Bristol Hot Air Balloon Fiesta

The Bristol International Balloon Fiesta is now in its 37th year and is Europe’s largest ballooning event. It’s a spectacular, free, four days of fun for the whole family from Thursday 6th – Sunday 9th August 2015. In the early 1960's, Don Cameron came to Bristol as a young, newly qualified aeronautical engineer to join the Bristol Aeroplane Company, as it was then known, based at Filton. At weekends, he would go to the Bristol Gliding Club at Nympsfield and it was in the evening at the bar that many aeronautical exploits were planned. One member of the Bristol Gliding Club, Giles Bulmer, produced a copy of a National Geographic Magazine showing a new type of ballooning that had just been invented in the USA. Seven of the Gliding Club members took up the idea and, after many difficulties, produced the "Bristol Belle", the first modern hot-air balloon in Western Europe. It first flew on 9th July 1967. All the members of the group learned to fly using this balloon.