Try Thame First Flies!

THE Try Thame First Campaign took to the skies last night (18/04/07), when the town’s Mayor took a balloon flight with ‘rising’ young Thame business, The Altitude Balloon company.
Ex RAF Glider pilot, Cllr Nigel Champken-Woods, sporting a smart brown summer suit and the Mayor’s Chain, joined members of the local press for what turned out to be a gentle and leisurely flight across the countryside from Thame Showground, up and away above Towersey and on to Bledlow, finishing with a text book landing in a field, executed by pilot, Ian Woodmansey.
Before they could take off however, the Mayor and his team had to earn their flight. They helped unload the bottles of propane gas, the basket and all the rest of the 1,000 kilograms of equipment before using a giant fan to blow first cold air into the gaping canopy, and then a gas burner to complete the inflation with hot air (jokes about the Mayor being used to ‘hot air’ in the council chamber setting the scene for the level of humour for the rest of the flight).

‘Try Thame First’ is the slogan that the 21st Century Thame Partnership’s Economic Working Group is promoting, to encourage local people to explore the excellent range of local shops, businesses and services in order to support their local economy.

After what he described as “a fabulous experience and one I shall definitely be repeating with my wife Alison,” the Mayor told ThameNews.Net: “New enterprises like The Altitude Balloon Company are exactly the sort of things that Thame needs and deserve to be supported, as do our more established, independent shops and businesses that bring so much to the town in the way of choice, variety and economic vibrancy.”

More information about The Altitude Balloon Company, which they believe is the UK?s first ever ? and only -carbon-neutral hot air balloon company, can be found on its website: “Link

The company works with the charity ‘Climate Care’ based in Oxford to off-set the carbon they create in flying, by donating money towards energy efficient projects. See Link

Photo: The Mayor or Thame, Nigel Champken-Woods, Pilot Ian Woodmansey, ground crew and trainee pilot, Stuart (outside the basket), Thame Gazette reporter, Sophia Jay and Editor of ThameNews.Net, Sonja Francis