Jules Vasquez reporting
It looks like a giant beach ball hovering above the coastline of Belize City - but it's actually a massive helium balloon - the initiative of a new company on the Marine Parade called Belize Balloon Rides:

Max Galas, Belize Balloon Rides
"Behind you is this beautiful balloon in the sky is a helium tethered balloon. What it means? is it is a balloon very much like the balloon you get at the children's parties that are tied to the hand of a child and are just elevated because of the gas being lighter than air and its helium. Helium is a non-flammable gas that occurs naturally. So what we do is that we full up the balloon with helium with gives it a suitable amount of drag. It's able to pull up. Underneath it is a gondola. It has a basket that people can enter into the basket and in total silence with mechanized parts in the moving up process, the balloon slowly elevates itself. This is a very simple apparatus, which means that actually it's safe in its simplicity and balloons has been around for a very very long time. The helium that's in the balloon is not flammable. It's not a hot air balloon there's no flames pulling it up, there's nothing burning so it's a very very simple thing."

To try it, I clambered into the gondola and held on tight - in short order, up, up we went - I did a little moving around to ahem keep the weight distributed - and pretty soon were up to about 250 feet.

Way up there - the cirrus swirls seems so placid the rushing world below reduced to small specks - but trust me I wasn't quite beholding the view, maybe it was my general distaste for great heights with no hard railings, maybe the fact that they just set it up that morning - and this was one of the first done or so test runs - I had a warmish time.

We radioed the winch operators to bring me down and I was glad to be back on tierra firma

Max Galas, Belize Balloon Rides
"The idea behind this is this is a product for Belizeans and however of course we are open to anybody who comes to our premises. I think it's a very good idea that also visitors to Belize City take a ride in this balloon so that they can see Belize City and actually see the beauty of Belize, I mean, you can see the cayes over there, you can see the sea, you can see the river, you can see the structure of the city and the way it comes out and goes in. Things that wouldn't normally see if you were just travelling in a car."

But, perhaps the real value of this is the selfie - as my camera - man showed when he was getting ready to go up - he checked his phone for full facebook exposure:

Max Galas, Belize Balloon Rides
"It's probably to take the maximum selfies and post them on Facebook and send them through to your friends however, the idea is i think sometimes people just want to see nature. Sometimes they want to get away from the world and being up in a balloon is completely different than being up in an airplane. There is no noise. You are exposed to the elements. I'll get a feeling of serenity when I'm up there."

And so now, visitors will have a new presence on the Belize City coastline:

Max Galas, Belize Balloon Rides
"I chose this colour because it's a happy colour and it's a happy nation. It's a nation of different colours, different places so I think that it gives Belize City a kind of a boost. You know, you see it when you arrive, you see it on your way to work, maybe you're having a bad day and you look and there is this beach ball."

We note that the Marine Parade road in front of the Belize Balloon Rides company was the site of major trenching. But it's not helium pipes running underground - its regular water pipes! Turns out that when Johnston International built Marine Parade which is the most expensive road per mile in Belize's history - they couldn't wait for BWS - so they just went ahead and built the road without water mains infrastructure. Galas reports that was the major delay in getting his project started.

IT'S not open to the public yet - since they are still in testing mode. It should be opened next week when a 10 minute ride will cost 35 us dollar sin the daytime and 35 dollars Belize after 4:00 pm.