Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Quechee Hot Air Balloon festival

I had heard of Hot Air Balloon festivals (HABF) around the New England area and was curious to see how they would be.
After some searching on the net, I found a few promising links and marked my Calendar to remind me of the various events.
The first HABF of the season was in Quechee, Vermont.
I had seen some pics from there of the HABF as well as the Gorge-ous Quechee Gorge.
After making some tentative plans, it turned out that the same weekend some friends were heading out to Martha's Vineyard.
That posed a conundrum as I was not sure what to do.
After much dilly-dallying, decided it was Sat in MVY and Sunday in Quechee.
That didnt go according to plan and unfortunately or fortunately, we headed back from MVY by noon of Saturday.
Headed directly to Vermont and reached there early evening to find the place under dark clouds and intermittent rains.
That was a mixed blessing too.
Because of the weather conditions, it was not great for Ballooning, but it did mean that the already green hillside of Vermont was looking even more Lush and fog and mist enveloped the countryside making it magical.

Headed out early on Sunday morning to catch the Balloon festival and the weather delayed the start.
It finally took off by around 7-ish and it was a sight to behold.
Colorful balloons dotted the hillside and skies and brightened a gloomy morning.
Of course it was not ideal conditions for photography, but we had a great time.
The good thing about HABF is tha they get over pretty early in the day and you have the rest of the day to explore the surrounding regions, in my case, the beautiful farms of Vermont.
I was lucky to see the famous Jenne Farm, Cloudland farm, Lee Farms, Grandma Moses scene all under the magical veil of fog that enhanced the experience a 100 times.
Pics from there soon.

Coming back to HABF, if you liked what you saw in the pics and are curious to visit such an event, there are quite a few around here.
See below for the list that I know of.

1) July 11-13 - Hillsborough HABF, NH
2) July 11-13 - Stoweflake HABF, Stowe, NH
3) July 17-19 - Green River HABF, Greenfield, MA
4) Aug 1-3 - Pittsfield HABF, Pittsfield, NH
5) Aug 15-17 - Great Falls HABF, Great Falls, ME
6) Sept 18-21 - Adirondack HABF, Adirondack, NY

If you need more information, search for these items, else you can contact me and I could share the url's for these events.









1 Comments:

At 1:06 AM, Blogger Unknown said...

Too bad it was overcast, but a very nice job anyway, and it looks like you found that waterfall I pointed out!
8-)

 

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