CALI and the Granddaughter visit... and stuff

We bounced out to visit the Granddaughter in the middle of the week. It was set up and prepped but came upon us quickly. Direct flight from the Burque to Oakland.. pick up and drive Northeast. Two solid days of baby time and two partials. This was a test.

This little kid is so smart she is running rings around us. Also wearing down two old people quickly.

But I am getting ahead of myself.

Great ticket prices on SOUTHWEST! Was able to book a hotel close to the kiddos... cheaply. Pre checked so walked through TSA checkpoint with the basic checks.. fantastic... Have to redo my pre check stuff for the future... was able to sit and have a snack and relax prior to the flight. Plane showed up on time and was only 3/4 full so being in the back of the line allowed us to get on and find a full three seat section no one had taken. WOW!

Flight was around 2 hours and a bit. Had the GPS running on the IPAD so caught that flight for the future. Enjoyed that a lot. Landed and my daughter was there waiting. Picked out the bag and got on the road up to Emmers with a short stop for a burger at In and Out.

It was a little treat as we were more wanting to get right to Emmers than anything else. Zipped up the 80 and stopped at Emmers care givers. She was happy even after bonking her head off the floor right before we got there. Big hugs and chatter and we headed off to check in.

Hotel was the Far West. It was acceptable and after a slight snafu with the check in we had a very spacious room that was clean and suitable for the minimal amount of time we would be there.

We had a lot of fun. We took Emmers to a play place just for little kids. She almost went the whole hour but couldn't as she used up all her energy quickly.... We visiting the Jelly Belly Factory and had some fun with that and we hit a few stores for clothes for her and other things and even got on a train and carousel... she didn't seem to like the carousel but trying to get her off it was a totally different story. She rode it three times in the end with the operator letting us all on to ride so I could get some better pictures.

I took over 800 shots but a lot are dark or out of focus since chasing a toddler around you need a prime lens and a lot of duct tape. I did get to put her play place together so she could climb and slide at home in the living room of her Grandmothers  in Cali. It also has a little ball drop and basin for balls. She loves swishing them around or out right throwing them at your head.

Four words... She is a treasure.

Cant wait for the next visit.. which will be here for the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta.  Five weeks or so. 39 days in reality.

Here are some shots from beginning to end of everything that touched my eye.. and no.. I will not load all Emmey shots ....

PS.. this was a trip exclusively to see the baby .. not to sight-see.... We blew her schedule up and she was running full steam ahead most times to crash asleep. Next trip we will adhere to her schedule and sight-see while she is at her caregivers... WHO IS ALSO VERY AWESOME!

Ok.. pictures...

This guy is going to have a bad day.. but it looked like there was assistance nearby.

Above ground shuttle train... seems this would be much better than the insanity of Central ave in Albuquerque. Would be nice to run one of these from the airport North to Fiesta Field area and Coors and Central to Tramway and Central. I would take it to work for sure.

Palms and traffic. Back seat shooting.

Off side views.

Flowers and trash. It was only a small bit I saw. The juxtaposition of the flowers with the trash caught my eye. Pretty clean otherwise.

Da Police. There were more here than in the 505. Nice to know they were cruising around.

All the crows seem to have had collars on lately.. that or forgot to bath in the morning. This guy was looking for scraps.. very few.

One shot. Good burger. I like In and Out and 5 Guys and also Mo makes a mean burger I don't have to leave the house for.

The golden gate bridge entryway. We were not going that way. It was very Smoggy or Foggy or Fire burning in the area occluded. Next time.

The city in the mists....

Jelly Belly HQ and factory... They had to have a balloon!

Not in order but... Digital Stitches owned my daughters Mother In Law. Nice place, big, loads of stuff and cool designs. Saw this jacket which would be real cool for Fiesta as it covers your butt. Can we get AIBF to look into these?

Shirt printer. Way cool. Very fast and excellent output.

Back to Jelly Belly factory tour. Emmers wearing the required headgear, also glasses by Cartier. Styling! This place was excellent. They even had a cat walk all around the factory floor with windows to the floor in most places so the kids in strollers could see. I didn't want to take Emily anywhere she would not enjoy. What fun is that... she liked it. I took pics though half and had her in my arms for the remainder. She loved it and got a very nice sugar high after. LOL. followed by a major crash. Look at those ankles! She folds her hands.. crosses her ankles, wakes up happy and is fantastic to be around unless he feels the need to put a hand in your mouth.... yeah.

Pina Colada jelly bellys prepping.. Lots and lots... the smell.. wooo boy!

Mixed fruits I think.... so many...

Carousels are my favorite and I only took a few of the thing itself. Some other time I will go back and really do it justice. It has been there for a very long time.  Counter clock wise.

That about it for DSLR shots. I have some on my cell phone but wont post those here. We did see a ride balloon or two on Saturday. The winds were very calm. Never got too close to it. We had other priorities.

Flight back was like the flight to but shorter by 20 minutes. Lots of turbulence on landing... storm clouds on arrival. Again... 3/4 full, so lots of room to relax in in the back of the plane. Sandias were right where I left them.

So now back the Albuquerque resting. Picked up a sore throat on the way back to the airport. It hit somewhere there and now I am suffering through it with lozenges and coffee.... One other thing that happened was I caught my thumb in the door of my daughters car. Lets say it hurt a lot and leave it at that... Its still bruised but I can wiggle it now.

Don't matter as I got to hold my Granddaughter.... Nothing else mattered really.

PPS.. Didn't mention how dry the hills around the area were. One match and the whole place would go.... Traffic was minimal but there. Car pool lane was nice. Motorcycles weaving through traffic was unnerving... Went to IKEA on a whim... interesting.. Didn't buy anything but food...People seems surprised when you were nice to them.

CALI... def going back. 99%.99 for the Emmers .01% to sight-see.

Almost forgot.. PPPS... We got flocked while we were away.. the Albuquerque Aerostat Ascension Association will flock a house with silly flamingos if your not careful or pay insurance... we got hit!

Hilarious.

Roswell, Aliens, Flights, Non weather type balloons.

Crazy week.... but that is to be expect this time of year. Not that that makes any of it easier to deal with nor will any of the stop-gap ideas you came up with the year before help at all this year end because everything has a dynamic shift to how you have to proceed.. so.. its a day to day situation. Just gotta deal with it. I expect large amounts of coffee though.....

The above shot is from the Roswell air park. Taken last week in a three shot pano. It was huge. This is the 1/3 version. Roswell air park used to be Walker AFB and had a hot pad as well as a staging base for the ICBMs that had silos in and around the area. There are also bombing ranges with nifty targets of built up mounds of dirt in the shape of ships and such. You can see them on Google Earth and if you look up Roswell targets on the nets it will give you the coordinates. Lots of holes still out there.

Not one damn alien but some strange people still.. could be aliens.. or tourists.

We went down to Roswell to get new badges and also install a new DTS1 Sensor... Layman's terms.. dew point sensor. Plus some cleaning of the optics since we were there. Nice drive down. So much open space and long straight roads... Strange things to see and some fun with the camera as we were driving.  All seen below.

On the way South from Clines Corners. I remember a time when this was only two lanes and constantly foggy and it was your life to try and drive it.

Edge of Vaughn.

Eastern Dude outside of Vaughn.

Western Dude outside Vaughn.  I really have no clue.

Roswell has a new sign coming in to town. Cute... Aliens and cows.

Heading down to the center of town... not a lot of change in a year....

ASOS or Automatic Surface observation System. Sensors from left to right or close to far.. Visibility, Freezing Rain, Celometer, Winds and Data package ( big white box ) Present Weather, Temp/Dew Point, Rain Guage with shield ( AWPAG ). Bark and dirt under T/DP for actual readings. This system, while very good at what it is set to do needs constant maintenance due to the weather and climate it sits in.

747, L1011, 747. Parking at Roswell is under 2 dollars a day. Elvis's jet still sits below the tower.

Inside the terminal a nice model suspended from the ceiling. There is even a neat museum about the base in here to wander through.

Heading out of town and into Smokey Bear area a lone rider wearing a rain cape rolls along. Sprinkles.

Carizozo dust devil heading North again.

Somewhat abused windmill.

So much space to stretch out. A new wind farm is being installed up North. Ugly and kills the view.

Booooo......

Well then... That led us into Saturdays flying. I went out to assist Bob and check out the repairs on Pitas Kiss. Good job but a couple of problems to get fixed. Nothing major. He flew off as there were a lot of able bodied crew and took Matt on his first flight. A nice one our tour of the North Rio Rancho mesa and arroyos.  Mo also got his gear out and flew Mojo ( Ytivarg ) with another new to flying person. He went off and had a lot of fun.

Bob landed at the Rainbow launch field and Mo tootled off West farther.... for fun.

World Balloon cuts through the air in the early morning.

Pitas Kiss lopes along.

Mojo spiking the sky with that bright yellow.

Lovely clouds to contrast the balloons off of. Could have been a little brighter but hay....

 Grim knot. Pretty cool.

Mojo lookin like a storm chaser but the virga was way off... It just looks close.

Enchanted Diamonds bopped on the head! Naa... just laying down after the flight.

Pitas Kiss resting while we watch the strange late flying going on.

Smile and wave boys, smile and wave.

I find this spot quite nice to sit on.

It really was a good day and I do wish I had flown but you make plans and should stick with them.  I did. It was fun.

Hoping to get a good flight in myself on Labor Day weekend. Its Highperactives turn out of the trailer so that might be a bit of fun if we can do some rocketing upward  and super speed drops.

Today I had to become a lumberjack and cut down what I though was going to be two trees ( not huge but too big ) and that turned out to be one huge bush, one tree and a group of trees and then one mass of tree insanity out front. Neighbor has a old tree that keep dropping seeds all over my yard and if you try you still wont get all the sprouts and these just got away.. so a lot of saws-all cutting later they are down to low stumps that I will have to poison with some stump killer or they will re-sprout and I will have to deal with it again.... and I hate yard work.

I think I will call my landscaper friend to come assess the cost of getting rid of the stumps, grading the ground correctly and laying plastic out for rock. That would be perfect. So many things to do and so little want to deal with them.

Now after all that its rest time and create this blog of stuff.

I had some cool link to share also...

Throw back movie soundtrack just goes to show the old music is still great and the new music sucks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JeU0_1CTdA

A pretty neat piece of music...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzm9bF9oLqw

I remember a lot of diners on our family road trips across the US
http://flashbak.com/roadside-america-a-look-at-midcentury-diners-31554/

And even thought I dont care for her acting or voice its a good song and funny movie by a loon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmV5MW_XAtg

Ahh to be rich and brainless..... Ill just stay me....  semi brained and relatively content.

42

and a pin to fix again.. I screwed it up last night.... was too tired.

As light as a bumble bee......

Seriously silly week at work.. Everyone running everywhere and flinging paperwork all over and everywhere also... The end of the year in the federal govt is like this due to how things work... Really.
In the next few weeks it will calm down and I can get back to searching for stuff and compiling another excel sheet of things...and yes.. that will make me happy.... weirdly... its also making my job easier. The weekend was a flop, and then a jump... no skipping at all... unless you call the skip of the flop... Yeah.. that works.

There "was" a AAAA balloon meet in Rio Rancho this Saturday.... but... the rains the night before did not stop. Now... mostly that's not a major deal in the city as most water flows down the arroyos or the man maybe culverts to the river and is gone... Due to the uncleared and nicely left alone ground in parts of Rio Rancho it was sloggy. Not muddy but sticky. Its sand.. gritty sand up there and when saturated with rain it can cling and saturate fabric. Been there and had that done... and Sunday looked nice as well so we skipped the slop and jumped right at flying Sunday. And it was...and it was.. nice.

Bringing out two balloons instead of one is dicey. If there inst enough knowledgeable crew it can be rough.

Having crew come out that knows to handle the fabric by the load tapes and not to step on the fabric or how to plant their feet away from the fabric before moving it saves holes and tears... Holes and tears that are not seen until the next time you try to fly just grounds you and stops the fun.

Great crew that instructs new people saves the Pilot from having to explain over and over and over again... I love it.. and we had great crew today. So I got to work with the cameras and check the system out with a closer eye than normal.

We flew In Czech ( Terpsnickery ) since I am trying to rotate the envelopes every flight. She is lighter but as strong and easy to load in and out. Flying was a nice curve from South East to South West in a very nice curve curve... from the track the tablet saved it looks like a fantastic bow. What you cant see is that we went up and stalled out around 6320msl for a while... shooting pictures and such until deciding to drop in to the nearby arroyo for a short break on the ground.

Landing we noticed we had stopped short of a bush full of big bumble bees.... after checking that Trent was not going to bounce off us we started taking pics of the bees but they were bouncing so fast all about it was next to impossible....

We lofted out of there and continued our curve and ended up headed towards a park.. but not close enough to make the first part. The second section was possible but it would be a quick drop over a tree.. which happened.. and with a brush past the tree landed nicely.

The grass of the park was so wet the crew had to walk me and the balloon out to the parking lot to lay out... and that went off with only a little sea sickness on my part.... swaying around about it a bit... much.

Here are the shots of all the fun today....

The crew..and crew and crew and balloons and stuff that happens after you leave the ground.

Some people like to fly above the ground.. and some dont.

Trent owns the sky around his beautiful balloon.

Eric and Kisses effortlessly zip hither and yon.

There are many balloons below me. Can you all separate so I can come down....  They did.

Sun Dagger flies the skies of Albuquerque and Rio Rancho again under new management. Its a lovely balloon and they had a good time today.

MOJO ( Ytivarg ) floats over the park in Breezys hand under instruction of Mo and Mezz. Cant get better than that.

The morning watch... See the sky... feel the breeze.... decide to wait...

Off to the South East its rippling but the breeze is almost nonexistent.

Over head the clouds are breaking up in strange patterns.

Landed and walked to the car.

Laid out and ready for straps and a warm bag.

Crown ring. It holds everything together at the top... very nice.. very big.. very strong.

And on the way back to the main road from packing MOJO up we almost drove right over this snik. It was just laying there. Thought it was dead. Got out of the truck and walked up to it and nope... ALIVE... not rattling but def big enough to take us out. We shot our pics then advised it to get off the road .. which it did .. it curled up and started getting fussy so we got back in the truck and drove on... Leave and let be.

 NO BITES!

Back home after tailgating and swapping stories... video and picture dump. Another time the GoPro failed but the Kodak 360 caught it all. Something is wrong with the battery I think.

Loaded pictures to fazebook cause I love sharing with my friends and they take fantastic shots of me so we share....

Here is me in the yellow and white balloon taking pictures of the bees...

Eric pic.

Bee!!!!

Just had to.

Have a great week! See you next...