Chevy & GMC Vans

Here's the current Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta pictures. Cherie and I had a great time. We hope you enjoy these.

A lot of great pics!

This one is cool:

Wow, what a cool hobby. I love the character balloons.

Fantastic pics as usual Skip, looks like a great time

Nice pictures Skip.The character balloons,how do they do that??.Do they order them from a company that makes them with their design or made them themselfs??.Sounds like a really dumb question,but how are these balloons made??.Some kind of huge machine that sew the panels together??.I honestly never thought about this before,but now you have my curiosity. :-k

The special shape balloons are computor designed. The fabric panels are sewn together with feld seams on a double needle industrial machine. There's not much magic involved but there is a lot of labor. Some of them can be well over $100,000.

Way too cool, Skip. If the event looks that amazing on my tv screen, it must be incredibly awesome in person.

You're living right, my friend, living right. =D>

Great shots Skip !! Life is great

What is the lift capacity of these craft?

The lift depends on envelop size. Envelope being the round upper fabric part. My "Smilie" is 32,000 cu. ft. and can lift 300 lbs. of passenger weight. Me and Cherie. There's a commercial operator here in Orlando that has two balloons with 315,000 cu. ft. Each of those will carry 18 passengers.

wow after seeing these pics i might have to check out one of these events one day
that cow and smokey are cool