Orlando Balloon Rides: Biggest ride in U.S. skies now in our air – Theme Park Rangers – Orlando Sentinel
The newest balloon — and the largest in the U.S. — can carry 24 passengers. (Photo by George Skene, Orlando Sentinel)
There’s even more hot air in Central Florida now. Orlando Balloon Rides has introduced its new jumbo hot-air balloon, designated as the largest hot-air balloon flying in the United States. It will be available for public rides beginning Saturday.
How big is it? It stands at 112 feet high — about the size of an 11-story building — and 90 feet wide when fully inflated. It holds 425,000 cubic feet of hot air. That’s more than four times the size of a standard four-person balloon. (Think Dorothy Gale’s vessel near the end of “The Wizard of Oz.”)
The basket beneath the new balloon holds a whopping 24 passengers. The addition will increase the capacity of Orlando Balloon Rides’ fleet by 50 percent, says Jason Schulke, company CEO.
“This balloon is massive,” Schulke says. “The basket alone is 1,600 pounds. The envelope — the top part — is 1,000 pounds.”
The big balloon was custom-ordered from Ultramagic Balloons of Spain. Although this size balloon is common in Europe, Schulke says, it is the first of its kind in the U.S.
The basket, or gondola, sports higher-than-average walls, which are made of aircraft-grade stainless steel that’s wrapped in wicker, and they have partitions that divide the standing space – a sky box of sorts.
“These are like the Bentley of hot-air balloons with these partition baskets,” Schulke says.
Friday marked the first time the balloon had been fully inflated since leaving Spain. Passengers on its first voyage were contest winners and combat veterans. Members of the media followed in the company’s other balloons, which hold 18 passengers.
We traveled west from a spot on the edge of a golf course for Reunion Resort and Club on County Road 532, then crossed above Interstate 4. Below us was an assortment of cars, dirt roads, mega-mansions, farms, orange groves, golf courses, swampland, barking dogs who hate balloons, a muddy motocross course, a horse and stable and friendly folks who waved and hollered “Hello!” We could see Walt Disney World in the distance, but in a hot-air balloon, you must go where the wind takes you.
“It’s different every day, but you’re guaranteed to see trees,” says Cameron Freeman, our pilot. Indeed, it turns out there’s lots of undeveloped land out there. He lowered us to skirt the treetops — nearly close enough to grab a pine cone – and avoided a water hazard before landing near Davenport’s Four Corners Elementary School, about 5 or 6 miles from our lift-off point, as the balloon flies. The company has 30 possible (and pre-arranged) landing spots, Freeman says.
The cost of the new balloon and related expenses was about $275,000, says Schulke, the CEO.
“People aren’t ordering balloons like these right now,” he says, but the time was right for him.
“From my standpoint in my little world in Orlando, I can only lift so many people on an annual basis – 18,000 people, 20,000 if I’m pushing the envelope,” he says. “Even in the gloom and doom stories, they’re still projecting 50 million people will visit Central Florida.”
Rides cost $175 per person, for a four-hour experience, Schulke says. That includes a champagne breakfast, inflation time and packing time and about an hour of air time, depending on flight conditions. (Penny-pinching note: Orlando Balloon Rides has been using online coupons/)
For more information, go to www.orlandoballoonrides.com or call 407-894-5040.
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