Hot Air Balloon Festival!

The nearby town of Gretna has an annual Hot Air Balloon festival. I'd heard of it, but usually after the fact. This year, Lakey gave us a heads up opening day and Jason, Julia, Mom and I were able to head up the next night.

The weather was a bit rainy so we didn't actually get to see a launch.. but we still made do and had a good time and by the end of the evening, found ourselves a pleasant surprise!

Jules got to ride a pony.

We got to watch the pilots light their flames sans balloons.

Jason, Jules and I got our first family portrait of the summer!

I got a few decent shots of the balloons as they lit up.

.. and some not so good shots!

There is a red and white one all the way in the back on the right that they were

filling up as we left. Honestly, we didn't think we'd get to see any of them filled.

The weather was bad enough they didn't do the launches and for quite a while,

the pilots weren't doing anything but blowing the propane- one nice pilot even let observers pull the chord to make the propane flare.. Jules was all for doing this but as she got close to all that fire and heat, it was a bit too much and she decided to just watch!

 Eventually a few brave pilots began to dare the weather and got their pretties up for the 9:00 light up. We were in the car when the two on each end were put up, otherwise I would have been more than happy to get closer shots of them.

Maybe next year!

Have you had any fun adventures like this lately?

Ang