16th Philippines Hot Air Balloon Fiesta - Part 2 (Feb 12)

February 12, 2011


The next day dawned bright and early for us.  We all headed straight to the buffet breakfast that was being served, excited to start the day.  Dana had toast and coffee.  Patrick and I had Spam, hotdogs and omelet with rice. I went back for some Korean veggies and Kimchi which Dylan and I shared.  For some reason, Dylan loves Kimchi! hahaha








After breakfast, We took some pictures around and along the corridor of the hotel.  That hallway was supposed to be empty since I asked Dana to go ahead.  I just liked the way the lights lit up the hallway, unfortunately, Patrick came out at the last moment looking for me haha He sorta looks like a ghost hahaha

After resting a while, we donned our swimming suits and went for an early morning dip.  Dana was progressing with her swimming skills and was able to swim farther than before.  She was already working on her arm movements this time.  Dylan was content floating in the water although he can maneuver himself quite well on his floatie :)

Around lunchtime, we headed back to SM Clark and had lunch at the Reyes Barbecue restaurant.  Patrick and I were laughing because even when we were out of town, we still ate Manila food hahaha We actually wanted to try other types of native dishes but we didn't really know where to go.   So, we went with the safe bets.

We bought our tickets to the Hot Air Balloon Fiesta from SM although it took some time to connect with the servers of TicketNet.  It was no bother since there were a lot of things to see around the mall.  Once we got the tickets, we headed straight to the site.







Apparently, there were a number of people headed the same way and we encountered quite a bit of traffic on the way.  We had to park a long way from the entrance due to the crowd.  But once inside, there was so much to see!




There were kites of all shapes and sizes everywhere!

 I don't know what this plane is called (Sorry!)

These gliders were fun to watch too!





Balloons getting inflated, and the green one was in flight!

At first, the balloons were having a hard time being inflated because of the strong cold winds.  Their owners were trying so hard to inflate them and it was actually Darth Vader who, through the Force, actually became the first balloon to get inflated!

 As you can see, it was already dark by the time the other balloons were fully inflated but they didn't get to fly anymore.  It was still fun to see them, especially in this light!

It was such an exciting thing to see this big pirate barrel balloon getting inflated right in front of us.  It was really huge and it made such a huge hissing sound, it was awesome!!

Because it was already late and it was rather dark, the balloons weren't allowed to take flight that night, which was a kind of disappointment.  So we were thinking of coming back again the next day.