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The breeze was cool this morning at Basil Griffin Park as five hot air balloon pilots prepared their crafts for liftoff, their eyes following a pilot-representative balloon that tumbled in the sky high above the park, its movements indicating various meteorological information to those of us on the ground.

It's going to rain, pilot Scott McClinton told me, unamused by my happy response. That's because McClinton, of Prospect, is the balloonmeister for this weekend's U.S. Bank Balloons, Tunes & BBQ event, and would like the sky to hold its precipitation just a little bit longer. As he laid out the red, white and blue U.S. Bank balloon on the crunchy, dying grass at the park, I offered a compromise: How about it rains today - all afternoon, preferably - but stays dry for the weekend?

We'll have to see whether this year's Balloons, Tunes & BBQ will usher in stormy weather, as it has in years past. For this morning, anyway, the sky was a pleasant light blue, the sun peeking through a bank of clouds, as motorists on Three Springs Road slowed to watch the spectacle, some getting out of their cars to snap pictures.

McClinton is used to this kind of small-town paparazzi. A hot-air balloon pilot for 20 years, attention follows him everywhere, from Pennsylvania to New Mexico.

After the balloon fabric was spread out on the ground and attached to the basket, McClinton climbed inside the balloon and held it open while a giant fan inflated it. Jets of flame issued from the burners attached to the basket, slowly bringing the balloon upright and warming my face as I stood nearby. Helpers guided the balloon into position, and then McClinton beckoned to me.

For those of you who plan to take a tethered balloon ride this weekend, allow me to offer a word of advice: There is no graceful way to climb into a balloon basket. You put your foot into a slot on the side of the basket, then hoist yourself up and over the edge in a very unladylike manner, clutching the supports for dear life. In 2005, the first year I was invited to participate in the annual media flights, I wore flip-flops despite the recently mowed grass at the Bowling Green-Warren County Regional Airport and had the worst time clambering in. I think I fell into the pilot, actually, who was helpfully holding my notebook.

This year, I wore ballet flats, which were easier to manage, but I'm pretty sure I still looked like a three-legged gazelle learning how to walk as I awkwardly scrambled inside. McClinton fired up the burners and we were airborne, gliding over the rippling lake at Basil Griffin Park on our way to the airport.

“When we first started coming here, none of this was here,” McClinton said, gesturing at the subdivision sprawl that spread out before us, swimming pools twinkling blue in the early-morning light and cul-de-sacs resembling, from above, our own craft. “I remember when Home Depot was a field.”

Nearly 2,000 feet below us, cars moved sluggishly up and down Interstate 65 as Bowling Green began to rouse itself from sleep. Brown fields stretched out like carpet, dotted here and there with construction sites. I spied Nutterville and my old apartment; the fire-scorched, skeletal roof of Logan's Roadhouse; and a friendly team of AirEvac crew members who waved enthusiastically as we began our descent into the airport.

“I tell you what, every day I get up I just have to smile because I'm going to work,” McClinton said, adding that he feels blessed to be in this career. “You're looking out my office window right now.”

Over the years, he's forged many friendships in Bowling Green, relationships he feels fortunate to have. I nodded in agreement - I've loved this city since I moved here 2 1/2 years ago, and it's nice to know visitors feel the same way.

The impending rain meant we had a shorter flight than usual, so it wasn't long until McClinton was telling me to put down my notebook, bend my knees and hold on for a landing Cincinnati pilot Sean Askren, my companion on my previous years' flights, compares to “a butterfly with sore feet.” We bounced a few times, the wind threatening to push us over until McClinton purposely tipped the basket, bracing himself as best he could to avoid crushing me as I hunkered down against the side.

We crawled out and set about taking down the balloon, disassembling the whole contraption and stuffing the fabric into what looked like a giant duffle bag. As McClinton pulled apart the various equipment, he regaled me with stories about meeting people from all walks of life on his trips across the nation - everyone from a brain surgeon in the Northeast to a massage therapist in the Southwest.

Following the flight, we all gathered in the airport parking lot for my favorite part - the champagne toast. Filling each of our plastic cups with bubbly, Askren shared the story of the Montgolfier brothers, who invented the hot air balloon in France in 1783. The brothers would often land in farmers' fields, where the leery farmers would destroy the balloon, fearing it was some sort of fiery dragon. To sidestep this problem, the Montgolfier brothers started carrying a bottle of champagne with them - a peace offering for those whose fields they graced.

The tradition stands today, as pilots pop a cork to celebrate a successful flight. Holding his cup aloft, Askren intoned the Balloonists' Prayer, an anonymously written poem that often accompanies the champagne toast:

The winds have welcomed you with softness.

The sun has blessed you with its warm hands.

You have flown so high and so well that God has joined you in your laughter,

and He has set you gently back again into the loving arms of Mother Earth.