By Bob Strohm
bstrohm@wbcowqel.com
A mother and son got a surprise present they may never soon forget, as they were treated to a ride in a hot air balloon Monday afternoon.
With birthdays on Oct. 24 and 25 Donny and Rosie Reer experienced something that they had never done before – ride in a hot air balloon. The hot air balloon was piloted by Walt Rudy from Aloft Horizons out of Wadsworth, Ohio.
Prior to taking off on their balloon ride at a Baker Road residence in Auburn Township, Donny explained that while the balloon ride was intended to be a surprise, his wife had spoiled the surprise for him.
“Actually it was supposed to be a surprise for both my mom and me, because our birthdays are in October, and my wife (Joyce) had to break it to me this morning. She didn’t want something happening where I wouldn’t be here to show up for it,” Donny said.
Donny reflected with anticipation on never riding in a hot air balloon.
“I have never done it before,” Donny said. “I am excited about it, it is something different, something new.”
Rosie noted that while seeing hot air balloons fly over her farm, she had never flown in one.
“It will be interesting,” Rosie said. “We have seen them fly over our farm already, but never this close, so yeah, it will be nice.”
Rosie explained that this wasn’t the first surprise that her daughter-in-law pulled for her and her son.
“Leave it to Donny’s wife Joyce, she pulled a surprise birthday on us,” Rosie reported. “We had a party earlier that day, and they took me out to the cemetery, and when we come back I said look at all these cars here. That’s Josh’s car, and I said what the heck is going on. We pulled into the drive, and there was all these people we were surprised.”
Before the takeoff Rudy, along with his wife Deb, his friend Mark Ebert, and Joshua Karl, unrolled the balloon, hooked it to the basket, and prepared it for takeoff. Rudy, who has been piloting balloons for over thirty years described the balloon which would traverse the Crawford County skies Tuesday.
“This is what we consider the smallest of the large balloons, which is 105,000 cubic feet, which means that 105,000 basketballs could fit in the envelope part of the balloon.”
Rudy, who works in healthcare finance as his day job, explained how he got started ballooning.
“When I was in high school I worked for a small regional pizza chain called Garcia’s Pizza in a Pan and they were located in Champaign, Illinois, which is where we are from originally,” Rudy explained. “They would always come to town and launch one of the first special shaped balloons in the country, which means it didn’t look like a traditional balloon. This one was red and had a tomato stem, and was called ‘The Flying Tomato.’ So when they would come to town they would need help setting it up and launching it, I would volunteer for that. After graduating high school, I worked as a paramedic in another town, and a buddy of mine was out taking pictures, and I told him that I used to help set them up.
“So we followed the balloon, and sure enough when it landed we walked up to it, and one of the passengers happened to be a surgeon that I had known at the hospital,” Rudy continued. “And so I saw him a few months later, and asked him how the ballooning was going, and he said that they were considering selling it. So I bought the balloon, never having flown in one before.”
After spreading the balloon across the yard and connecting it to the basket, Rudy and his crew began inflating the balloon using fire to heat the air. After a few short minutes the balloon was fully inflated and the Reers climbed into the basket before ascending into the heavens on their birthday balloon ride.
More information on Aloft Horizons can be found by visiting their website at http://alofthorizons.com.