In the two decades I've been adventuring, I've never been rescued - and I don't intend to start now David Hempleman-Adams

Last month David Hempleman-Adams decamped to the United States to ready for an epic balloon trip in a traditional wicker basket.

For weeks he and his team waited for the right weather conditions to cross the Atlantic. In the early hours of Saturday morning, he got the go-ahead. But within hours of take-off, the winds forecast to carry him to Europe slowed.

Mr Hempleman-Adams had food and fuel for a six or seven day flight - the change in weather would have almost doubled its duration, and his team had to accept it was no longer safe to continue.

"Even if I was to ditch every single fuel tank once it was empty as well as my food and life raft to make the balloon lighter, it still would have taken eight days," he told BBC News Online. "If throwing my boxer shorts overboard would have made a difference, I would have done it.

It was the Wiltshire explorer's second trans-Atlantic attempt

"But there was no way I wanted to put my life or anyone else who came to rescue me at risk by coming down in the Atlantic. In the two decades I've been adventuring, I've never been rescued and I've never had to make an insurance claim - and I don't intend to start now."

So as dawn broke 30 hours and 53 minutes after taking off, he touched down in a farm in Massachusetts.

"It was the most perfect landing I've ever done. This farmer and his 29-year-old daughter came out in their pyjamas and took me into their idyllic New England farmhouse for breakfast. I thought 'this is it - I've actually died and gone to heaven."

Nigel Mitchell, of the flight control team, says: "We were all being terribly English about it, apologising profusely to the farmers for coming down on their property. But they were thrilled to have him drop in - even though it was before daybreak."

It was the adventurer's second trans-Atlantic balloon attempt. Last September, he was forced to land in Connecticut when the onboard autopilot - which would have allowed him some sleep - failed.

Try, try again

While plans for a third attempt have yet to firm up - not least because all members of the team have full-time jobs outside the balloon challenge - he is keen to try again in several months when the winds are less "fickle".

DAVID HEMPLEMAN-ADAMS 1998: completed explorers' Grand Slam - highest mountains and all four poles 2000: North Pole by balloon April 03: skied solo to North Pole, but didn't tell his wife

"I'm definitely going to do it again, because everything worked beautifully - the team, the balloon, the equipment - everything, that is, except the weather."

And as the balloon came down gently on dry land, nothing was damaged bar the hopes of the team.

"It looked as though he could have taken off again straight away if only the weather had been right," says Mr Mitchell. "Instead we had to deflate the balloon, letting out the �10,000 worth of helium it took to fill it."

If successful, the voyage would have broken the solo world distance record for the AM-08 Roziere class of balloon, and he would have been the first to do so in an open basket. It was also aimed at raising awareness of the 2003 Special Olympics, currently taking place in Ireland.

Instead, he will return bearing a bunch of flowers for his long-suffering wife - after skiing solo to the North Pole without telling her, he famously asked the BBC's John Humphrys if flowers would do by way of apology.