‘See the sun creep over the horizon in a blaze of crimson glory’ they said, ‘glide like a eagle on warm updrafts’ they said, ‘watch the morning mists furl and unfurl around the 2000+ stupas of ancient Bagan then touch down to chilled champagne’. They said it and they were right. Our first balloon ride was during our Queenstown honeymoon almost 14 years ago - and sadly, we became addicted. Ballooning over Bagan with Oriental Ballooning was to be our fifth balloon ride* and it almost didn’t happen.

We were up early (again... seriously... so far from ‘bright’ it wasn’t funny) and picked up from the hotel lobby at 5.30 am. The recent downturn in Myanmar tourism hasn’t affected the ballooning concerns in Bagan and of Oriental’s 7 balloon fleet with a capacity of 84 approx - there were only 6 spare spots available the day we were set to balloon. Coffee and pastries were nice enough... but there seemed to be a lot of umming and aahing amongst the 7 pilots. Baby balloons were sent up and even we could see that there was barely a breath of air to be had. As with any sport/hobby/experience that relies on nature - ballooning is at the mercy of too little or too much wind and any wind heading in the wrong direction - eg. the airport. As they approach the end of the ballooning season here in Myanmar, it looked like we might be out of luck.

In the end, the pilots decided it was a ‘go’ on the proviso that the likely unusual flight path would probably miss quite a bit of the temple zone - so gave people the option to back out if they didn’t want to fly. We love ballooning so much that we decided to keep the faith and, ‘lo and behold, our general luckiness held fast and we had an incredible, lazy, hazy balloon ride, right over the temple zone and ended up in the air around an hour. The bonus was landing on a massive sandbank in the middle of the Irrawaddy River - ground that doesn’t even exist in the wet season. When it became clear we’d all definitely be touching down on the bank, the pilots whistled up the ground crew to order boats to meet us and ferry us back, along the river, to the waiting fleet of minivans.

If we leave aside having to cull, edit and agonise over 400 odd photos... the high from ballooning is hard to explain - absolute magic. Aside from paragliding, it is the most peaceful way to fly and when the gas roars the chill of the day dissipates altogether and you feel like a marshmallow just a bit too close to a campfire. We had had the tiniest of breakfasts pre-flight, so the fresh fruit and champagne (and more champagne and a bit more)... went down a treat and before we knew it we had life jackets on and were chugging down the river to eventually reach the mini-bus ready to drop us back to the hotel. We were last to be picked up which meant first to be dropped off and we made it to the hotel breakfast buffet with 15 minutes to spare. Superb timing really as we speed-gathered breakfast then went back to bed for a few hours.

It’s highly unlikely to come true, but we really are trying to avoid sunrises for a few days. Sunsets are, afterall, scheduled for a much more civilised time of the day. Right. A few days rest in Bagan, a spot of sightseeing on Friday, fly to Yangon for 2 nights and 1 day of doing nothing but catching up with ourselves, then off to India and, in a couple of weeks, we’ll be definitely seeing a sunrise as we go ballooning over Jaipur. Our charmed life (and a snooze) await.

*Queenstown (NZ), Serengeti (Tanzania), Cappadocia (Turkey), Valley of the Kings, Luxor (Egypt)