Back from Holiday

We've just got back from our holiday in Keszthely, Hungary. Lots of wonderful memories, though there were a bit of frustrating parts, too, but never mind that he he...

Just want to write down a lovely short convo with hubby just now. 

Me: "Dang, honey, you're rich! Look at all these coins!" (Some Hungarian and Euro coins were scattered on his computer table)
R2: "Of course I'm rich. I have you." (grinning like a madman with his 3D glasses on 'coz he's playing a 3D computer game - actually I love it when he puts on those 3D glasses 'coz it makes him look like an MI agent or something ha hahhh...)

Anyway, I am happy to inform that nobody asked about kids at all to us during our holiday, but that was also probably because the people in Keszthely preferred speaking more German than English. That was one source of the bits of frustration that I felt. Maybe that means I'm a spoilt traveller ha ha ha ha ha...ahem...

We also had fun going up on an air balloon ride. I don't think hubby even thought about going on such a ride before I mentioned it to him. This is one of the lifelong dreams that I have on my dream list that I wrote down years and years ago. I'm not really that ambitious about fulfilling all those things on the list, though, but it's just that while browsing about Keszthely on the net, I found the air balloon ride possibility in Balaton area, so I said to hubby that even though it was rather pricey, we'd better try it! :-D

It wasn't what I had expected, but it made me understand more that dreams can be different from reality/the experience. Dreams are made of all the sweet, tasty, nicely-smelling, soft-as-a-cotton-ball, gorgeous idealism in my head without knowing what it's really all about. It may be sweet, but there may be a slight tangy taste as well. Or it may be nicely-smelling, but it's a bit rough on the touch. It may even be bitter with a slight sweet taste only and mostly rough and not smelling like anything at all. It sure opened up my view, though.

I didn't think it would be THAT tough to prepare for an air balloon ride nor would it be that tough to land. After the balloon was almost ready for take off, the wind suddenly changed direction and the people preparing for the ride had to really act quickly to turn it all around and they had to do it all over again - they had to deflate the balloon in order to reposition it and then inflate it again before we were finally ready to take off.

The take off itself went very quickly and excellently, though. It didn't feel like anything at all. I have motion and sea sickness, so I was a bit afraid that I'd feel dizzy or something, but I didn't feel it at all. In fact, the take off was MUCH better than a plane's take off. The only difference was that we both felt HOT!!! The heat of the burners above us was rather uncomfortable, though it got better once we got high enough and the air temperature dropped down. The burners were also so noisy, so it was hard to talk.

But we could see a gorgeous sunset that took place slowly from high up there as well as the bird-eye-view around the area. Despite the heat, the rather tight space in the basket that made it impossible to move around too much and the noisy burners (and a rather rough landing which I'd tell soon), it was worth it. After taking plenty of pics and videos (I had to hold on to my camera so tightly for fear that it would drop down ha ha...), we looked into each other's eyes and we both had that certain look that said, "Hey, it's kinda cool up here. I'm SO glad we can experience this together! Marvellous view!" :-D

Anyway, the wind picked up when we were preparing for landing, so the pilot told us to hold on with both hands to the ropes that were conveniently hung around the basket. The pilot became so very busy then because he had to use the walkie-talkie to tell the others where his location was so that they could prepare themselves down there as well as checking the wind speed and then he had to pull one of the ropes connected to the balloon so that we didn't graze on a tree that we almost ran into. Apparently by pulling the rope, the balloon then swerved a little bit to the left side of the tree. Phew!

Then we heard a low thud when we landed on a 45 degree angle and then one guy grabbed on to the basket to get it back straight up whereas the other had to grab onto one of the other rope so that the wind didn't blow the balloon back up. Then after securing the basket and the balloon, the pilot told R2 to get out of the basket, then he himself get out of there after a while and finally in the end I was told to get out of the basket. Then they had to pack everything before we could leave. Phew! Quite an adventure! :-D

Anyway, here are some photos that I took...

The process of inflating the balloon. This was before the wind toppled it over to the other side (diagonally across it).

The noisy burners.

The view of Balaton lake. On the left side of the photo you can see one of the dangling ropes that the pilot can pull if needed to "steer" the balloon (I think):

The gorgeous sunset...it took a while before it finally went down, so we had plenty of time to enjoy it:

The landing place. The pilot wanted to land on a grassy field, but alas the wind blew us to this place instead.