Ballooning!

We met the group for sunrise ballooning at 5:55 am in the hotel lobby. Our bus driver was an incredibly charismatic man named John. There was a small amount of confusion from a family whose booking wasn't recorded correctly, so we were a little behind schedule.

Rather than taking that as a setback, John accepted this as a challenge. As a result, we took a very fast bus trip out to the site where the ballooning began. We got a safety briefing before we floated away, interspersed with several bad jokes. John was a bit like everyone's favorite grandpa or uncle- all of the corny jokes were readily available. 

Here's Cas' favorite: Prince Charles came to Alice Springs when he was just 19 years old at the time. When he stepped off the airplane at the airport, he was wearing a fur hat. A reporter asked him, "Your majesty, Welcome to Alice Springs, but what is the fur hat for?" 

Prince Charles said, "It's not a fur hat, it's a fox hat- we use them when we go on fox hunts." 

The reporter still wasn't quite understanding the point of the hat. "But, your majesty, why are you wearing a fox hat?" 

"My mother the queen told me to wear it, and the queen must always be obeyed." 

The reporter persisted, "But, your majesty, why did she suggest the fox hat?" 

The prince explained, "I told mother I was going to Alice Springs. She said Alice Springs? Where the fox hat?"

It helps to tell the story with an accent. 

We got into place, watched the balloon inflate, then got into our basket.
Here is a moment from our trip:

And the champagne that followed:

When John got us all back on our bus, he drove us to our tour bus, where we met up with the members of our group who skipped the ballooning trip. 

It was a totally remarkable morning. 

The tour bus took us to a place for a bathroom break and camel ride. Cas and I were up on a camel named Murky. I love that name. 

It was ridiculously fun, but it defies explanation. It was bouncy, jostling and totally hilarious. Just... Here: 

We're headed to Uluru, also called Ayers Rock. I joked this morning that it was odd for the Australians to name a large feature like this after Nichelle Nichols' character from Star Trek. So, it's off to Uhura with us.