New Mexico Family Vacation

Saturday morning we went down to Intel and caught the park and ride to the balloon field. We left at about 5:30 am and it was already packed by the time we got down there. We took quite a few pictures, but I thought I would spare you and just choose the best ones...

While at the balloon fiesta we saw the Darth Vader balloon and made our way over to it. The balloon was surrounded by Star Wars characters in costume. I really wanted a picture of us with the sandperson and when Braxton saw him he freaked. It was a scary costume, but when Braxton reacted the way he did all I could do was laugh. If I was 2 I would be scared too. The actor lifted his mask to show Braxton he was ok. I think he did it because Braxton made him feel really bad.

Late that morning we came back to grandma and grandpa's to watch conference. We saw some and because of the early wake up slept through much more of it. What we did see we really enjoyed. Thank goodness for the internet so I can go back and see what I missed. Sunday was a fun day too. We got up and headed North to Los Alamos to see Julie and visit Bandelier State Park. It is what is left of where the Indians used to dwell in the rocks many years ago. It was really fun. The best part was going up ALL the ladders into the ceremonial caves. On the way home we took the back way through the mountains and saw some nice country. Along the way we saw deer (one with antlers) and a wolf as well. I even had my dad stop to take my family pictures where there was nice foliage. I did catch some of those conference talks a couple of days later.

Monday was the trip to the ice cave and fire land. It's called that because about 10,000 years ago a volcano erupted. Part of the lava formation created the perfect atmosphere in a cave for ice to form. It was kind of cool. Unfortunately it wasn't quite as exciting as I had hoped, but made for an interesting field trip.

We are finally to the end of this super long post. There were so many pictures to go through it took ALL day. It may seem you've seen them all, but this is the condensed version. Tuesday the last day we were there we got out in the morning a did a little balloon chasing as they started to land around the area where my parents live. That afternoon we went souvenir shopping in Old Town Albuquerque. Finally there are a few pictures from our drive home.

So after all the work to bring you this post picture trail (the web slide shows) ran out of free space so I had to switch to photo bucket. I don't know if it will work since it seems to have trouble loading. It looks like if you click on 'view all images' it will work...that is if you are still patient enough to be looking. It was a very fun trip and there are A LOT of pictures. I hope you do enjoy some of it.