Tomorrow is the big day...

There was another practice flight this morning:


For the first time since we've been here, we had a laptop in the van connected to a GPS. The competition map is loaded, and as you drive a pointer on the screen indicates where you are. All the goals are in there as well, so it's like having the competition map and all the waypoints in your GPS. We'll have one of these setups in each van (my next project after writing this is to configure another laptop), and most of the pilots here are flying with the same thing in their balloons (see picture from the previous post). Below is a picture of Mike Howard's new Cameron racer. Mike used to live in Michigan and work for Cameron, but now he and his wife Renee live in his home country of Great Britain. The graphics were actually printed right on the balloon fabric using a giant inkjet printer:


After the flight, we refueled the balloon. Here you have to take your tanks out of the basket and carry them to a platform. They're filled for you, then you carry them back to the basket and re-install them.

After that was a 2-hour long Master Briefing. We finally grabbed some lunch at about 3:00pm (a hamburger from the cafeteria here inside the racetrack), then came back to the room to get a little work done. At 6:30pm is the Opening Ceremonies (no flight tonight), and the first competitive flight is tomorrow morning.

For the balloon people reading this: It looks like 80%-90% of the balloons here are "racers". It seems like every company has one now, so there's lots of different looking ones here. Here's a little bit about what the US pilots are flying:

• Nick Donner: Lindstrand 60X racer
  
• Joe Heartsill: Lindstrand 56X racer
• Johnny Petrehn: Lindstrand 56X racer
• Paul Petrehn: Cameron ZL-56 racer

The rest of Paul's setup includes a 42x52 Cameron Aristocrat basket, two (2) 15-gallon titanium tanks, two (2) 15-gallon stainless steel tanks, and Cameron Sirocco double burners. It's the nicest balloon racing setup there is; even with an unlimited budget, there's not a thing he could change to make it better.

For the non-balloon people reading this: I promise that soon I'll return to writing about some things that aren't related to ballooning.

Awesome

This morning we did a practice flight from a parking lot near the race track. It was pretty low-key, but did give us a chance to connect some of the equipment in the balloon:

Paul picked a few goals and practiced maneuvering. There's about 400 goals that we can pick from, and some are very different than what we're used to. Here's an intersection of 2 roads that we used for the last one:

And here he is working slowly toward it, with Erica cheering him on (he landed right where she's standing):


After he landed, Erica and I took the balloon up for a 30 minute flight. The scenery here is absolutely breathtaking; probably the only comparable flight I've had is one over Niagara Falls. We flew down one valley, then over a ridge to another valley and landed on a small hill between a couple crop plantings. The pictures can't even come close to doing it justice, but I'll try to post them later if I get a chance.

We spent about 5 hours this afternoon wiring the vans for all the radios, GPS's, and computers we'll be using. Each vehicle will have several radios, at least 2 GPS's, and a laptop computer connected to a GPS that will display a moving map as we drive. That's in addition to the laptop, multiple GPS units, and radios in the balloon.

Shawn and Joe landed in Tokyo about an hour ago, so they're on the way to Motegi right now. Tomorrow will be an insanely busy day, we're leaving the hotel at 5:30am or so and might not be back until after dark. There's a morning flight, refueling, a master briefing, and opening ceremonies...

Here at last

We got into Motegi today, and this is finally starting to feel like a balloon race. After checking into the Twin Ring Motegi hotel:

We went and fueled the balloon, put together the burner and fan, and got things ready for a practice flight in the morning. We'll try another practice flight in the evening, and spend much of the day working on electronics, computers, radios, and the like.

The Twin Ring Motegi is Honda's testing ground for their race program. As such, there are about a dozen different race tracks here. It's a very impressive facility. Here's the view from our 5th floor room:

And finally, here's Johnny preparing for the big event:

Greatest idea ever

So Erica's got an entire 50 pound suitcase full of food. Cookies, crackers, granola bars, hot cocoa, and such. But the genius idea was the instant oatmeal. All our rooms have these instant hot water machines. They look like coffee makers, but just put out boiling water. So you just grab a cup, pour in the oatmeal, add water, and you've got breakfast:

It's great because not only is it cheap (breakfast is $25 here at the hotel), but it'll give us something hot to eat before flights.

Enough being a tourist...

Today is the day we leave for Motegi. We'll help Johnny get his balloon from the airport, then load up the vans and drive up. Once we get to Motegi, we'll start putting the equipment together and get fuel (the balloon tanks are empty). We'll do some practice flights tomorrow, and the rest of our group (Shawn and Joe) gets in tomorrow night. Saturday is practice flights along with the registration and master briefing. Then on Sunday morning the real thing starts. Right now the weather doesn't look so hot for next week (60% chance of rain most days), but it's been changing by the day, so who knows.

Earthquake / tsunami

Apparently there was an earthquake (and possible oncoming tsunami) about 1000km from Tokyo. I say "apparently" because even though we were in Tokyo all day, we didn't hear a word of it. There are some warnings on the TV here, but they're for the areas much further north than we'll be. It seems to be much more of a story in the US than here.

Bottom line: We're all fine, and everything is still on schedule.

Tacos in Tokyo

Today we spent about 10 hours in Tokyo. We took the train from Narita to Tokyo, which took about an hour. Our first stop was Asakusa, which is like a giant outdoor market:

We ate lunch in a little cafeteria-type place in the basement of a building just off the main street. Then we went to Ginza, which kind of like the Times Square of Tokyo. High-end stores everywhere:

Then we went to Akihabara, which is the electronics district. There were big (7 stories tall) electronics department stores, as well as little "flea-market type" shops that sell the "raw materials" of computer and audio and video equipment (circuit boards, transistors, plugs, fans, etc):

The selection was way cool, lots of handheld radios and GPS's. But the prices were no good - a GPS that's $500 in the US was $1200 there. Al bought lots of things, but all I bought was a splitter to let us connect more than 1 computer to the Internet at a time. Then we went to dinner:

Erica had onion rings and garlic bread. Paul and I had tacos, chips, and salsa.

Tourists

After we got the vans and balloon, we went into Narita to eat lunch and see some sites.

We ate our first real meal in Japan at a food court in a mall. I don't know what you call my food, but it was a pile of rice, covered in egg, with cheese on top and brown sauce. Very good:

I ordered by pointing to a picture, but it wasn't very clear what drinks they had. The language barrier was pretty large, but we could agree on the meaning of "Coca-Cola", so that's what I got. It's the first soda I've had in about 3 years. Al got some gray ice cream that looked like concrete:

It had a very unique taste, but we couldn't figure out exactly what it was.

Then we went to the Narita-san temple. Very cool. There's a downtown-type area with lots of little local shops, then many individual temples on the grounds:


Tomorrow we're going to take the train into Tokyo to see the city. After that, the ballooning starts.

Got it

We picked up the vans and balloons this morning:



(The first picture in the second row is the envelope)

Here's a list of what was packed in the 42"x52" basket: ZL-56 envelope, four 15-gallon tanks, double burners, inflator fan, case of radios, windreader, tripod, tons of USA flags.

Total weight: 811 pounds

The air cargo operation at Tokyo is very interesting, especially with the language barrier. There are tons of security and customs guards, so by the time you get done looking confused, nodding to them, and handing over various pieces of paper, you finally drive off feeling like you just got away with something that you shouldn't have. At any rate, we're pretty much done with ballooning for the day, so it's off to lunch (no more McDonalds) and some sightseeing at the Narita-san temple.

Up and at 'em

We woke up at about 5:30am this morning. It felt really good to sleep. Last night we ended up going back to the airport terminal to eat. A cab into the city of Narita was $20 each way, which seemed like a lot just to eat. So we ended up at a McDonalds. I know, 6500 miles to eat at American fast food...

This morning we'll pickup the balloon and the vans.

The hotel is pretty much like any American hotel. We'll be here until Thursday morning.

Chasing the sun...

We just arrived in Tokyo. It was a very strange flight because it was daylight the entire time (flying toward the west). It was also weird because we lost Monday. When we took off from Detroit, it was 1:45pm on Sunday. When we landed in Tokyo 14 hours later, it was 5:00pm Monday. We've been up about 22 straight hours, and will probably stay up another 4 or 5 to try to get acclimated to the local time.

The flight was probably as good as a 14 hour flight gets. The plane (a 747) was about 60%-70% full. Most of the ride was smooth, and we actually arrived a little early. We passed the time by watching some videos (The Jerk and some competitive balloon videos from the '90's) and wondering when the taco bar would be setup. It never was. Beef tips/rice for dinner, ham and cheese sandwich for a snack, and terikayi pork w/ fried rice for breakfast.

We'll be at the Holiday Inn Tobu Narita for the next few days. Tomorrow (Tuesday) we pick up the balloon and vans. On Wednesday we'll hit Tokyo. Then on Thursday we head up to Motegi.
Right now Paul and Erica just returned to the room bearing gifts:

That's cold Suntory Beer brought out of a vending machine. It's not Coors Light, but after a long day, it still tastes good.

Our balloon

Here's the balloon that Paul will be flying in Japan:


For those who are interested, it's a Cameron ZL-56 made in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Joe Heartsill will be flying one that's almost just like it; his is a Lindstrand 56X, and has just 2 rows of checkerboard in each band.

Sad news

Received in an e-mail from Debbie Spaeth:

We are very sad to inform you that Masashi Kakuda, of Japan, passed away today, November 8, 2006, from complications of a myocardial infarction.

Masashi has been a dynamic force in ballooning for many years. He was the Event Director for two World Hot Air Balloon Championships in Saga, Japan and was scheduled as the Event Director at the 17th World HAB Championship in Tochigi, Japan.

Masashi believed in the power of air sports to bring people together. With that in mind, he formulated the World Grand Prix for Ballooning. Starting in 1998, this was a competition held in three continents/countries - Wisconsin,/USA; Luxembourg/Europe and Japan/Asia. Pilots from the various countries joined as one team, forming friendship across cultures and national boundaries.

Masashi will be greatly missed by his family, his ballooning friends and all who had the privilege to share time with him.

The 17th World Hot Air Balloon Championship will begin in Tochigi, Japan on November 18th. Masashi had assembled a first class team of people to work with him on the Worlds. This team will continue Masashi\'s plans for the event. Mr. Les Purfield has been named the Event Director for the 17th World HAB Championship.

Details of the funeral/memorial services and of Masashi\'s family contact address will follow as soon as it is known.

Where we're going

Some facts on the town of Motegi:

• It's in the Haga District (equivalent to a "county" in the US)
  
• It's in the Tochigi prefecture (equivalent to a "state" in the US)
• It has a population of roughly 17,000, making it about the same size as Traverse City, Michigan
  
• It's about 60 miles northeast of Tokyo
  
• It's the home of Honda's Twin Ring Motegi facility. It gets its name from the fact that there are two racetracks on the facility: a 1.5 mile oval and a 3 mile road course. For more details, see the Wikipedia entry. This is where most of our morning events will be.
  

Most of the evening events will be in the nearby town of Haga (about the same size as Motegi).

Right now it looks like the event will move to Sakushin Gakuin University for a day during the middle of the week, which is located in the much bigger city of Utsunomiya (population 450,000). According to Wikipedia "Utsunomiya is also well known for its abundance and quality of cocktail bars."

The plan

Here's an outline of our itinerary:

• Sunday 11/12 : Leave Detroit, non-stop to Tokyo
• Monday 11/13 : Arrive Tokyo
  
• Tuesday 11/14 & Wednesday 11/15 : Pickup balloon & vehicles, see Tokyo
  
• Thursday 11/16 : Drive to Tochigi, refuel balloon and check into hotel
• Friday 11/17 : Event check in, practice flight
• Saturday 11/18 : Master briefing, practice flights, opening ceremony
• Sunday 11/19 thru Saturday 11/25 : Competition flights every morning and evening
  
• Sunday 11/26 : Cash prize morning flight, awards ceremony
• Monday 11/27 : Drive from Tochigi to Tokyo, turn in vehicles, ship balloon home
• Tuesday 11/28 : Leave Tokyo, non-stop to Detroit