Sky High and Sky City

Tuesday, October 4, 2016

Tuesday was another day with lots of new experiences!   The weather was a bit “iffy” this morning, and the dawn patrol did not launch.  We got to see the weather monitors in the pilot club which showed the low altitude winds were fine, but if you got higher, it would take you toward the airport, (which is a problem—the airport is a “no fly” zone.)  It’s amazing how much monitoring goes on.  During the “hold”, our favorite pilot Dave, was interviewed by the local news.  It’s so much fun to be in the middle of the action.  Everything was on hold for awhile, but when the sun came up and the wind died down, the green flag finally came out and the balloons began to take off, including this one, that shared the skies with an airplane!  It was a beautiful sky, and the winds took the balloons right over the rv park, which generated a lot of excitement for everyone.  The pilots “teased” the RV’ers, by flying really close to the top of the rv’s, then turned their burners on, and went back up.  It was like they were trying to find a parking spot among the RV’s. 

  It was fun watching them over the top of the coaches.  It made for some wonderful pictures!  (Note Jim taking a video right in front of our RV.)  Many of the balloons landed in a field right next to the RV park.

Later in the morning, we took a trip to Acoma Pueblo which is one of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in the country, with some areas over 1500 years old!  It is also called “Sky City” since the pueblo sits on top of a mesa 350 ft high.  The families live in adobe dwellings, where there is no electricity or running water.  We were not allowed to take pictures of the people without their permission, but our tour guide let us photograph him.  We were also not allowed to take pictures inside the church or the cemetery because it is sacred ground. The cemetery is actually three layers deep…once it filled up, they covered it up and buried the next layer!   It is so hard to visualize how they were able to get the materials up to the top of the mesa to build these structures so long ago. A road was built in 1969, which made it easier to replenish supplies.  This tribe lives here and continues to observe the customs and traditions of their ancestors to preserve their language and culture.  Many had their artesian crafts (mostly pottery and jewelry) outside their homes as we walked through the village.  Their native language is not written—only spoken.  There is no alphabet.   Most of the tribe can speak English (very well). 

About 8 from our group were willing to walk down the ancient staircase which is a steep path back to the bottom of the mesa to understand the route they had to take to bring the supplies prior to building the road—simply amazing.  But darn it, I forgot my fitbit again!