Albuquerque Balloon Festival 2008

We're lucky enough to have been invited by my cousins who live in Albuquerque to come down and stay with them for the balloon festival.   We had a great time and seen some beautiful sights and spent several days with smiles on our faces and laughter in our hearts

Credits to the Albuquerque balloon festival for this on line photo 

We spent the first day with them just enjoying our visit and the
beautiful views from their patio

A little road runner came to visit

We got up the next morning before daylight to head for the field to watch 

the dawn patrol show and the "morning glow"

routines.  It was beautiful

Stunning glows in the night sky

As dawn broke we toured the field and watched as the operators fill the balloons with air

and prepared for takeoff

The first wave lifted off and the crowd roared

One by one hundreds of beautiful ballons

lift from the ground in waves for the mass ascenion

Along with many "special" ones

The Eagle

The milk cow

Smiley

a mug of beer

Covered Wagon

Fish

Castle

Smokey the Bear

The Strawberry

The Love Bug

Honey Bees

Back

and as they went higher they had to split apart

Dumbo

Below are some of my Favorites

Later in the afternoon we took a tram ride up Sandia Peak.

At 2.7 miles it's the world's longest passenger tramway

The top of the terminal is 10,378 feet

he wind was blowing at the top so badly we could barely stand up

The scenery below us was beautiful

We left chocolate colored peaks behind....... the tram windows reflect their beauty on the lens

The next day we toured "old Albuquerque" and shopped at the indian square craft market
and visited the old Church

Thanks to our great hosts Terry and Marti for a really fun weekend get away

Good Night Albuquerque