I would like to hear from anyone with information regarding hot air balloon flights over either Napa Valley, or San Diego area. We were considering adding this to our itinerary during our vacation to California in late August (we are traveling with our 17 and 13 year old.) Is this fun, and worth the money (145/pp for one hour, including brunch.) Is it safe? It sounds like a memorable experience to cap off the end of our vacation.

Thanks in advance for any help.

this is on my list of things to do in Napa, in fact we have booked several times in May,and November only to have it cancelled due to winds. Most of these balloon companies are ultra-cautious, probably for insurance reasons, OK by me, I want the champagne brunch before, during and after but would love early morning over the vineyards. If it doesn't work out for some reason, the gondola ride at Sterling Vineyards offers some vineyard views

We ballooned in Napa with my whole family. We couldn't go over the valley because of excessive early morning fog (this was in late August), so the van had to drive us 30-minutes away, and we ended up going over more dry farmland east of Napa. Nevertheless, it was a very memorable experience. Our brunch afterwards was not very special; I would rather enjoy one of the many great restaurants in Napa valley.

You might want to check out http://www.napavalley.com/cgi-bin/home.o for the info you requested and much more or check out http://www.winecountry.com/ for that and other wine country destinations. -cheers

In my opinion, hot air ballooning is not very safe. At least a couple of times a year you read about deadly ballooning accidents in our California newspapers. There seem to be a lot of accidents compared to the number of people who ride in them. I'm sure it's beautiful...but I wouldn't want my kids in one of those things.

HOT AIR BALLOONING IS A GREAT WAY TO SPEND YOUR TIME IN THE NAPA VALLEY. IT IS A WONDERFUL EXPERIENCE AND ONE YOU'LL NEVER FORGET! I CALLED AROUND AND DID A LOT OF RESEARCH AND FOUND THAT BALLOONS ABOVE THE VALLEY 1800-GO-HOT-AIR WAS THE BEST COMPANY...THEY EVEN OFFERED ME A DISCOUNT BECAUSE I FOUND THEM ON THE WEB! IT WAS VERY SAFE AND THE BRUNCH WAS EXCELLENT! GIVE THEM A CALL