I thought we used balloons when we went on our "beer run?"
We did.
We used balloons when we lifted off from Lake Fate, when we arrived at Loch Ness, when we went on the beer run,
*breathe*
... when we lifted off from Loch Ness, when we picked up the Thrust Ring in the Norwegian Sea, when we flew over the North Pole, when we left Kauai (Hawaii), and when we landed at Eniwetok.
That's where we dismantled them and sold off our huge jet engines.
All of our remaining flights, (to the Moon and Mars), have been using the thrust of Gas-Cooled Nuclear Reactor/Rocket Engines.
But those huge hot-air balloons seerved us very well!