One of the experiences many RVers are hoping to enjoy is the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. Held every October in Albuquerque, New Mexico, this event brings together many hundreds of hot air balloons for a 10-day gathering involving daily takeoffs and many exhibitions. It’s a huge event. [This year it took place Oct. 4–12.]
In fact, this is the third time I’ve done it, and I have a great tip if you want to get in—but also a heads-up.
Why you will enjoy the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta
If you have a spot in the RV park at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta, you have a nearly front-row seat to the action. Oftentimes the balloons take off from the adjacent field and land right in a large open section of the RV park called the box.
There are shuttle buses that start very early in the morning to take you to the actual Balloon Fiesta, and that’s where everything starts. Describing being on the field while many hundreds of hot air balloons inflate and launch is about as effective as describing a visit to the Grand Canyon or the Redwoods. Yeah, yeah, it’s a big hole in the ground or a lot of big trees. But the only way to actually experience how incredible these things are is to do so firsthand. Photos, words, or even videos won’t do them justice.
There are the early morning mass ascensions (weather permitting), where many hundreds of balloons launch in waves. There are traditional balloons and unique shapes. My personal favorite is Airabelle the cow, which is a huge hot air cow from the local dairy cooperative.
There are also evening “glows,” where the balloons light off their burners but don’t take to the sky.
Both the morning and evening events have included a drone show in the past few years. I personally marvel at these. I like them better than fireworks shows, and they continually get better.
There are also a ton of food vendors as well as other vendors—so prepare to come hungry and take home souvenirs. None of this is bargain-basement priced, but you’re in a special event with thousands of other people. Have a burrito with New Mexico chile on it, and try some other local items. Your soul will be richer even if your bank account is a bit less so.
Why you will not enjoy the experience
Camping at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta is, for the most part, dry camping with zero hookups. There are some tour groups such as Fantasy RV Tours that offer power through huge diesel generators. If you’re a VIP, there are some options. But most of us camp with no services.
The conditions are also quite crowded as you’re there for the balloons mostly. Essentially, the main camping area is a former garbage dump and the surface has some sections that are rather sloped. We saw a few rigs that compensated in some interesting ways, including a diesel pusher with the back wheels lifted completely off the ground.
There is a water service and a pump-out service available. I use my Wolverine bags to just replenish the water supply in our trailer—but I’m used to boondocking.
But, in a world of off-grid campers, most people figure out the stinkiest, noisiest ways to generate power possible, including a few open-frame generators. Yuck. As someone with a solar and lithium system sufficient to run my air conditioner (I installed the Furrion Chill Cube), these generators are particularly annoying.
The stench during the day from generators is overwhelming, to me.
I know a number of people who were camping who had comparable solar and lithium systems to my own. I would love to see the Balloon Fiesta somehow figure out a section of the field where those of us not living in the past can camp in peace without the pollution.
Also, two of the three times I’ve been to the Balloon Fiesta the neighbors were an issue—with this one being the worst.
There seems to be almost no enforcement of “quiet hours,” even though it’s stated on the rules. Our neighbors were having such loud conversations into the night that I finally just left at midnight rather than confront a bunch of drunk people solving the world’s problems late at night.
Being a former dump site, there are rules about camp fires and having generators too close to the ground. But, as I walked around the RVs, I saw two campfires going. Apparently these people didn’t realize that the methane produced in an old garbage dump is quite flammable.
A great way to participate
If you’re interested in this experience, there are a number of ways you can participate. Of course, you could be one of the many thousands of people who try to get an RV camping spot the day they release them to the public. That means having a very, very fast internet connection and several computers trying to get into the reservations system at once.
Or, you could join a tour group like Fantasy RV Tours, which has quite the elaborate setup. What else are you going to do with those lottery winnings?
But the way I found what works well is to volunteer through Escapees to crew a balloon. You still have to buy your camping spot, but Escapees reserves a bunch of them for balloon crew. Therefore, it’s not the challenge of fighting tens of thousands of others for a spot at the same time.
This gives you a front-row seat, as you’re assigned to a balloon crew to help them launch and land balloons throughout the Fiesta. The good side of this is that you’re there at each launch and the event your assigned pilot chooses to participate in.
The challenge is you’re getting up very early and working. By working, I mean you’re holding ropes, helping to keep onlookers from injuring themselves tripping on your ropes, running very loud fans that inflate the balloon and then chasing the balloon around the city and trying to be there when it lands.
My job was to assist in the launch and then drive the chase vehicle, where we followed the balloon in the sky. We then helped pack it into a trailer when and wherever it landed. I was particularly qualified for this since I’m a champ at backing a trailer.
Lifting, pulling, and other things are going on, so you should be in reasonably good shape to be ground crew. And you should like very early mornings. I’m fat and lazy but I was able to pull it off… and I love mornings.
There are also volunteer opportunities with the organization itself, and volunteers are the life blood of these events. But there is also a vetting process and plenty of volunteers do so year after year.
This is not a universal experience as some of the balloons are sponsored. But our balloon was not, and every member of the crew who wanted to got to go for a ride. In fact, here’s a video of my bride and one other member of our crew flying high.
A few more thoughts
The frustration of inconsiderate people in the RV space is a big bummer. But I also reached out to the Balloon Fiesta people about simply enforcing their own rules. I know many of the people in the RV area are volunteers. But a nightly round with a team reminding people of the rules would go a long way to making the situation better.
I would also like to see a section of the RV space for those with significant solar and lithium systems so we don’t have to endure others’ love of vintage generators. Bleh. I hate those things.
You could also avoid the RV experience altogether (but, come on, this is RVtravel.com so why would you want to do that?) and stay in one of the local hotels. There are buses from parking areas around, and you could go that route.
As for RVers, there are a lot of filling stations and other locations where you can dump your tanks, plus there is a pump-out service right on the field.
Would I do it again? Maybe. And that answer would change if I could camp away from people and their generators. Have I mentioned that I hate those things? I do. And then with so many of them, the stench is overwhelming to me.
I know a lot of people are going to comment about this and I look forward to that. I’m lucky in that my home base is only about a half an hour from Balloon Fiesta Park. I just went home at night, making camping there a silly expense. But our friends stayed, as did my wife, who can sleep through me dreaming about which RV to review next.
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RVT1230
So appreciate the tips…but, NO THANK YOU! At least not with a camper.
great post
Thanks for the insight into the Balloon Festival, It is on my bucket list.
I am sitting in the Balloon Fiesta at the moment as a Navagator (festival volunteer). Each parking lot is managed by a volunteer team with limited authority to kick those scofflaws out of the area, we do a pretty darned good job. Remember, this is not advertised as a wilderness camping event. It is a Fiesta, more like a carnival atmosphere. Most of the 1000 people that came through our site enjoyed the event even though the weather did not cooperate at the end. Many said this was definitely one of thier bucket list events.
Yes if you don’t like people, stay home and plug in your electric thingie.
I still think the Fiesta could make an attempt at actually enforcing their own rules – I would imagine if one of those campfires had ignited a pocket of methane the lawsuits would be more expensive to defend than hiring some off-duty ABQ peace officers to just drive around at 10 and tell people to pretend they’re adults.
Also an ever-increasing number of RVs are available with significant solar and lithium systems so this is how things are trending.
Decided to go on short notice but couldn’t get an RV reservation nearby so found one in Santa Fe. Got up early and drove to a mall parking lot, where buses were available to take you to the festival. Much better than driving as the buses by-passed the cars and took you straight to the entrance. Returning once again no traffic to deal with as you by-passed the cars. Then it was a 45 minuete drive back to Santa Fe for the night at a nice RV park. Worth the drive. And the balloon fest, very much a must-see.
Sounds way better. Thanks for the idea for next year.
If you’re still in Santa Fe and have some time things I love there include Kakawa Chocolate House and, if you’re into beer, definitely visit Santa Fe Brewing.
You’re right about the shuttles from the local mall and such – those buses have an express pass to get in and you bypass much of the traffic and frustration.
Thank you. That’s exactly what we will do.
Tony, not all of us can justify the HUGE expense of adding enough solar equipment to power our coach plus the air conditioner! You may have went a little overboard on your slams to us peons that find a way to enjoy our RVs! I agree, they need to find a separate parking area for you snobs!
My recommendation is to go the Navigator route. You get a free camping spot for the week, you are guaranteed to be present for all launches, and you have a designated area for camping. (much quieter!) There are enough different volunteer opportunities that everyone can find something they like. I worked the drone show and was released before every morning balloon launch.
I realize that I am very fortunate in how I’ve configured my camper and we use the living heck out of it for a lot of off-grid camping.
I just wish they would offer an opportunity for those of us who have solar systems like this to camp in a section. Many of my friends whom I camp with have equally capable systems including my friends whom I camped with at Balloon Fiesta. This holds true for other gatherings including FRVA, Escapees and others.
We stayed in an RV park 2 miles from the Fiesta grounds. Pricey, at $175/night, but we were able to cycle into park for the glow and evening festivities, and get up at 6:45 in AM to watch ascension from our spot ( even better with coffee on roof). No noisy neighbors, no generators, and FHU. The box effect kept balloons passing back and forth over us for 2 hours.
Thanks for the heads up. The balloon Fiesta is on my bucket list, but after reading your report I’m going to find a full hookup park, and we will drive to the festival grounds to watch.
As others have written, the hot tip is to find one of the ride sharing buses which leave from local places like the Coronado mall. Those buses have express passes into the facilities and that way you don’t have the parking hassles.
Have attended the ABF 6 times. Each one was a different experience (from the point of RVING/BOONDOCKING). However, the over all ballooning experience was so much fun and visual exciting, including the evening GLOW and fireworks show, like non-other, that we enjoyed all 6 stays. Are their “RV JERKS” their – sure. Anytime you have that many RVers, you always have “A-Holes.” But that should not deter you from attending. However, if you are one of those RVers that everything has to be “perfect” in order to enjoy yourself, stay away.
Absolutely accurate and point well taken.
The “Albuquerque Box” you referred to is NOT a place but a set of air currents that take balloons one way down low and the opposite way higher up. It doesn’t always occur. Some who may have succeeded in “boxing” might land in the field you referenced and mention the box. Thus making a box shape. I have flown there several times so…..
I’m aware of the box as the unique air currents here but I thought they also referred to the large open area on the field in the RV park as the box – the ticket I bought reads, “box view” and we were supposed to park right on the outside edge of that space. I believe our tickets were an upgraded location but what do I know – my wife told me where and when to be and I just tow the rig around and make sure not to crash 😆
Hot air balloon and 2 meter HT. Almost heaven.
One other thing deserves a mention. There is a large amount of “goat head” stickers in the dry camping area. If you bring a dog you probably ought to plan on having them wear booties while outdoors. We also wore soft sole sneakers the first day or so and a large number of the stickers would be embedded into the soles of the shoes (which you could track into the camper). We swapped over to hiking boots for the remainder of the Fiesta; the harder soles were less prone to be a pincushion of stickers. If you stick yourself with these they really hurt. One person in my group had an ATV and he ended up with a punctured tire from them.
Thanks for sharing your experience Tony. We also boondock by default and enjoy our robust LifePo4 and solar setup but you have one on me. I’ve never camped on a landfill and (looking through my notes) it doesn’t appear on my bucket list so props to ya!
We just left ABQ on Sunday. I totally agree with the generator vs. solar situation. One of our rotating cast of neighbors put his pair of generators in his pickup’s bed which was parked at an angle so the noisy end of things was aimed directly at the back of my rig. Then again, I’m an anticampfire person that would LOVE a non-fire area in campgrounds.