Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta

The Largest Hot Air Balloon Event In The World; Held Over Nine Days In Early October At Balloon Fiesta Park, With Roughly 500 To 600 Balloons And Pilots From Around Twenty Countries · Albuquerque, New Mexico

Albuquerque has held the largest hot air balloon event on earth every October since 1972, and it is the rare festival that genuinely deserves the superlative: roughly 500 to 600 balloons, pilots from about twenty countries, and a 78-acre launch field that visitors are allowed to walk straight onto while the envelopes are being inflated around them. The reason it happens here is a piece of local meteorology called the Albuquerque Box, a winter wind pattern in the Rio Grande valley where surface air moves south and air a few hundred feet up moves north, so a pilot can climb, drift back, descend and land near where they started. The set pieces are the mass ascensions on the weekend mornings, when hundreds launch in waves against the Sandia Mountains, the special shape rodeo, and the evening glows when the balloons stay tethered and fire their burners in sequence after dark. It runs for nine days beginning the first Saturday of October and for the rest of the year the field is an empty park, which is the one thing to understand before booking a trip around it.

5000 Balloon Fiesta Parkway NE, Albuquerque, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87113, United States

The Fiesta runs for nine days starting the first Saturday of October, with dates confirmed a year ahead. Gates open in the dark, around 4:30 to 5:00am, for the morning sessions; mass ascensions launch after dawn and are finished by mid-morning. Evening sessions with the balloon glows start late afternoon and run into the night. Every session can be cancelled or shortened for wind or rain, usually decided at the field within the hour.

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