One of the many reasons I don’t ride in hot air balloons
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What most people fail to realize is that the Balloon Fiesta is primarily an excuse for a 9-day tailgate party. Having to take the balloons up for 20 minutes and chase after them is the price balloon pilots and their crews pay to attend the party.
Yeah…but also…it’s about chasing that perfect, elusive Rio Grande box. When the weather is right and the winds just so, a balloon pilot can stay up a long time. I’ve seen it work (I used to work at Honeywell, just catty corner to the launch field), but most of the time…it doesn’t.
So then they fish the balloons out of electric wires and out of the river and out of people’s backyards and out of traffic, etc, etc, etc.
The balloon fiesta used to be a lot more fun for the average joe “back in the day”. You could go out, help guys unfold and blow up the balloons, hold the gondola until they launched, pull the propane to keep it inflated.
Now it’s all corporate and sponsored and…well….not the same.
The Fiesta is still an odd mixture of amateurism and commercialism. And you’re right Karen, the real — and to this non-party-goer only — fun is going out and helping unfold, inflate and hold down the balloon down until the pilot is told to launch.
Oh, and it can be very, very pretty.
For those that don’t know, the famed Rio Grande or Albuquerque Box is a combination of opposing air currents at different altitudes that when ideal allow the balloon to take off and land at almost the same spot. I’ve seen it working once.
What did my ex used to say? “It’s not Balloon Fiesta until somebody burns and dies!”
He was kinda right, sadly.
I used to live right down the street from Fiesta Park and often had balloons practically outside my dining room window. It was amazing–so beautiful that I never even complained about all the traffic in my neighborhood. Plus, I loved the Rio Grande Art Fair.
I used to feel sorry for all the horses down the street, though. They hated that WHOMP sound, poor things.
I can remember watching a balloon with tourists floating above the Masai Mara in Kenya one morning and very much wishing I was up there with them for the amazing view.
What a way to watch the herds below!
So, I wonder if the woman that received minor injuries in the casino parking lot went in to gamble.