I will be at the fiesta, staying in ABQ on Oct 7& 8 to ride in a balloon with the mass ascension on the 8th. Bucket list item and it’s one of our stops on a 2 week road trip to drive the original alignments of Route 66 from Amarillo to Santa Monica. Their is only one company allowed to launch from the balloon park amidst the other balloons. Consider this if it’s in your budget
Here is the event schedule. http://www.balloonfiesta.com/event-info/event-schedule
Even though we are staying in ABQ, we will take the park and ride, where we will park elsewhere and ride the shuttle bus to the balloon park.
Events are in the morning and afternoon and you will need a separate ticket to do each session.
Here is park and ride info http://www.balloonfiesta.com/guest-guide/park-ride The Rail Runner has a combo pack to ride the train from Santa Fe and then bus you to the balloon park and back. I believe it was for the two weekends though, so you need to double check. Park and ride isn’t available M, T, W either, I believe.
The menu at the top also has great links for photographing balloons at the various times.
Regardless, it’s hard to go wrong with most New Mexican restaurants in either city.
In Santa Fe-- Tia Sophia’s, Cafe Pasquale, The Pink Adobe, La Choza, Palacio Cafe, The Pantry, El Parasol… so many others
In ABQ, Cocina Azul, El Pinto, El Modelo (take out only, no dining area other than 2 picnic tables in the parking lot, but the tamales are sooo good! Cash only), The Range Cafe (diner food plus the best huevos rancheros in town). Monroes (always reliable and their chile is less hot than some other places). Padillas (tiny, hole-in-the-wall near UNM campus, cash only) Papa Franks. Mary & Titos. Cervantes. And oddly–any Golden Pride fast food drive-in for really good breakfast burritos.
If you get to the Fiesta, think about visiting the Anderson-Abuzzo Balloon Museum.
@WayOutWestMom, thanks for taking the time to share all this. I just read in People magazine today that Mary and Titos is “the best” restaurant in NM. We will likely ty there, unless they have long lines or something.
We are staying in Santa Fe, but will likely drive into Alb twice - once for the very early morning (probably Sat Oct 7th, while we are still on east cost time, and then once for the night session, maybe the day after - Sunday. @Thelma2, we likely will NOT go up in a balloon. When he decided we should go my H made me agree we wouldn’t.
Mary & Tito’s is good, but there are other restaurants that are just as good. Don’t stand it line for it.
If you want something a little different, you might try The Pueblo Harvest Cafe at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center @ 4th St and Indian School RD, NW. Native American cuisine.
The Pueblo Cultural Center is a wonderful living museum plus its gift shop has authentic Native American artwork for sale.
There will be several breakfast burrito stands on the Fiesta’s grounds. I don’t which local restaurants got vendor contracts this year since those aren’t publicly announced, but the burritos are usually pretty good.
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As is usual with the Balloon Fiesta, the weather is the big variable. ABQ has had major thunderstorms almost every night this week and the daytime temperatures have dropped by about 15-20 degrees in the last 7 days. The weather forecast for next weekend isn’t looking great right now. Pack sweaters & rain jackets and be prepared to change your plans at the last minute. If winds are more than 10 mph or there are any thunderstorms nearby, the balloons can’t launch. Always check the weather report before leaving for Fiesta Park.
The Balloon Fiesta was AWESOME. We went this morning before sunrise and it was so worth it. We plan to go for the evening show one day, and we may even go back to the morning show again.
Santa Fe has been fun so far, but we’ve only been here one entire day.
Our trip to Santa Fe was great. We hiked just about every day, and had lots of good food and plenty of margaritas. We liked it so much went to the Balloon Fiesta twice. We hiked Bandalier (including climbing up something like 6 staircases to get to one place which pushed our comfort zone), and drove out past there to the Caldera (for some reason my husband was fascinated with the caldera). We hiked Abiquiu Ghost Ranch (my favorite -including Kitchen Mesa hike, which is in my top 10 hikes ever), the Aspen Ridge trail (we were a little late for prime leaves, but it was still very pretty), and many of the Dale Ball trails (great system of trails that intersect so you can hike for as little or as long as you’d like). We hit the plaza multiple times, and walked Canyon road once very early in the morning, and again when we could go into several of the shops.
The weather really was spectacular. If it wasn’t, we would have hit museums and other indoor activities, but we spent every day doing something outside.
Thanks again for all the advice.