Armed with two cameras, we set off before 5am to explore Cappadocia by hot air balloon. We met our hot air balloon in a field on the outskirts of Göreme.
I had never flown(?) in a hot air balloon before. The whole experience was just amazing. The take off and landing were barely noticeable and performed with incredible precision. This wasn’t necessarily true for all hot air balloons. After landing we witnessed one balloon full of passenger being dragged along the ground as the wind took hold of the inflated balloon. Don’t worry, it wasn’t anything too bad. The time spent up there was very peaceful and relaxing. The only point i did get a bit scared was when I actually stopped to think about the reality of it all. Yes we are incredibly high in nothing more than a wicker basket…crazy isn’t it?
For the flight I took two camera bodies. I remember trying to change lenses during helicopter flights over Uluru and the Great Barrier Reef being very hard and time consuming. If you can, better to take two bodies with lenses to cover different focal lengths (so one zoom, one wide). On this trip I had my Canon 5dMkII + 17-40mm F4 and my Canon 5D MkIII + 70-200mm F2.8. I figured I would need the better noise performance of the MkIII as I would be shooting at long focal lengths, with a fast shutter speed and high ISO. I would also probably reduce the aperture to further minimise camera shake utilising the little light I had at sunrise.
The great thing about this mode of transport for photography is that things happen slowly. You have time to cover all the angles, whilst taking time to step back and enjoy your surroundings. A rarity in the world of photography!
