Last Saturday, I spent the Valentine’s day with the family at the overhyped and overrated, 14th Philippine International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta.
AFTER driving for an hour or so from Manila to Clark, AFTER finding a parking spot in the sea of cars, AFTER squeezing through and rubbed shoulders with hundreds of people, I didn’t freaking get to see those balloons in the air!!! And that’s what I came there for!!! The 6:00 to 6:45pm scheduled hot air balloon flight did not push through because “it is too dark for the balloon to fly” (not exact words by the emcee, but something to that effect). Now I wouldn’t be too surprised if its dark already because they pushed it to 7pm!
I really think the organizers did a terrible job of “organizing” that particular day. They should have sticked to the schedule. I mean, that’s what its there for right? People who drove all the way to Clark had expectations they have to deliver.
The traffic jam after the event was also a nightmare, it took us an hour to drive out to Roxas Highway. There’s no sign or whatever markings to give us idea where to exit. So the visitors literally went off-roading to get to the easiest exit. They did a good job of advertising and hyping up the event, I just hope they did equally well with organizing.
If its any consolation, I had fairly decent photos of the fireworks display.
More photos of the 14th Philippine International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta fireworks: Please click the thumbnails to zoom in on photos.
