This week we talk with Mary Ann Steinhauer, a hot air balloon pilot, and concierge who lives her passion. She shares with us how she started her career. She also talks with us about what it takes to be a pilot and to fly a hot air balloon. She shares with us one of her most amazing adventures as a balloon pilot in Austria and Costa Rica.
Transcription:
Intro 00:02
Welcome to Changing the Rules, a weekly podcast about people who are living their best lives and advice on how you can achieve that too. Join us with your lively host Ray Lowe, better known as the luckiest guy in the world.
Ray Loewe00:18
Hi, everybody, this is Ray Lowe, and welcome to Changing the Rules. You know, this week we're going to do something a little different. We also have been recording podcasts on another network and we had one the other day that is just so good. And it just fits so well with the Changing the Rules network that I have to make it available to you. So, we're going to be talking with a young lady by the name of Marianne, and rather than make a lot of comments, let's just listen to our podcast. Welcome to the willow Valley podcasting channel where exciting podcasts are created by Willow Valley residents, for Willow Valley residents, and about Willow Valley residents. And good morning, everybody. My name is Ray Loewe, and I'm a member of the podcast club here. And I want to welcome everybody to our brand new podcast studios here at Willow Valley communities. And we have an exciting guest today. All right, so I need to kind of set the stage for this because Marianne is on the staff here. She works here; her full name is Mary Ann Steinhauer and I met her because she was running the concierge desk over in the north building. And she was indispensable to me. You know, first of all, she had all my packages and, unless I behaved, I couldn't get them. And second of all, whenever I needed some information about where to go or where something was going on, she's the person who had it. But then the surprise came because I found out that Marianne has hidden talents way beyond what she was doing. And I found out, and I don't remember how the conversation came about, and Marianne, you can fill us in, but I found out that Marianne pilots hot air balloons.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 02:09
It may have been a reference to how I was so full of hot air. And I just jumped right on it.
Ray Loewe02:16
Well, whatever it is, it just changed our whole relationship because I've been fortunate enough that I have been up in a hot air balloon. I've been in a chase car chasing around at other people, who were in a hot air balloon. And I was lucky enough to be at the Albuquerque Balloon Festival, where 800 balloons went up in the air at one time and the sky was filled with color and it's absolutely spectacular.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 02:43
It's an amazing event.
Ray Loewe02:45
And then to find out Marianne here actually pilots one of these and so let me ask you a couple of questions before we get into hot air ballooning. Hot air ballooning is only part of Marianne, Marianne actually has a master's degree in elementary education. She has a master's degree in library science and she has been an author of a number of publications. And the other thing that I found interesting in your background is you actually took graduate studies in folklore and folklife from the University of Pennsylvania. So, why did you do that? And what where did that take you?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 03:25
Well, I've always been fascinated with folklore, folk life, and also storytelling, and what a magnificent place, you know, to be studying that, you know, it was just absolutely amazing. So it was a graduate program for older people because I had already done my other education work. And I just lapped it up. I mean, I just got really, really excited. You know, I'm interested in what people consider really important to continue their traditions and their culture, and it's all through performance and storytelling, the oral tradition, and all of that, that is really, you know, I'm a storyteller.
Ray Loewe04:17
All right, now we're going to have to do another podcast some other day just on that because I think that whole area is phenomenal and, you know, everybody has a story.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 04:28
I believe you're right.
Ray Loewe04:29
Everybody has a story. And the secret is to get it out there. And you know, you're never going to get the story if you don't talk to people. And ever since I started talking to Marianne about what she loves and what she's passionate about, it just makes me have more fun when I go down there. So thank you for that. And let's start with a really important question. So, why in the heck did you ever get interested in hot air ballooning?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 04:59
Wow. The first seeds were planted back when I was teaching at the lab school at Millersville University. And I was with the children out on the playground. And low and behold, here through the sky, we see this beautiful, hot air balloon. And not only did we see it flying, we noticed that it was coming toward us. And it ended up landing in the playground, at the playground. And I, of course, I had all the children were like all excited. And then I had to tell them, you know, you got to really be careful about this, but I was beside myself, I was more excited than they were. And it turns out that, you know, we managed to get safely around the balloon. And what happened was the pilot was stopping to get refueled. Because typically, and I, later on, found this out, that you can fly just so long before you have to stop and get more fuel. And so they were waiting for their chase vehicle to come with more fuel. Okay, so we didn't know this. But I was just I knew right then in there that I really wanted to go up in a hot air balloon. And I said to the children, I'm going to do this someday. And this was back in the 70s.
Ray Loewe06:12
Okay, and, you know, you talk about dancing with the wind. And that's how you feel when you're in the balloon, isn't it?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 06:18
Oh, absolutely. You know, people always ask, like, how do you steer the balloon? Well, really, you are dancing with the wind. And sometimes you, you know, you'll release it. First of all, you have to check the weather. But then you release this helium balloon to see which way the winds go. But then once you're up there, you know, you can take a turn, just because the wind says this is where you're going to go. And I know with the British people, they usually have a can of shaving cream. And when they're in the basket, and they're up aloft, they do a doppel of shaving cream to see which way it goes, then they can tell which way the lower winds are. Now you don't know about the upper winds. But you know, you can start to climb, and you sort of park there and you see where that takes you. Does it take you right? Does it take you left? And, I never had a can of shaving cream, I just spit out of the side and that worked.
Ray Loewe07:18
So that's kind of how you control the balloon, you control it by going up or down and finding the wind that's going kind of in their direction you want.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 07:26
Exactly.
Ray Loewe07:27
So that's why in Albuquerque at the balloon festival, they have these two levels where the balloons go one way at one level and they go up to another level and they go the other way. Is that what goes on?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 07:37
Absolutely. That's what happened. They are dancing with the wind.
Ray Loewe07:41
Incredible. Okay, so how does one get a license to pilot one of these things?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 07:48
Well, first of all, I spent a lot of time as a crew chief. Because my husband at hell she, at the time was very, very interested. He wanted me to take fixed-wing flying lessons. And you know, after the fourth lesson, when I had to stall the plane in the sky, I said, this is not for me. I think I would prefer being in the basket surrounded by this wicker. And I would rather be in a balloon. So, what does it take? Well, I did a lot of crewing and of course, you know what that's like, you have to chase the balloon. And you have to make sure that you handle landowner relations when you're on the ground. And also, you have two-way radios and you let them know, you know that there's there's a field that of course, they can see where the field is. But you sometimes have to clear permission. So I did a lot of crewing. And I would get thrown in the basket every now and then in fly. And I thought you know, I can do this. And before I knew it, I had like 100 hours in the balloon. And I took okay what do you need. And it's not just having the hours you have to be pilot in command, you have to know how the workings of the balloon are. But you also have to take a written test. You have to take an oral test. And just like a driving test, you have to take a test with an examiner, a federal examiner.
Ray Loewe09:14
Oh my. So, do you have to parallel park too?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 09:17
No, but I'll tell you what, you know, one of the things that's an absolute no, you don't want to land where there are horses, and you don't want to land in the middle of cows or any kind of livestock. The Federal examiner that I had for my test, you know, my driving test, and no, I didn't parallel park, but he said why don't you just land here? And I said I'm not landing there. There are cows there. You know, I'm not doing that. And while you know he's talking to me about where I should be landing he was testing me out to see if I could take off and land and do all that. He was messing around with the tanks he was turning the valves of the tank saw. And I looked at him and I slapped his hand and I said, stay away from that! You know, because he was gonna knock my pilot light. But he wanted to see if I was attentive to it. You know, if you have passengers, a lot of times they're touching all kinds of things. And that's a no no.
Ray Loewe10:20
So what do you do when you land someplace like in a farmer's field? That's where you become a diplomat, right?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 10:26
Yes, absolutely. And you hope that your chase crew has already, you know, set up, of course, I did that a lot. But if I was the pilot, you know, you wanted to make sure that it was okay. And most of the time, people love to have you there. And occasionally, we'd stop at an Amish farm. And the Amish men would hop in the basket and we'd give them the second leg of the flight. You know, we'd let them fly and they could see their land. They could see their handiwork in a way that they never could before.
Ray Loewe11:00
You know, you are a storyteller, aren't you? Okay, and what a great story. And you know, when I went hot air ballooning, the one time I was up in a balloon, we had a bottle of champagne with us. And, a basket with foods so that if we landed in a farmer's field, you know, we could we could have like a picnic and celebrate?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 11:00
Yes, well, yes. I know, when flying in France, they really love to have the wine and the champagne. But you have to understand that if you're the pilot, there is no alcohol, from you know, bottle to throttle. And you only have that once you land. And you have the food and the party and I love that part of it, too.
Ray Loewe11:44
Okay, so before we get into some of your adventures, I know our listeners are gonna want to know what one of these things cost.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 11:54
Well, when people asked me that, I mean, there's more than just the balloon, there's a basket and the tanks. And then there, the beautiful, artistic piece. It's called the envelope. And it's made of ripstop, nylon and some fireproof, you know, portions of it, where the flame goes. To answer your question, I always say it is like the cost of a car, like a luxury, nice luxury car. And the thing is, once you have the basket and your tanks and everything, you can fly with the envelope for so long. After how many hours you get on it, and over time, because it's heated up a lot, and it's put down and it goes through a lot, it gets porous. And so you know, a new balloon is really tight, like a new car. And you could always just change, you know, just get a new envelope, design a new envelope, and that's another cost, but you also need a chase vehicle. You need a fan to put cold air in. You need radios. You need little helium balloons. There's all kinds of equipment that you need before you even go out to a launch field and start the inflation.
Ray Loewe13:18
All right. So tell me you had to design your balloon at least once in your life. So when you design your first balloon, how do you design it? Would did you put on it?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 13:28
Well, first of all, we started out with a used balloon that had quite a few hours on it. And we knew that it was going to be good for us to learn how to fly and to have our instruction. But when it came time to actually designing our envelope, my husband really felt that we were flying in Lancaster County. So he designed a map, an outline of Lancaster County, and it was a yellow map and he had a red rose in the center so that people knew we were from Lancaster County. And then on my side of the balloon, I asked that they do the flying horse, Pegasus, which is a beautiful white flying horse. And whenever I'd see her coming up over the hill, you know, people would see this beautiful Pegasus, and Pegasus is definitely a symbol of inspiration and creativity. So it held a lot of meaning for me.
Ray Loewe14:23
Alright, I think you're more than a storyteller. I think you're a poet too. Okay, I mean, it's great. I can just see having so much fun with this. You know, first of all, being aloft is quiet, you know, except when that darn blast of propane takes off. And you just get these magnificent views. You know if people that are listening to this have never been up in a hot air balloon, you have to do this at some prime in your life. And you also have to be in the chase car because that's an adventure too.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 14:55
Oh, it is, it's a lot of fun.
Ray Loewe14:56
So, let's talk about some of the great places you've been, and let me give a list that you gave me, and then you pick the one that you want to talk about first. Okay?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 15:05
Okay.
Ray Loewe15:05
So you were in Austria flying in a balloon, you were in Costa Rica, you were in Spain, you were in Japan, you were in Leningrad. And then who knows where else in the United States you've been. All right. So pick one, and tell us what the appeal was, what the adventure was, and be a storyteller and a poet.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 15:25
Well, let me tell you. Oh, my goodness, alright, you mentioned Albuquerque, and I'm going to tell you about a time we were flying in Austria, and we didn't have our balloon, a lot of times, there's a network of balloons, ballooners, balloonists around the world. And so if we would be invited to fly in a particular country, there would be balloonists who would lend us their balloons, and then they would come to the United States, and we would reciprocate. So, it was a very, very nice thing. So we were in Austria, we were flying this particular balloon. And we were going over cows and churches and whatnot. And so I thought, well, let's see if we can just land here in this churchyard. And we came through and landed there and all of a sudden, I hear this brass music from a brass band. And I'm thinking, where is that coming from? I mean, this is a church, and out comes this band of Austrian brass trumpet, trombone, and tuba players, and they are serenading this balloon. You know, they were so excited. And they said to us, oh, you know what, we want to come to Albuquerque, you know, and I'm thinking yeah, well, we were rarely at Albuquerque, you know? And I thought, yeah, right, I will never see them. And so later on that year, we were in Albuquerque, and I was there early early morning. We get started at four o'clock in the morning, and we're out in the field. And of course, there's all these stands that are selling breakfast burritos and whatnot. And there are tents set up. And all of a sudden, I hear brass music coming from one of the tents. And lo and behold, it was the brass band that greeted us when we were in Austria. And they recognize me and I recognize them. And it was like a grand reunion.
Ray Loewe17:22
Incredible.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 17:23
They were they said they were going to come to Albuquerque. And they did. They did.
Ray Loewe17:27
Alright, we're getting near the end of our time, but pick one of the other places that you've been, and tell some other story.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 17:35
Well, I'll tell you, I should talk about Costa Rica, because we were friends with the Minister of Trade of Costa Rica, and his job was to bring new businesses into Costa Rica. And this was a number of years ago, he contacted the ballooning company that made the balloons in the United States and his name was drawn Luis Escalante and he was definitely interested in getting more flights from Florida to Costa Rica from American Airlines. So he thought it might be a great idea to have a balloon that had the American Airlines logo on it, it would be great publicity. Well, my husband and I and our girls went to Costa Rica on two occasions. And we were in charge of teaching Don Luis how to fly this balloon. It was designed and it had the American Airlines on it. But I mean, what we saw, while we were there, the people were so friendly. There was flowers and beautiful plants everywhere and macaws flying in pairs. So I would see things like that, you know, and I thought, oh my gosh, this is really fantastic. Anyway, we came to the point where the training had gone so far, and it's time to do a solo flight. So Don Luis had to do a solo flight. Now you have to understand, his father-in-law also had a sugar plantation. And so we were flying, and actually over the plantation. And I, you know, I said, Don Luis, you can do this solo flight. This is really good. You know, I was on the chase vehicle. Ed was there, you know, so there we were, and he's getting ready to come in for his landing, actually on the plantation. And I thought this was really wonderful. And then all of a sudden, I hear the clanging of the tanks in the back of the pickup truck. And I looked at the power lines, and I saw that they were undulating. And so finally he landed, and the earth started to move. We were having an earthquake. I couldn't believe it. I mean, it actually happened at that moment when he was landing. And I said, Don Luis, that was a hell of a landing! I could not believe it!
Ray Loewe20:03
So welcome to Adventures in Costa Rica. And, you know, we're gonna do another one of these if I can get your attention later because the stories can go on I'm sure. Okay, but before we sign off, your daughter is also a hot air balloonist, isn't she?
Mary Ann Steinhauer 20:19
Oh, yes, my older daughter, the younger daughter never really cared for it. But the older daughter definitely took to it. And she's highly competitive. She actually competes all around the world right now. I mean, she lives in Colorado but she was in Lithuania, she's qualifying for the Women's Championship. And I think it's going to happen in Australia.
Ray Loewe20:45
You know, when you compete, what does that entail? Because you don't have control over where the balloon is going.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 20:51
No, but you do map your course. And there's always a big x at one of the fields. And the whole idea is to be able to fly over that X in your balloon and toss a beanbag that has your balloon number on it. And the closest you get to the center of the X, you're definitely you know, the winner or you get the ranking. But there's also a hare and hound. So there's a hare balloon that leads the way and whoever can fly closest, and land in the same place that the hare does, the Hound is the winner. I mean, so there's those kinds of competitions.
Ray Loewe21:40
So who knew, right? So again, you know, we're at the end of our time and Maryanne Steinhauer has been our guest, and she's opened up this whole world of hot air ballooning to us and she's available, stop at the North desk some time and if you're lucky, you'll see her.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 21:59
I do want to read one thing as we close.
Ray Loewe22:02
Okay, go ahead.
Mary Ann Steinhauer 22:03
That is called the balloonist prayer. The winds have welcomed you softly. The sun has blessed you with her warm hands. You have flown so well, and so high that God has joined you in your laughter and then gently set you back into the loving arms of Mother Earth.
Ray Loewe22:24
There's nothing more to say. So Luke, sign us off, please. Thanks for listening. And be sure to listen again next week. And every week when we'll have another exciting guest. I hope you enjoyed this. This is something we're going to do from time to time, and I think you can certainly see why our guest is one of the luckiest people in the world. So listen again next week and, Luke, sign us off.
Outro 22:58
Thank you for listening to Changing the Rules. Join us next week for more conversation, our special guest and to hear more from the luckiest guy in the world.