At Friday evening’s Cortez Rendezvous Balloon Rally’s Balloon Glow, hundreds of members of the community came to Parque de Vida to see the balloons and get to know the pilots who fly them.
By 7 p.m., cars lined both sides of North Mildred Road as attendees of all ages set up camping chairs and laid out blanket in preparation of the balloons kicking off the event. Pilots and their crews set up the baskets and prepared the burners to inflate the balloon. Not long later, the balloons were up and glowing against the sunset backdrop.
A balloon sponsored by the Cortez Parks Department and CREA offered free tethered balloon rides with Pagosa Adventures on a first-come, first-served basis.
Pilots handed out trading cards that featured their balloon and people walked to the baskets to ask questions about ballooning. Some waited in a line for s’mores, courtesy of the fire from the burners of the Happy Endings balloon.
Peter Procopio shared about his balloon, the Koshare Gallup. The balloon, which is designed like the Pueblo Indian sacred clown, did not participate in the glow because of the winds. Out of the 21 balloons participating in the weekend’s events, only five or six inflated for the glow.
Procopio, who is from Gallup, told The Journal he has been a pilot for 47 years, and he became interested in flying after he saw a hot-air balloon fly over his house one day.
“One flew over my house and I followed it,” he said, laughing. “Be careful what you follow.”
The design for the balloon came about after a friend designed a crew shirt with the caricature of the Koshare about 23 years ago. After seeing the shirt, the idea to make it into a balloon was born.
Though he is 80 years old, Procopio said he doesn’t plan on stopping any time soon.
“I’ll keep doing it until they take the keys away from grandpa,” he said.
Others discovered their love for ballooning in different ways. Patrick, from Tucson, shared that his first ride in a hot-air balloon was very early in his life.
“My first ride was when I was 18 days old,” he said, adding that his father had been a pilot and his mother also earned her license.
He began learning to fly at 12 or 13 years old, and took his first solo flight at 14 years old.
Glenn See, who has been a pilot for 38 years, learned to pilot a balloon because he’d always wanted to fly.
“I grew up in a family who couldn’t afford to fly in a plane, so I thought, ‘Maybe I could afford to fly in a balloon.’ But it ended up being just as expensive,” See said, laughing.
See, who is from Albuquerque, said his favorite part of flying is sharing the joy with others.
“I love seeing the smiles on people’s faces; seeing the children come up,” he said.
Of course, a hot-air balloon pilot can only do so much without a crew to help them set up and chase the balloon to where it lands. Elsie, a crew member for the Happy Endings balloon under pilot Colin DeGattis, said the crew is like a family.
“The camaraderie (is my favorite). We’ve all been a crew together for 20-30 years,” Elsie said.
Another crew member from Happy Endings told a child waiting for s’mores that DeGattis worked at the post office and ballooning was his hobby on the side.
While waiting for a s’more, The Journal asked DeGattis about his time as a pilot. DeGattis shared that he has been a pilot for three years now, but was a member of the crew starting around 2010.
“I started piloting because our pilot couldn’t do it anymore and I wanted to keep the crew happy,” DeGattis said. “You don’t want an angry crew.”
After receiving one of the last s’mores of the evening, the balloon crews slowly began packing up to the light of their headlights in preparation for the morning’s flight.
On Saturday, Journal photographer Aaron Lewis joined a chase team from Greeley. The chase crew, Robin, Jackie and CJ, followed a balloon flown by their pilot, Kenny Bradley.
“They took off from the park and landed the balloon in a field on the corner of County Road N and Mildred Road,” Lewis said. “Once we got Kenny's rig packed up and put away we went over to help another crew who landed their balloon in Mildred Estates.”
On Sunday, Lewis went up in his father’s plane to follow the balloons and get aerial photos.
“The balloons mainly went southwest on Sunday landing at and around the airport,” Lewis said. “Saturday the majority of balloons went north.”
