There aren’t many ways to convince Abu Dhabi Week to go to a chilly desert location before sunrise. Then again, it’s not every day we’re offered the opportunity to jump into a hot air balloon and fly high above the Emirate

There we are, bundled up in two jumpers in a vain attempt to keep warm, trying to stifle the yawns and longing for a nice cup of tea. We’ve already been awake for over an hour, having been picked up from the Carrefour car park (at 5.15am sharp, as we’re reminded with a scolding early-morning phone call from our pilot). One rather uncomfortable journey in the back of a van later, we find ourselves standing at the side of a deflated balloon in Sweihan in the Eastern Region.

The calm silence of the still-dark morning is broken as an excitable man in a red jumpsuit jumps down from his jeep, arms waving and fantastic German accent penetrating the silence. Our pilot has arrived, and Peter Kollar is by no means a shy and retiring type.

Peter started hot air ballooning in 1991 in New Zealand as a business proposition. With no competition in the market at the time, he found a niche opportunity – and his passion.

In another sharp business move, Peter decided to bring Balloon Adventures to the UAE in 2004. Why the UAE? Near-perfect flying conditions most of the year (though the summer months are just too hot) and vast open spaces. Peter has a commercial pilot’s licence but he admits that he has no interest in aeroplanes; for him, the only way to be in the air is in a balloon.

So he yells a few orders at his team and they run off obediently to tend to the balloon – a huge sprawled out heap of nylon and a large basket. It seems impossible that it’s going to be able to carry the group of 14 or so passengers, but there’s no time to work out the maths; Peter shouts for everyone to gather around and we’re briefed on landing positions and in which order we’ll be jumping into the basket.

Landing position basically consists of ever-so-slightly bending our knees, facing the opposite direction that the balloon is travelling and holding on tightly – which we can safely say we won’t forget to do.

As the sky lightens, there’s a slight breeze in the air – nothing much, but enough for a fair few exclamations of “bloomin’” from Peter and quite a bit of manpower required to get things straight. Suddenly there’s an urgent order for everyone to start jumping into the basket. We’re in first with as much grace as is compatible with clamouring into a giant hamper (and losing a shoe in the process).

We straighten up and wait with baited breath.
And we wait. There’s a lot of action outside the basket – including a workman who has wandered along to see what all the fuss is about – and there’s a mad blur of red jumpsuits as men run around securing ropes, loosening ropes, and paying careful attention to Peter. He has donned a fetching pair of aviator’s goggles and is blasting a flame into the now-billowing balloon.

We can’t help but notice that the balloon is secured to one of the jeeps ... and it’s moving. There’s some tipping and lurching, and occasionally we rise off the ground and bump back down to practice the landing position early. Finally, with a rush of ropes and shouts – we’re off.

Within minutes we’re high above the crowd of men below and rising surprisingly fast. Peter counts our height as the sun begins to break through the hazy dawn. At 4,000 feet above sea level, the sunrise bursts over the Hatta Mountains – and it’s suddenly a very clear and vast view around the balloon with Oman to one side and Jebel Hafeet to the other. Dubai glimmers in the distance, a whole new prospect of the Emirate and neighbouring regions.

We float in perfect stillness above rolling sand dunes. Peter radios air traffic control to let them know our exact location. While the crisp silence makes us feel completely separated from the rest of the world, we are in fact being tracked on radar somewhere.

We’re in the air for an hour. Apart from the occasional blast of flame to keep the hot air hot, all is perfectly still and peaceful – apart from Peter that is. We’re regaled with ballooning tales, including his 26,500 feet maximum– though he admits he’s a little too old and sensible for such adventures now.

We peek over the side of the basket in awe at the height we’re at; we’re perfectly content with 4,000 feet. Below us lies the occasional camel farm, a vast vista of sand, and – surprisingly – plenty of green, neat squares of farmland. Despite the odd blip of rubbish lying in the sand, there’s not much disturbing the serene, peaceful landscape here. The deserts around Dubai and Sharjah have already been blighted by a mass of litter, according to Peter; he rarely flies there any more because it has sadly been spoiled.

After a group picture (a digital camera dangling in the air with a clever remote control system) it’s time to begin a steady descent. At this point the wind is mentioned again. Flying in an aeroplane is no longer much of an adventure; travelling in a hot air balloon is rather more of an escape and much more basic. You can try and estimate your landing patch; but if the wind suddenly nudges the balloon a little further to the left or right, you have to stay in the air a little longer and look for another suitable landing spot.

Despite at one point getting worryingly close to some pylons, Peter decides it’s time to go down. Landing is simply a matter of letting the air cool down. Peter thinks it may be a little bumpy. We hold on tighter.

It’s a fun landing. It’s only after the bumpy drag-ride for several metres along the sand and the basket finally tipping over on to its side that Peter lets us know the basket manages to stay upright on landing “most of the time”. Not for us it doesn’t.

We get to our feet, a little shakily but feeling completely exhilarated – and disappointed to be back on the ground. We’ve attracted a group of workmen once more, all of whom seem thoroughly amused by our hilarious arrival.
We leave, clutching flight certificates and wondering where we could store a balloon if we could get our hands on one. The experience is literally uplifting, genuinely exciting (in a perfectly safe kind of way) and just plain fun. If we had it our way, we’d be up in the air everyday – it’d certainly ease some of that Salam Street congestion, even if it probably wouldn’t get us to work any faster.

Balloon facts

• The hot air balloon is the oldest successful human-carrying flight technology
• On 19th September 1783 the Aerostat Réveillon was flown with the first living beings in a basket attached to the balloon: a sheep called Montauciel (climb-to-the-sky), a duck and a rooster
• A couple of months later, the first manned flight was made over Paris by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d'Arlandes. They were in a hot air balloon created by the Montgolfier brothers
• A hot air balloon consists of a bag called the envelope that contains heated air. Suspended beneath is the gondola or wicker basket; this carries the passengers and a source of heat, usually an open flame. The heated air inside the envelope makes it buoyant since it has a lower density than the relatively cold air outside the envelope
• The world record for altitude in a balloon is 34,668 metres, about 113,740 feet, set in 1961 by Americans Malcolm Ross and Victor Prather. The longest flight – 40,814 km – was made in 1999 by Bertrand Piccard (Switzerland) and Brian Jones (UK). They also set the record for the longest-ever flight in terms of time: 477 hours 47 minutes

For more information and to book a Ballooning Adventure: 04 285 4949 or www.ballooning.ae

Charlie Kennedy