10-3-09 Balloon Fiesta, Albuquerque, NM

5:30 AM we should've been part of the dawn patrol, who would've thought we'd be up at the butt crack of dawn with these crazy crazy people on a Saturday morning to boot! But man oh man the crowds are out and all these balloons! The weather is supposed to be beautiful, but you can't prove it by me- of course I brought, hat, gloves, scarf & extra heavy jacket & sweat shirts but when we leave the camper the sun is shining and we think....it's not too bad, we'll be fine with just the sweatshirt and a couple layers of clothes-WRONG!!!! Just wait till we get to the open field and the wind picks up just a tad bit-you'd think you were in the Antarctic, so of course within an hour or two my back starts to spasm & I go glove and scarf hunting because it goes straight into my neck and by 8 AM I'm in total pain :o( not a happy camper to say the least.....found a pair of adorable gloves with little hot air balloons on them ($5) what a deal & then I go into one of the vendor tents and guess what? There is a masseuse....I'm in heaven :o) So I get a "mini" massage for half an hour-then we decide to bag it and head back to the camper where I spread out on the heating pad for a while until it starts to get better & later in the afternoon we get the shuttle back and watch the evening glow-which in itself is a site to see :o) Yes, indeedy I am happy again! I'll put some more of those pics up for you to see...

Tomorrow we have to take the suburban in for some work (oil change etc) so we'll just watch from our campground & then head out I believe

yahoo, finally Albuquerque 10-2-09

what a zoo of a town! I never expected such a metropolis as this, roads every which way and their grid system truly is the worse I have ever seen-the roads make no sense and even the east west and south north seem to go the wrong way but who are we to complain-we're the foreigners, lol-except the one night we hit Olive Garden for dinner and guess what? The wait staff even agreed with us, lol-so how's that for a screwed up town....but other than that it is pretty neat to finally be here & balloons, OMG are there balloons-everywhere you look you see them & people with balloon logo's on them and their cars & hats and shirts & selling stuff....it is definitely the balloon capital of the world!

The day we arrive we have time to do some sightseeing -so we decide to do the Sandia Tram, which we had heard about and supposedly is the longest in the USA but we decide it isn't because we had gone on the one in Palm Springs with my neice Katherine & Tim and that was much better, higher and longer (prettier pictures too) Anyway, it costs about $17.50 each and the temp up there was rapidly dropping (43 degrees when we started the wait & 32 degrees by the time it was our turn) so we get crammed into this tram car & head on up the side of this mountain as the sun is rapidly setting and the heat is rapidly dropping, by the time we get to the top of the mountain - I am literally frozen to the bone (and I have sandals on) but I have my sweatshirt & long sleeve shirt on and so does Joe because they warn you about the temp up top....Well when we see the look on the people that are literally dying to get on our car as we get off at the mountaintop and down the hill -I said to Joe "I'm not getting off this car, just move to the other side and make like we're getting on with these people-no way I'm standing out in that frigid weather and waiting for the next car like they did" and sweetheart of a hubby that I have just looked at me dumbfounded and did what I said & moved forward with me, lol-but we stayed semi warm and rode on down that mountain with those frozen people, lol. He still thinks we missed out on some "pictures" but guess what I don't give a rat's ass!

couple pics from first day of balloon fiesta- dawn patrol goes up a little before 6 AM-we're up at 4:30 to get there by 5:30-man oh man are we nuts or what & it is friggin cold

Vegas pics-back up a few days

left photo is taco night at my sister Sue's and poor thing missed out because she had to work :o( but she was nice enough to cook for everyone because Angela's boyfriend, Enrique and her room mate David flew in from New Jersey that afternoon (actually moved to Vegas that day) and we celebrated her birthday and Enrique's birthday that night! Happy Birthday you two and also a late one to David, Samantha & Lexie-since we just missed theirs as well :o)

Middle pic is my sister Carol and my godchild Lexie & top right is Samantha and her "friend" Nick or should I say "boy" friend? hmmmm She posted it on Facebook so I imagine it's OK that I post it here, since I took it, lol

Holbrook, Arizona October 1, 2009

Pass Hoover Dam on our way Plus this time the security check point was a real fiasco compared to the last time.....

On our way to the largest Balloon Fiesta in the entire world in Albuquerque, New Mexico.....kind of like a double edged sword....upset about leaving my daughter but totally thrilled to be going to NM! I can't tell you how long I've had this on my "Bucket List" but to finally be doing it is really thrilling. I said to Joe last night-he's doing his dream-driving across country (at least some of the states-hopefully we can finish it next year) and I'm getting to the Balloon Fiesta :o) how cool is that! The only other thing I hope to be able to accomplish is to get to Venice and Italy....but I don't think it will be with my husband-unless I can pull some strings in that department :o( since I don't think my daughter will be doing the trip with me now that she's moved across the world, so I guess I gotta work on my better half (again)

this picture is the new walk way they are building across the hoover dam, what a sight & amazing the way it is being constructed too!

Anyways-we pull into this RV site called OK RV campgrounds and it's in a seedy side of town but let me tell you it is packed, so we figure what the heck, how bad can it be? Well, apparently it is the stop-over for Albuquerque and in the morning when we get up (which is dang early) the place is empty, lol.

We're on the road by about 8 AM and pull into NM about noon, talk about a zoo, OMG-it is a Metropolis that puts Philly to shame-apparently it has a census of about 1.5 mil and climbing steadily everyday and the grid system in this town SUCKS!!!

Left Las Vegas today-Meteor site from 50k yrs ago

Not a happy day for me, so not going to post much tonight....I hate hate hate leaving my sisters and my daughter especially :o( but we won't go there
It's now about 8:30 and we pulled into a little town called Holbrook in Arizona, we're about 230 miles away from Albuquerque! We made one stop today at some Meter/crater place on the way here and actually we stopped at exactly 4:55 because they were closing at 5:30 and we were debating whether or not it would be worth the $30 admission (it wasn't) but I guess now we can say we saw a hole in the ground that was something from another planet (I'll post a pic or two later)
gotta run now

Entering Vegas...51 miles to go

alright I'm taking a break for a couple days...be back when we head out to Albuquerque on the 1st of October...cya all soon
We'll be enjoying time with my daughter, sisters and their families and chillin (maybe win a jackpot and take a couple more weeks off, lol)

Beaver, Utah

this town has a special place in my heart...you see back in May I did this drive with my darling daughter (as some of you know) however, we did it in 4 days straight with one stop 0vernight (for my birthday as a special treat to me cause my ole bones needed a break from being cooped up in her little VW Passat all that time, lol. Anyways, we got to Beaver and no where along the way had any gas station attendant offered to check our fluids, under the hood or tires for that matter & when we pulled off in this god forsaken exit there were two gas stations,one on the left and one on the right-we chose the right for some unknown reason (I swear God was leading us)! WEll, good thing we did because this young fellow not only checked our fluids but happened to see that one of her tires had a bubble and the other one had a split down the side of it and let me tell you the speed limit is 80MPH out here......we would've definitely been KILLED if either tire would've blown out-so trust me when they say God works in mysterious ways!
SOOOOO, yesterday my sister Carol and I talk, as we have been doing regularly along the way and when I tell her where we are and about this Beaver town, she says one of her patients runs a RV park and Mexican restaurant in -yup- you guessed it Beaver! Now, wouldn't that be nice if we could pay back a local for something nice that was done for us back in May......so we push and we push to make it to this little park and I'll post some pics, lol.....because it is definitely not something we would've found -especially since it was way after dark. In fact many a times along the way we were so tired we were ready to just pull off and just camp by the road and finally about 8:15 PM we pull in way off the beaten path (have to admit they gave us good directions tho) The owner even teried to talk us into trying some of his wife's mexican cooking but we were soooo exhausted we didn't unhook, or hook up to anything, just fed the dog, walked him and crashed!
First one is their house (green), second one is the entrance and third is the office :o)