October 6-9, Albuquerque, NM





We all left Chama on Thursday morning and headed to Albuquerque for the Balloon Fiesta.  We are dry camping together on the fiesta grounds.  School buses pick us up right here in the RV park and take us to the front gate for every event.  It is wonderful not to have to fight traffic to get to Fiesta Park.
We attended the Thursday evening Special Shapes Glow and fireworks display.   We got to see lots of different special shape balloons but the glow seemed to be a bit disorganized.  The fireworks were great.











We got up early Friday morning for the special shapes launch.  We had a great time as we really love all the different balloon shapes.










There are lots of new shapes – notice the fire hydrant at top right and the fire truck below.  At the bottom left is part of the red fire chief’s hat.  We wonder how some of these balloons fly.











Nancy’s favorite from past trips to the Balloon Fiesta was a pair of bumble bees that launched together and would meet on the way up looking like they were kissing – well only one was here this year – but still a cutie.









These two cute penguin’s that we had not seen in the past did launch together but didn’t get close and no kissing.










Last week in Chama, we noticed a hot air balloon cargo trailer that said they were from Windsor, CO – a small town close to where we used to live.  Well, we spotted the same trailer and this was their wonderful balloon – a dragon curled around the balloon – wonderful.  Notice Darth Vader floating above – the force is strong here!









And Rex’s favorite balloon that we have been fortunate to see almost every time we come to the Balloon Fiesta.  It did not fly today but was inflated for a static display for quite a long time.









The Friday night glow was cancelled due to bad weather.  Here we are on Saturday morning in the cold waiting for the mass ascension – finally took off around 10 am with only a couple hundred balloons launching - a disappointment for us but Tom and Donna were happy as this was the biggest launch they have ever seen.  The Saturday night glow was cancelled as it was raining.




Sunday morning we watched the balloons from our camp sites – it was great as some of them were coming directly over the campground.  Overall we were a bit disappointed because the weather caused delays, less balloons and events cancelled.  We also noticed that despite the weather the crowds were a lot bigger than we have experienced in the past – we still had a great time and love the balloons.





After lunch we drove to the Petroglyph National Monument where we hiked on the Mesa Point Trail in Boca Negra Canyon and saw lots of petroglyphs on the rocks.  At the top we had a great view of Albuquerque and the Sandia Mountains.














Later we rode the Sandia Peak Tram and had a great dinner at the High Finance Restaurant while we watched the storm roll in and a beautiful sunset.








Thanks to Donna for this beautiful sunset picture.


We had a great time in Albuquerque despite the bad weather.  We really enjoyed Tom and Donna’s visit and also seeing David again.





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