Since we have family that lives somewhat close to us and family that lives in another state we find our family traveling every other year for at least Christmas time to the other state. While we travel every year a couple of hours to have Christmas dinner with one side of our family, the other years we find that we have to take the time to travel two days down and then two days back. It is always a fun time traveling, but sometimes we find things to do together once we are there.
This year it was time for travel to the other state to visit with the family we don’t get to see as often. The travel days were not too bad this year even with a one year old. We were surprised that he did as well as he did and did not freak out as much as we thought he would.
Since this year we came down to Albuquerque, New Mexico we wanted to go and visit areas of light displays that we would visit when we lived here.
This year we learned of a tradition that we had not heard of before even when we lived here. We all went to a golf course not far from where we were staying and they had some of the local hot air balloons set up and do what they call a balloon glow.
So I feel like a lot of people may not know what a balloon glow is, so I will try to explain. So the hot air balloons are inflated and they light their burners. It is a magical thing and I feel that if you have a chance to see one then you should.
Well apparently this has been going on for years, but we never heard of it before. They set this up every year for Christmas Eve, so while our dinner was heating up we packed all the children into the cars and headed down to the golf
Everyone thought that we were going to be able to drive onto the golf course and be right next to the balloons as they were glowing, but they thought we were just allowed to drive through. It turned out that we were able to walk around next to the balloons as the burners were lit. I feel that it was an amazing experience and I am glad that we all decided to just hop in the cars and head down there to see it. I will share some of the photos I was able to take all the while carrying my youngest around.
I do feel that the pictures, of course, do not do justice to experiencing a balloon glow for oneself so I say if you have an opportunity to see it you should take it. Christmas Eve is not the only time they have balloon glows in Albuquerque. They have them a few nights for about two weeks during the event of the International Balloon Fiesta. I have been to this event a few times in my life when I lived in Albuquerque. There are other Balloon events around the nation, but this one brings people in from all over the world and truthfully was the first one that I had heard about.
Spending time with family looking at the balloons was a great time. Afterwards we returned and had some dinner and then again loaded into the cars and went to look at some Christmas lights around town. We were saddened to hear that one of our favorite places to look at lights no longer had the lights like they used to. When we lived here there were a lot of houses on one street that would decorate each year and we would drive down and walk the street, but that was no longer possible. We were able to see some, and had a good time as a family.
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