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 Being Retired now, I thought that it was time for a new name to this Blog |
At The Balloon Fiesta We were up at 3 am to get to the Park-n-Ride at a local mall for a 4 am bus ride. My est friend from H.S., and former on/off again girlfriend insisted I have a 'cane/stool' to take with me, and dropped it off last night. It came in handy, and helped us a lot. At the last minute, another Niece of mine decided to bring her daughter along. That was fine, except the Park-n-Ride tickets were sold out. We figured we'd cross that bridge when we got to it. There we were, in a long line waiting to board a bus when a worker came to me and said, "You look handicapped (I was holding that cane/stool), come with me." I explained that I wasn't handicapped, that the cane/stool was loaned to me by a good friend. He explained that his job was to identify handicapped people, it didn't matter if I wasn't, we were to still come with him. Off we went; this ended up saving us at least 30 minutes of time. Remember that we now had 4 people in our small group, but only 3 tickets? Another employee was scanning tickets, we had talked a little before this. The three tickets were scanned, then Kristin's (my niece) daughter showed her ticket on the phone, of course it was invalid. Still, he had us board the bus! Off we went and joined the huge crowd of people on buses getting to the Fiesta. We had skipped breakfast to get to the mall on time, getting coffee and a bacon, green chile, potato & cheese burrito was our first move. Yummmm. After that, we walked around until we found a nice area to sit in. Now that cane/stool was even more handy! I was able to sit a little, and relax. We eventually had to move so the tarp for the Smokey The Bear Balloon could be laid out. The balloon would then be laid on it for inflation, not on the grass. Having never seen this kind of evolution going on, I walked to the area around the Smoky The Bear Gondola. I was 5-10 feet from the Gondola as this was being done. Here's what the team does. 1. The balloon is spread out on the tarp, it was pretty large too! 2. The team holds the bottom of the balloon open so air can be blown in. A gas powered fan blows air warmed by a heater into the balloon, and it slowly inflates. But this air is not hot enough to lift it off the ground. It was during this evolution that I walked over to the Gondola area. 3. So far, the Gondola has been on it's side. Once the balloon is inflated enough, the Pilot lights the Propane Burners to heat the air in the balloon even more and the balloon slowly rises off the ground! It was quite an experience to be that close to the Gondola while this was going on. Sadly, no balloons flew today, it was too windy at the higher altitudes for them to fly. Still, it was quite the experience to see the hundreds of balloons floating, even if still on the ground. If you have any interest in something like this, attend a balloon festival near you!   |
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