Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta

Sorry it’s been a while for an update. We’ve been traveling with some friends Jay and JoAnne and enjoying life.  When we left Denver we headed to Albuquerque, NM where the annual Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta was about to start.

First off, the drive was not fun. It started with us waking in Denver to snow. After we brushed off our slides and got on the road, the snow turned into rain. Then we got lots of wind as we were heading directly into the front, and for those of you who drive big rigs you know, driving in very windy conditions with big gusts does not make for a fun day.

But alas, we had a destination to get to. We could not just pull over and wait for it to pass. So we pressed on. We will have to do this drive again some day though. The scenery was just beautiful going through some of the New Mexico mountains. On a nice clear and sunny day perhaps.

When we got to the American RV Park in Aluquerque we were dismayed to find out that we were not going to be parked next to our friends we were traveling with. Yes, it is a busy time of year with the balloon fiesta, however, we did make these reservations back in June.

Our site was decent enough but being a pull-thru it was no where near the length it needed to be. If we were stopped here for one night I would not accept this spot as we could only fit our coach in the spot and had to unhook our tow vehicle. Our friends had a lovely open spot in the new section, with other friends that they were meeting up with. Easy pull-thru’s that were long enough for a tow vehicle.

Oh well. I digress.

We went to the first evening of the balloon fiesta. We had to take a bus into the fiesta as we were not parked right at the park. The buses ran pretty regularly though and we hardly had any wait.

Having never been here before we knew their were to be a lot of people.

This was a little much though. It was shoulder to should people. Shopping, eating and laying on the grass staking out there territory to watch the balloons.

Our friend Jay had to buy this Sock Monkey hat that he found.

Yeah..that’s right..I went their. Hey, you buy the hat you get your picture taken and end up in the blog. That’s all I have to say about that.

It was super windy still and they weren’t even sure they would put the balloons up. So all this way for that? That would not be good.

Fortunately once the sun went down the winds died down a little bit. Just enough to do an evening glow.

It does make for some very interesting shadowy pictures though. At least I think so.

The next morning their was a planned balloon ascent. However, when I say morning, I mean 5am and at this elevation of 7000 feet, it is cold to say the least. When we woke that next morning it was in the 40’s and C-O-L-D. With no guarantee that the balloon would go up in that temperature and the wind was back, plus did I mention it was 5am? We opted to not go.

We later found out from our friends that went that the balloons did indeed go up and it was beautiful. Oh well. We really are not early morning people and we just couldn’t get motivated at 40 something degrees to go. Maybe another time.

The balloon fiesta went on for a whole other week. We were only there a few days. We did manage to squeeze in a few more excursions around town, other than the balloon fiesta.

One day I went with the girls to Old Town Albuquerque. Founded in 1706 it was a nice square with shops, restaurants and artisans lining the streets.

They are just so beautiful.

The architecture was amazing also. Not only did you have these old (1700’s) buildings but you had all these old and worn structures and adornments all over.

After lunch it was time to head back to the coach.

All in all it was a nice visit in Albuquerque. We had never been there before. Lots to see and do. Lots of yummy places to eat. A surprise that we just happened upon was this little taco truck. They are everywhere down there. This one did not stand out from the others. We just happened upon it when we were coming back from shopping one evening.