Angel Fire Balloon Rally 2017

A small ballooning event in the "lee" of a ski resort nestled into a green valley almost died a few years ago... but through the bold attention of a man named Bill Lee it was revived and has now flourished to the point Pilots are now requesting an invite and that set of Pilots has made a waiting list appear.

Amazing.

This year was amazing. I said it was amazing! We went up on Thursday making it a three day weekend and three days of flying. We got the three days of flying but the glow was a crazy night of frisky windages and no glow for me.

We were given a lovely condo in the middle of the Angel Fire Ski area.

Angel Fire off the ski season is a select, calm, quiet, fully enjoyable venue. No.. not a venue.. a town of great people who enjoy ballooning as much as balloonists love this great town.

Each day we flew had some novels things I could speak of and each day it was nice weather to fly if a little skewed.

Its a valley and on each side hills and mountains full of trees. You have to stay in the valley and that makes for some novel flying. Every bit of it was fun.

One of the things that made it a great rally were the people who showed up to observe and volunteer to crew.

For us those wonderful people were....

Ipa and Tina, Dutch residing in Portugal and camping through the Continental Americas who crewed for us all three days and the glow.. What can I say... wonderful people who were eager to help with anything and everything, asked for nothing but to enjoy the time. I was able to fly thing on a short hop Sunday. From the field to the edge of a church in the pines. Wonderful fun.

Dale and Gwen from the Northern part of Texas.. So north its the arm pit of Oklahoma ( their words )..

Owners of the Condo we stayed in and their children who we flew on Friday... Jamie and Lance and their parents too... And our sponsors from the Peoples Bank of Taos of whom I have their names in my mind a second ago and voom its gone. Ill post that later but they know who they were... and also the parents and good friends of a co worker who didn't tell me they were going to be up there and so I couldn't fly them.. LOLOL.. but I will fly them!!!

Then our crew from Albuquerque, Rory and Hannah who drove up to be our Professional Anchor team of which were immeasurably needed.. and my Brother Nick who bounced in for Saturdays launch and made that day smooth as glass.

This was a family  ( short Daughter Son In Law and Granddaughter ) rally and my Son was up with his balloon and Nick for his anchor team. He has crew volunteers from the local area and even went to a concert and met more balloon enthusiasts who came out and helped a couple of days. He had some fantastic flying and it was a hoot to get out flown by him.

Pictures were hard to shoot due to the novel shifts of the wind and flying at 8400 feet. I think it was a bout 350 total of three days.

Below are the few I have had time to remove dust specks from and clean up a tiny bit.  Comments on each.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial chapel.

Huey.

Back of the chapel.

The Condo.

Fires in the mountains...

Solitary

Target Fixation.

Riding the other level.

Cruising the edge of the forest.

Free Fire.

Mojo Close up while they were not paying attention.

Low and slow.

Ridge running.

One hell of a group of people!

So 350 plus pictures and a few edited. and now its super late in the day that started super early after a super super late day.... guess I am far too tired to go on about all this. Stay tuned for next weekends continuation of this story.

Id say Cheers but it will be more like.. Snores.

Special Times

What are the special times? Did they pass you by? 

Did you even recognize them as they were around you?

We have a wonderful little Granddaughter who is a lot like every 16 month old you will see but she also has a lot of not normal behavior. She is quiet and polite and her expressions and grasp of what is going on around her is completely amazing. 

I could sit and watch her 24/7/365 if just to not miss the next item she finds interesting or see how she reacts to the world. It would be well spent time. But that would be impossible and probably very strange in the end. I expect being apart from her will allow her to change and surprise us more though I will hate it every moment. 

She is the cutest little model too. She will take direction or just ad lib it but you get a great shot every time and she knows what the camera is since its been in her face since she was born.

This weekend was interesting. Between going out to AAAA rally in the Rio Rancho Desert and watching the balloons take off but staying on the ground.. getting family pictures and many pictures of Emily in her bounding around the area.... it was a good day... Then we were off to the ZOO on Sunday to see the animals but timing was bad and most were sleeping or hiding from the massive heat we got in. All of us were done and cooked good by the time we left.  Pictures of that adventure next week if they turn out.

Here are a few hot shots from Saturday.

Stacked up in a line to cold inflate. Space is premium where its nice. Weeds are no fun. There should be an etiquette pamphlet for balloonists.

It was a dusty hot day so a lot of atmospheric diffusion out there.

Winds were weird but flyable. Targets were out there to the leftish... there was a box in there too.

Sister to my Kennedy 90000. This is Woosh or now Kkisses and a 77000. Love that Check pattern.

 That's Ted up there.

Smart Vent in a Racer. You want the air out of your envelope... that will do it fast. Thanks Mark.

A 65000 Balloon owned by a great guy. She is now his back up as he bought a 90000 Fantasy envelope with a Kubi bottom end..Very Nice.

Matthew shows us how to rotate as he ascends... yes.. you can get sick easily from it. But its fun!

Kicking it in high gear is what is happening here. Super big ball of fire.

I was using my Nikon D300 with the 10.5 lens on it. its only 12 MPix but that lens is sweet for special shots like the one above. I lost my cap sometime in the past two weeks so I had to order a replacement. Its very necessary as this lens is quite unlike normal lenses and the price of it has gone up considerably since I bought mine. I just need a Nikon D7100 to put it on instead.

I was just talking to a very good friend and it is so much fun to shoot these good people flying about or cutting up .. its very easy to catch that great shot because they make it easy. The things they do.... 

La Familia.... 

You know every group of people have some bad apples .. and yes even with balloonists there are some real sour ones... but for the most part those that stick around are the ones that you want to have next to you. They teach you... share the fun and the pain at times and always are there to help out or are wonderful to help out. La Familia works in stating this group of HAB people. Rings of friends of friends and friends and Framily.

Oh.. So when I flew last weekend I gouged out a good six inches of my kick leather.. that is the leather at the bottom edge of the basket to protect the basket itself from damage.. it got damaged pretty good. I glued it yesterday to see if I could get it repaired... it kinda did. But there is a gap between the two edges that isn't filled in and I think its just going to get caught again and ripped off. Its okay now and I am going to rotate the basket so its at the back but I will have to get a replacement kick leather side to get it fixed right. 

The awesome bottom of my basket. 

Sigh!

Now to get on getting on. Things to do and paperwork to get processed and another week ( short ) to get ready for.

Next weekend is the Angel Fire rally . Three days of flying in a beautiful green valley at 7200 feet. 

Picture city baby!

Oh.. Balloonist etiquette..

Add your own..

1. When you arrive at a launch site and there are balloon vehicles there already. Respect their lay out space and do not interfere unless you talk to that Pilot.

2. Be respectful of whomever you lay out next to. 

3. Crew should always help the Pilot see what he might have missed. Its very easy to do so.

4. Tail gating should always be in a circle large enough for all to get in and around. 

5. If you crewed for a balloon team and need a drink of water or soda, my cooler is always open to you. Same goes for the food on the table. 

6. Be respectful of briefers and the Pilots during rally briefs so they can be heard and hear the important information being passed out.

7.

Pack that Weekend

So its amazing how much cant be done when the Granddaughter shows up on Saturday afternoon... Everything kinda shuts down since she has to be and is the center of our attention. So.. yep.. nada... but its been fun of a little sleep deprived now.

Starting Saturday morning and the flight of Patturns In Czech ( Terpsnickery ) and it was a quick flight due to some 16 mph winds..landing in a "supposed" clear field and running over a piece of cement with re-bar sticking out of it... thus tearing a section of the leather on the bottom of the basket ( Kick Plate ) made for some frustration. I think its easily repairable with some glue but I will ask Lindstrand USA in Galena Ill to send me a new one.

Bummer but it could have been fabric and that would have been much worse. Then as easy as it is to put her away it was still exhausting then home.. dump pictures and videos and then .... then things got interesting.

We went over to pick up our Granddaughter for the night to let her mom have a break and get some cleaning done to Said Granddaughter not wanting to nap or sleep and then in the middle of the night screaming her head off to wake the neighbors.. woo boy. So that kinda ended the sleeping part of the night...

To make it more fun Mo wanted to fly and had volunteered to fly some people so we ran out to Rainbow, which is far North and West of our usual launch site and he took off from there with a new friend. The drove South then popped up to 10,000 msl to catch a North East wind and after hanging up there for a bit dropped back out to a South West and a fun bouncy landing on a road.

Home right after and back to playing with the baby.... Loads of fun... and now waiting for some BBQ to be brought over will top the day.

Here are the shots from the Vid Cams and today's main cams.. Yesterday I took 15 pictures .. not much heavy but oh well...

Flight date info. Flight time is wrong and Temp is wrong. Why... I dont know.

Standing up and ready... almost...to go.

Off we go with Nelly B and Charity besides.

Up and over the big arroyo.

Back down South or Paradise and racing across the ground.

Passing over Unser.

Tree and rabbit avoidence processing quickly.

Over Paseo Del Norte quickly too...

Third and final bump but just past the nasty re-bar and cement. More damage to deal with. sigh!

Above is the Kodak 360 can and now the GoPro cam on the side..

Im not sure why my hand is on that whisper burner but I didn't light it off. Must have been for stability as we were swinging.

Kyle taking pictures as we head South.

Building avoidance.

Roofing inspections.

Up over high... Looking at the balloons in front of us to gauge where to descend.

Hi truck number 1..

Bush.. rabbit.. bush bush rabbit rabbit.

I same truck no 1.

 Mojo off and up high.

Much higher.. Looking South.

10,000+ and looking at Rainbow launch site below and to the right.

Headed North like crazy.

Dropping out over the Star Center..

Close to the ground and transitioning into ground tracking flight.

Groundtracking across the mesa basin.

And waving off that landing spot as we watch from the truck.

Right before landing on the road....

 gound.. bounce across the road and stopped on the edge.

Surveying the basket before standing it upright. Nice fun flights both. Much fun to be had.

 So that was the weekend... Not much of the week but what to say about that really. This next week is coming up and is full of stuff. I do have to get the basket into the garage and taken apart to see how much leather I have to glue... fun city.