester, there’s plenty of ‘flight paths’ to choose from. However do bear in mind, the exact course you end up taking is completely wind dependent! Our customers commonly see the impressive Winchester Cathedral and are in awe of its staggering beauty from above! Be seduced by the rolling Hampshire countryside, the River Test, the pretty little villages such as Laverstoke, Whitchurch, and the Candovers. You can often see the large estates of Leckford on the River Test where Waitrose produce a lot of their food, the Mid Hants Steam Railway that runs from Alton to Alresford, and many a time we’ve had the rather unusual experience of seeing a glider circling around Lasham airfield, or microlights flying from Popham airfield.

Book your chance to fly in a hot air balloon with Adventure Balloons and you will receieve a 12 month voucher which will entitle you to select your date from anytime (depending on which voucher you buy) over the 12 months following purchase! Book online or call us on 01252 844222.

Picture it now, your company’s logo splashed across a huge 330 cubic foot in volume hot air balloon. Just imagine the pride you’d feel when you saw you businesses colours in the form of a colossal balloon floating high up in the sky for the world to see. But even better still image a hot air balloon created to the shape of your companies icon; now that would certainly make people look, and what better way to advertise your business!

Balloons are proven unique and without a doubt attention-grabbing media vehicles. Hot air balloons are becoming increasingly popular among businesses wishing to use them to generate publicity at events. Promotional balloons are often found at balloon fiestas, major sporting occasions, outdoor shows and events that attract television coverage due to their unbeatable power at engaging an audience and creating interest in a product or an organisation.

In fact, research has suggested that the costs involved in balloon advertising ‘per thousand opportunities to see’ is vastly lower than the costs involved in advertising through a newspaper, through posters and through radio or television. What’s more, this is based on the amount of people who actually saw the balloon and not the number of people who saw the wider ‘fall out’; the ‘editorial’ press releases and the television coverage of the event where the balloon was used.

Adventure Balloons are always happy to help businesses promote themselves using hot air balloons and so if you’d like to understand more about how we can assist you in finding new customers, rewarding your existing customers or just giving your company a boost, then get in touch.

The typical hot air balloon shape is something we all know, even a 3 year old can tell you what a hot air balloon looks like!  But balloons are not all lightbulb shaped, they come in a huge array of different shapes and sizes, used for advertising or just for showing off and having some fun!  In order to create a special-shaped hot air balloon, several techniques need to be used to hold the fabric in position.  When successfully completed, these balloons can be very large and incredibly complicated.

Malcom Forbes, the original publisher of the Forbes 500 magazine, is known for his astounding hot air balloons.  Each time Malcom visited a country, he would commission a special-shaped balloon to “honour” that particular country.  He created a Pagoda to represent Japan, an Elephant in honour of India, a Sphinx for Egypt and the Santa Maria for Spain.  Unfortunately, Malcom is no longer here to show us his astounding balloons or to create more, but when he was alive, he held an annual festival at the Chateau Balleroy in Northern France to show off his masterpieces. 

Special-shaped balloons may be fantastic on the eyes, but inflating them can be rather difficult!  Balloons such as the Santa Maria, which have lots of parts that stick out pose problems when inflating as all the parts need to be pressurised at the same time to assume the correct shape.  They also can take a long time to pack away so as you can imagine, pilots have a love-hate relationship with these rather breathtaking balloons!

At Adventure Balloons, we offer hot air balloon flights in the standard shaped balloons, though our “Happy Birthday” balloon is the UK’s only birthday balloon.  Take a look at our website for information of flight locations and vouchers. 

When you think of what a hot air balloon looks like, what comes to mind?  Light bulb shaped perhaps?  Well how about sphinx, elephant, pagoda or even an Ariel washing up liquid shaped balloon? 

Since the 1960’s and 1970’s, special shaped balloons have been created to suit particular requirements.  The original publisher of the Forbes 500 magazine, Malcolm Forbes had a stunning collection of special shapes. Every time he visited a country, he commissioned a special shape to “honour” the country; a sphinx for Egypt, an elephant for India and a pagoda for Japan to name a few. 

Pilots have a love/hate relationship with special shapes as they are difficult to inflate without burning them, often take lots of room to come to a stop because the deflation system is compromised by the balloons shape and take ages to pack away (ask the crew about that, the pilot will be unlikely to know anything about packing away!).  Malcolm Forbes’ balloon, the Santa Maria is a very tricky special shape to inflate because of all the bits that stick out from the middle. If one bit comes up before the others it can be impossible to get the other parts to “pressurize” with hot air and thus assume their correct shape!

Yesterday, my grandparents (who are visiting from France) mentioned the annual festival at Chateau Balleroy in Northern France.  It just so happens that Malcom Forbes organised this festival when he was alive to show off his special shaped balloons.  Malcolm, who took up ballooning when he was 48, bought Chateau Balleroy in 1970 and five years later, the first museum dedicated to hot air ballooning was opened in his converted stable.   He truly was a lover of balloons.  If you are ever visiting Normandy, take a trip to the Chateau Balleroy where you can learn about the history of balloons and enjoy visiting the beautiful Chateau itself.

Visit the Adventure Balloons website where you can take a look at other special shaped balloons, or even book your own hot air balloon flight for the experience of a lifetime!

A huge fork lift truck, mobile phone, UEFA cup replica and a railway train are just some of the designs that can be seen flying in the skies of Britain this coming summer. When you take your planned hot air balloon flight with Adventure Balloons, you will see many of these weird and wonderful designs, which are a valuable form of advertising, one of the most effective too. However, when you rise to the skies, you will be in a conventionally shaped balloon, or envelope as it is referred to but the thrill will be just as great.

Floating over the patchwork quilt of the south east or the home counties will offer you a new aspect on landmarks that you normally see from the ground, you will be surprised at how much different they look from the tranquilly of a hot air balloon. Flight booking are being taken for hot air balloon festivals and rallies, as well as normal morning and evening flights throughout the spring, summer and autumn. Contact Adventure Balloons and book a flight, or buy a voucher for yourself or loved for use later in the year.

Since the resurgence of hot air ballooning in the late 1960’s, balloon designers and manufacturers have used new techniques and machinery to design increasingly complicated hot air balloons. Special shaped balloons are usually commissioned by companies wanting to advertise a brand, but there are a few people who collect unique balloons as a hobby.

Probably one of the most famous hot air balloon collectors was the late Malcolm Forbes (the original publisher of the Forbes 500 magazine), who had a variety of special shaped hot air balloons. Malcolm Forbes would commission a new balloon when he visited a new country, to honour their culture and diverseness. These ranged from a Sphinx for Egypt, an elephant for India and the Santa Maria to honour Spain.

Because of the complicated nature of custom balloon designs, hot air balloon pilots seem to have a love/hate relationship with them. These balloons are often harder to inflate and pressurise consistently, take more room to land because of their shape and take longer to assemble and pack away. But for the pilot it is a great feeling to fly a custom shaped balloon because it handles a lot differently from a standard balloon.

With the advances in hot air balloon manufacture and the incorporation of computer aided design (CAD), there are bound to be even more specially shaped balloons for many years to come.

Hot air balloons have been used as an advertising medium for many years and can be up to 5 times cheaper than traditional advertising types. A balloon can be seen from a distance, so can advertise to many people at the same time, and if the balloon has a unique shape or distinctive artwork this adds to the image of your brand and becomes a talking point for spectators.

Hot air balloons come in many different sizes, from small hopper balloons which carry just a pilot, to large balloons capable of taking up to 16 passengers. Large balloons are ideal for corporate events, whereas smaller balloons are great for tethering at balloon events.

Because a balloon can be packed away into a trailer, it can be transported easily around the country or the world for advertising in different areas. With a fully branded hot air balloon costing as little as £10,000 and with a lifespan of up to 10 years, it definitely is a viable and cheaper option to traditional advertising mediums.

Hot air ballooning is the oldest form of flying and can be traced back to its pioneers, who conducted the first manned balloon flights way back in 1783. A hot air balloon works on the principal that hot air rises; the balloons envelope (the fabric dome shaped structure) is filled with hot air and once enough air is inside the balloon it lifts off into the sky.

Nowadays, the balloon is filled using balloon burners, which use propane to heat the air inside the balloon; to keep the balloon in the air, the pilot must fire the burners regularly to maintain a steady flight.

One piece of a hot air balloon that has hardly changed since the late 1700’s is the use of a basket to carry the balloons passengers. Modern balloon baskets are still woven, but are now made from a combination of Kooboo and Palambang cane, which is extremely strong and flexible and able to withstand multiple take-offs and landings.

Due to the advances in technology, hot air balloons now come in many shapes and sizes from standard balloon shapes to uniquely shaped balloons, used to advertising and balloon festivals.

The 2009 balloon season is fast approaching, so you can be sure that there will be many happy birthdays and anniversaries, as people open their presents and receive their balloon flights.

It will not only be the people who will have the chance to fly in a balloon that will be happy, the balloon spotters will also be excited in the prospect of seeing all the different shapes and sizes of hot air balloon that will be rising into the skies in 2009.

Balloon spotting has long been a popular hobby, even as far back as the first manned flights, as thousands of spectators gathered to see a glimpse of these huge dome-like structures. The number of balloon spotters is increasing each year and there is now estimated to be well over 2000 balloon spotters in the UK alone.

This growing popularity is due to the increased numbers of balloon festivals that are held all over the UK; which is one of the best ways to see a hot air balloon close up. Balloon spotter may also visit their local balloon launch site to take pictures and see the balloon up close; many balloon operators encourage spectators to watch the launching of a balloon, as long as they do not obstruct the balloon crew.

Using hot air balloons as an advertising platform or for promoting new and existing products has been around for many years. A uniquely shaped or branded hot air balloon can make a great addition to existing advertising campaigns, as the balloon not only attracts attention, but also holds the spectators interest.

With an estimated 6 million people attending balloon festivals in the UK alone, and the added bonus of the balloon envelope being able to be seen from a distance, a branded or specially shaped balloon has the ability to be seen by millions more and has greater longevity than TV and radio adverts.

The most famous and well known balloon is probably the Bud Light Spirit of Freedom, which was piloted by Steve Fossett as he became the first person to circumnavigate the globe. The flight took just 14 days, 19 hours and 51 minutes to navigate around the world and as Bud Light sponsored the balloon; its name was mentioned every time the balloon was talked about.