Hot air ballooning over Luxor, Egypt

Hello Steemit travel bugs!.. thought I would share my recent experience of hot air ballooning :)

After ringing in the new year with a bonfire on the banks of the Nile I already had a sneaking suspicion that 2018 was off to a flying start!... so when on the second day of the new year I was going to go hot air ballooning to see the sunrise over Luxor, that only confirmed my suspicion!

I'm not an early morning person so getting up at 4.30am nearly put me off (thankfully it was winter otherwise it would of been even earlier!).... but luckily just the thought of a birds eye view of the city, that in ancient times was known as Thebes, was enough to drag me out of bed!

It was still pitch black when we got picked up from our hotel in central Luxor. We continue to pick up more ballooners until our van is full and then get taken to a jetty to catch a motorboat to the West Bank. Even though it is a super short trip we are served tea, coffee and a Twinkee on board.

When we arrive at the other side it's back into another van for a short drive to where the balloons take off.

Once there we are seperated off into our different groups and then led to our balloon which is way bigger than I expected!... we are essentially hopping into a giant wicker basket which is equally scary as it is exciting.... this basket fits 24 passengers and 1 pilot and we have a full load so it's a very cosy ride. The pilot has his own section while the passenger sections are divided into four with roughly 6 people in each.

Once everyone is in and we have been briefed on the 3 different types of landings... Egyptian - soft and smooth, Australian - pretty smooth/couple of bumps, American - hard, bumpy and possible tip over of basket, we are then shown the landing position - which is holding onto the handles and facing the opposite direction to which we are landing. With the safety demo done it is now time for lift off!!!

It wasn't long before the sun started to rise and it is nothing short of spectacular!

Now with the sun up we can really take in the sights of the city of Luxor from above! We can also see the Valley of Kings, the Nile and Delta region. It is amazing to see the stark contrast between the rich fertile land along the Nile and then the surrounding desert.

We also get to see the temples of Luxor, Karnak and Hatshepsut from a different angle to when we visited them later that day!

Hatshepsut temple

All up we are in the air for about 45 glorious minutes. Since we are at the mercy of the wind we don't have an exact landing location, as we start our descent we see a small boy waving at us! He starts to run as he follows our balloon's descent... we make what is considered an Australian landing in a nearby field.

It takes about 10 people on the ground to hold our balloon down as we wait for the hot air to be released... as we are waiting the young boy comes running up all smiles and waves! We can't believe he ran all that way....What a way to end an amazing flight!!

Safe and sound on the ground

Unfortunately just a couple of days later there was a fatal crash in the very same area involving one of the balloons we shared the sky with. Like anything adventurous there is an element of risk and Hot air ballooning is no different, so make sure you do some research and go with an experienced and reputable company.