PENDLETON- I’ve flown in the nose of a B-52 World War II fighter plane. I’ve talked to a guy who said he’d been abducted by aliens and I’ve spoken with a convicted murderer. I’ve even been on a police drug raid. My short career as a reporter has taken me on many adventures, but none compare to the feeling of peace and serenity I felt floating aboard a hot air balloon as the sun settled into the morning last week.

I arrived to an empty field east of the Wildhorse Resort and Casino at around 6 a.m. and met up with Jim Frame, a hot air balloon flyer, and David Franklin, who helps with the hot air balloon owned by Wildhorse. The three of us, along with Wildhorse events coordinator Charles Denight, set up the balloon, which Frame said is about 69,000 cubic-feet (imagine filling it with 69,000 basketballs – it’s that big).

Using a large fan, we held on to the balloon’s ropes as it filled with air, expanding to its massive size. Once the fabric’s crinkles had smoothed out, Frame turned on the propane, through which hot air causes the balloon to raise into the air. Frame and I hopped into the two-person thick, wicker basket for our ascent into uncharted skies.

Lift-off was much gentler than I anticipated. I braced myself for a jerky lift, but instead found myself effortlessly floating into the air. As we aimlessly floated higher and higher into the air, the casino became smaller and smaller. Cars speeding on Interstate 84 looked like they were merely cruising at 25 mph.

A bird flew past us, dodging the gentle giant in its airspace.

It was quiet, peaceful, serene. A lawn mower on the greens of the golf course at Wildhorse hummed below, while ducks in the course’s pond quacked to one another as the balloon’s bubbled shadow crossed over them.

The only other sound was the intermittent poof of heat triggered by Frame from the balloon’s propane tank, keeping us afloat. Each time that puff of heat filled the balloon, I could smell the gas-like odor of the propane and my head felt like it was on fire. I guess that’s what 15 million BTUs (British Thermal Unit) feels like.

Frame told me it takes about 8,000 BTUs to heat a house. That balloon could heat a lot of houses.

Eventually, we had to come back down to Earth, and the balloon landed gently in the Tamastslikt Cultural Center parking lot. Just like our ascent, our descent was light as air and we landed with barely a bump.

After we let all the hot air out of the balloon and packed it into a small bag (which took about four people to do), I experienced the post-ride balloon ceremony.

Frame and I knelt down on a mat across from each other and he proceeded to tell me about how the first hot air balloon was invented in 1873.

Apparently, when an inventor saw the heat and smoke from his chimney fill his wife’s bloomers drying on the mantle, he got the idea that maybe he could get a large pair of bloomers to fly. The first balloon was made out of silk and chickens were the test-pilots.

When humans began flying in the large balloons, they carried bottles of champagne with them as an offering to those land owners whose fields they landed in. As a tribute to this tradition, Frame placed a glass filled about a quarter of the way with sparkling cider in front of me. I was then instructed to drink from the glass.

However, there was just one stipulation: I couldn’t use my hands. Feeling like I was back in college playing a drinking game, I grabbed onto the lip of the glass with my mouth and attempted to gracefully drink the cider.

There was nothing graceful about my drinking. Most of the cider ended up dribbling down my chin and the front of my fleece sweatshirt.

We toasted (using our hands) to my first hot air balloon ride and to the anticipation of more rides to come.

Contact EO reporter Casey White at (800) 522-0255 or (541) 966-0834, or by e-mail at cwhite@eastoregonian.com.