icicle one

Beautiful frosty morning, blue skies and very cold. Briefing started at 08.00 and finished at 08.15. Queue at mobile caterers so we decided to rig the balloon first and pop back. On our return the queue was four times as long, it took us over an hour to get breakfast. The plan had been to fly twice, but with refuelling ending at 12.00 this wouldn't be possible.

Margaret, Dave and I flew, and Chris drove the retrieve with Wendy and Kathy. Dave inflated the balloon, did the take off and all the flying until the landing.

Our track was 270 - 280 degrees at 15 kts, an excellent direction. We flew along the edge of the Downs to the South and West of Marlborough. Fantastic view over the Hill Forts, earthworks, strip lynchets etc: and with the ground falling away sharply to our left. The escarpments average height was about 800ft amsl and we cruised at about 1500ft.

We were approaching Lyneham CTR. Upon changing to the third tank Margaret spotted a bad leak from the valve. After reconnecting to the previous tank I didn't try to resolve the problem because 1) We were already descending for landing because of approaching controlled airspace and 2) we had the same problem testing the tanks and it took 6 - 10 minutes to thaw out the valve.

We went down over the end of the hill and landed in what turned out to be 'set-aside', having seen a vehicle track along the sides of the field and an entrance without a gate. This is where our troubles began - viz 1) the soil was clay and damp, stuck to our boots and everything else and we slid all over the place. 2) Margaret left the field, met the retrieve and farmer who wouldn't allow the vehicle in, and 3) the retrieve spent over an hour trying to find an alternative route in - there wasn't one.

We trolleyed the envelope to the farm (Margaret and Kathy carried the burner) which was just over half a mile away. In places the track consisted of deep wheel ruts frozen solid and in other places pools of slush. Chris, Dave and I were exhausted. Recovering the basket and tanks was going to be a nightmare so I went to find the farmer and asked if he knew anyone with a tractor and trailer who would get our gear out for a fee.