Up, Up and Away - Boulder, Colorado

Hot Air Balloon Ride in Boulder, COWe recently received an offer we couldn’t pass up when Gary, a friend of Matt's, called to ask if we'd like to “catch a lift” in his hot air balloon. 

Early in the morning with coffees in-hand, we headed towards a vast field near Boulder, Colorado where several people were staging their balloons.  We found Gary and his lovely wife Rachel, said our good mornings, and quickly got to work preparing for launch.

In about 30 minutes, we were ready for takeoff.  We climbed into the basket with Gary and up, up and away we went over fields, homes, and ponds.  The weather was clear and lovely, providing an incredible, panoramic bird's eye view. 

While floating in for our landing, we were fortunate to spot two playful coyotes.  Rachel, who was in hot pursuit with the SUV and trailer, arrived a few moments after we touched down.  We packed up the balloon, drove back to the original launch site and opened a celebratory bottle of New Zealand champagne. 

Thanks to Gary and Rachel, we were able to check off one more item from our bucket list.

WHERE WOULD YOU GO?

Today, Matt's high school French teacher (Hello Mme Brubaker!) asked for more information about our plans.  Since a picture is worth a thousand words, we will keep this post brief and let the above graphic do the talking.

We have not created a set agenda for our adventures.  Our approach is to remain flexible and avoid over-planning in an attempt to retain a reasonable level of spontaneity.  Have you ever wanted to go to a train station or airport and choose an unfamiliar destination from the departures board?  We hope to do that on this trip.

Now that you have an idea of the general geographic regions we intend to visit, please comment and let us know if there are "must see" sites, cities or experiences that we should pencil into our informal itinerary!