AIBF final day

Well, here it was, our last day at the Balloon Fiesta, and it looked like a quiet one. There was no mass ascension scheduled so we slept in. Or so we thought. About 7:15 we heard a "whoosh" outside, and then another. Jumping out of bed and quickly dressing, we rushed out to find ourselves bombarded with balloons.

 
We learned later that this was an unscheduled ascension to give rides to the volunteers. It seemed that a large number of them were coming down in the field right in front of us.

That's our motorhome in the foreground

That meant that they were coming in low.

In fact, one of them scraped the roof of a fifth-wheel parked behind us, damaging the air conditioner cover.

Then came very close to our rig.














It was beginning to get personal.

One came down in the street at the end of our row. A bunch of us rushed over to help. He needed extra weight to hold it down. Then he lifted it a couple of inches off the ground so that we could pull the basket a little more to one side. Deflating the shroud wasn't all that easy, the hot air doesn't want to come out sideways.

Then the wind shifted and the remaining balloons sailed off in a different direction.

It was certainly an exciting way to end the Balloon Fiesta for us. We won't be able to top that, so I don't think I'll try. For the rest of the trip, I'll try putting up pictures on Facebook every few days. Folks can follow us that way. So for now, "Good night and good luck."