MEDIA INFORMATION

Balloon Safaris at Bill Harrop's for Teambuilding and Special Corporate Events

Do It In Style

Bill Harrop's 'Original' Balloon Safaris Ballooning Challenge combines the unforgettable experience that is ballooning in the Magalies River Valley with a unique team building exercise that is both fun and effective.

Your group is divided into teams and each team is allocated a balloon and a pilot. With the aid of a �met' balloon, a target site is set in the beautiful Magalies River Valley. Teams can either choose to assist their pilot in preparing their huge colourful hot air balloon for flight, or they can watch our professional crew set up the balloon whilst enjoying the view from the vantage afforded by our brand new Clubhouse Pavilion and Restaurant. Choosing to assist setting up the balloon, just by virtue of its size, requires the assistance and cooperation of all team members and ensures a feeling of joint accomplishment and camaraderie once the task is completed.

After a safety briefing, the balloons take off. Once up in the air, teams must work with one another and within the parameters set by the pilot (whose priority is of course safety and legality) towards a pre-determined goal. The many and varied tasks entailed � from directing the pilot towards favourable wind direction, to locating the target and dropping the marker, through directing the ground team to the exact spot where the marker has been dropped while, at the same time, directing the pilot to an accessible field for landing and retrieval by our licensed and maintained vehicles � require effective delegation and communication within the team. And all of this must be achieved within the confines of a basket floating up to a kilometre in the air!

This unique experience removes most people from their familiar surroundings. Suddenly you are required to look at a much bigger, three dimensional picture, as it were. From the ground, you are required to make judgments about the multi-directional air movements above, made visible only by a black �met' balloon. From the air, the earth retreats and perspective again changes. In this, ballooning poses a challenge faced by very few and one that therefore engenders flexibility and creativity. Ballooning asks one to change one's perspective with one's surroundings and to adapt accordingly.

At the same time, Bill Harrop's Ballooning Challenge demands cooperation in a way that makes for successful team building. Effective communication is required, not only amongst team members, but between teams and Balloon Safari staff as well. Teams must, for instance, ensure that they issue effective instructions to the pilot and the retrieval crew within the physical parameters posed by the Challenge. Where those physical parameters constitute wind direction, aviation safety and both natural and man-made boundaries on the ground is where Bill Harrop's Balloon Challenge provides a unique team-building corporate activity.

Bill Harrop's 'Original' Balloon Safaris caters further to corporates in terms of branding. We can arrange company banners at the launch site and can include corporate logos in our tickets and Citations. This serves to reinforce one's corporate identity and unify diverse team members under a common flag (and makes for wonderful souvenir photographs!).

Upon landing, teams are taken back to our beautifully appointed, traditionally exquisite Clubhouse Pavilion and Restaurant where their early start and �hard work' is rewarded with a sumptuous Champagne breakfast. All participants are awarded a Citation for braving the African skies and the winning team is presented with "Gold Medals" (and possibly the chance to participate in the South African Hot Air Ballooning Championships!).

Our Ballooning Challenge presents team members with, what is for many, a once in a lifetime experience. It not only makes for an extremely memorable experience � a story to dine out on for years to come � but a fun and exciting one as well and one that, in terms of team-building, encourages both cooperation and effective delegation. What better way to thank one's staff for their hard work and inspire them for future endeavours than on an unforgettable and unique Bill Harrop's Ballooning Challenge?

An accomplished yachtsman, Bill Harrop describes hot air ballooning as �three-dimensional sailing�. Bill has been taking to the skies in hot air balloons for thirty-two years and turned his hobby into a career in 1981, with the advent of Bill Harrop's 'Original' Balloon Safaris. The family run business prides itself as market leader and its commitment to ethical business practice, staff well-being and morale and customer satisfaction are all features that have contributed towards and are expressed in our Team Building Balloon Challenge. Bill will also admit to experience as a singer, hotelier, portrait photographer, advertising ----executive, and a balloon pilot examiner. Last year he took part in the International Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque, Mexico along with six hundred and fifty other balloon enthusiasts.

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