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Indy
11-01-09, 10:31 AM
Every year at about this time of the season is held a hot air balloon event in Palo Duro Canyon. I had gone last year, but the winds ended up cancelling the event. Fortunately this year, the winds were much calmer, and they were able to launch the balloons with no issues today.

I ended up shooting close to 400 pictures this morning and got what I think are some pretty good shots in the mix...

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3514/4064066551_1a80602993_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4064066551/)


http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2769/4064022847_dd98de9cd0_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4064022847/)


http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2742/4064015841_8f4bf5529e_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4064015841/)


http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2766/4064009251_4e83785269_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4064009251/)



http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2671/4063998771_38feebaaed_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4063998771/)

This balloon was freakin' huge! One of the crew said it stood at 185 feet tall, making it the tallest hot air balloon in the United States. You can tell by this picture that it just absolutely dwarfs the next balloon to it by a huge margin...
Easto
11-01-09, 10:34 AM
I'd love to go up in one of those someday.
Humboldt
11-01-09, 10:54 AM
Looks like a lot of fun, that shuttle is massive.
Indy
11-01-09, 06:57 PM
A panorama from this morning:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2530/4065950209_174d4236e4_b.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sonicaeronautic/4065950209/)

Click on the image for larger sizes...


I shot this picture from about 150 yards away. I had to use my 18-70 lens, as the 75-300 telephoto couldn't take in all of the shuttle in one frame. The parking lot that they're in, they had to wait until all the other balloons had launched (the one that's left was just there for up and down rides), so they could use almost the space to unfurl the shuttle.
Humboldt
11-01-09, 07:05 PM
That's awesome.

Was the shuttle hot air as well?
Indy
11-01-09, 08:21 PM
That's awesome.

Was the shuttle hot air as well?

Yeah, it was. It took them probably about 40 minutes to get it inflated. The parking lot where they did this stuff would fit 5 to 6 normal size balloons, but they cleared off the entire parking lot minus the one balloon so they could unfurl the shuttle balloon...the thing was just massive.