Strange visitors in the sky...

While I was working out in the yard I was relaxing with the sounds of nature around me. Occasionally I'd hear neighbors down the street talking with each other, a dog barking in the distance, a car drive by, etc. But for the most part it was just me, the birds, the bugs, the frogs, the wind through the trees, etc.

I'd heard the old guy across the street and down a few lots talking to someone across the street at the new house that was just built at some point, and then after a bit of quiet I heard this odd, loud noise. After several repeats of the noise I thought I was hearing a furnace firing up...were they using some device to burn stuff?

Looking down the street I couldn't see anything odd - no one was even around. Looked back in the other direction down the length of all the yards. Nope, nothing. So if no one was to be seen, who was making the noise?

Then I looked up a little bit, and what did I see coming over the tree line? A couple hot air balloons! Whoa! I know A Balloon Affair, the annual event in Ravenna just miles away from us, had already happened a month or so ago - but there's often hot air balloon sightings in the area. Just never anything quite this close!

I ran inside, grabbed the camera, and told Brett to come out and look around - he was hearing the noise now, came out, and couldn't tell were it was coming from.

"Look up!"


And then we heard a "Hello down theeeeere!"* LOL


There were two balloons passing over the neighborhood at a decent clip. Kinda fun! What we were hearing was the riders flaring up the fire to keep the balloons aloft, and the darker one at one point really seemed to drop down near the trees down at the far end of the neighborhood at one point (after they'd passed over us), and then started firing up again to rise back into the sky. Cool!









* It was a short while later, after all the mowing, reseeding, fertlizing, and balloon excitement that I was walking to the back door for a drink when I found a ball point pen in the back yard. Hm, I must've dropped it. Wait, I haven't been writing in the back yard! AND it was just a short while before that I'd made AT LEAST three passed while doing all the yard work! So I think the balloon riders that passed directly overhead who littered in my yard!! Can I sue them!? What if that pen had hit me in the head!??! What if it hit me in the eye while I was looking up at them!??! LOL