A balloon slowly descends near Peavine Mountain above the University of Nevada, Reno’s “N" on Sept. 8, 2022.
Photo by Jessica Garcia.
Jackets weren’t required during the early morning hours Thursday of the Great Reno Balloon Race Preview Day. As StarLite pilot Peggy Watson-Meinke of Santa Paula, Calif., launched her balloon after 8 a.m., she was already feeling the heat on the ground and worried it would be too warm to stay in the air long.
It didn’t stop her from going up anyway, but she continually tracked where her balloon moved, the altitude she was reaching and the temperature she was reaching. She had to since she preferred not to land north of McCarran Boulevard near the Bonanza Casino if she could help it.
“(I like) the scenery, the beauty, the people,” she said about Reno. “We like the glows and the dueling banjos. That’s pretty unique to this event.”
The 41st annual Great Reno Balloon Race started Friday and continues through Sunday at Rancho San Rafael Regional Park in Reno, bringing between 40 to 45 balloons for the daily mass ascension. The schedule still offers its traditional Super Glow Show, Dawn Patrol, Paint the Park Pink and Donor Awareness Day. Spectators remain drawn to seeing the balloons in the sky inside or out of the area or enjoy participating in activities throughout the day.
Reno’s festival holds many special memories for StarLite crewmember Misti Martin, who has been in ballooning since she was 15.
“I’ve flown every one of (these events) but one,” she said. “I first came up here ballooning (in Reno) and knew that it was someplace that would always be super special in Nevada, right, and my dad decided that on his 80th birthday it was his best ride and his freest moment he ever had.”
Martin said about 15 years ago, he died in January, it was her father’s wish that when he passed, he wanted his ashes scattered around Peavine Mountain, which shows the letter “N” for the University of Nevada, Reno. Her family had put his ashes in a wine bottle on a bar until September for the event, and they flew above the mountain especially for the occasion to honor him.
“Daddy’s up here, and I see him when we leave every day,” she said. “He’s smiling on us.”
Watson-Meinke and her crew prepared for Reno’s morning glow event Thursday and waited for the area’s temperature to cool during the weekend, and then they would head out to Albuquerque in October, she said.
Festivals continue to become more selective about which pilots and crews are allowed to enter as time goes on, Watson-Meinke said.
“This one (Reno) is hard to get into,” she said.
Veteran board member Pilar Aldecoaotalora, serving for 32 years, said the festival this year for the first time offers its Dawn Patrol all three days, and signs now allow to identify where to find the pilots, crews and balloons with greater ease.
“Before, we had to worry about the crowds and who goes where,” she said.
But in spite of all the work it takes, Watson-Meinke and her crew agree they’ll keep on traveling and flying as much as they can, haze or snow.
“She’s the best,” Kathy O’Connor, another crewmember, said. “We’ve been everywhere, and every trip is an adventure. Peggy’s a great pilot. She’s been a client forever. She’s been in Germany, and that’s been an adventure. … We have all the fun and we laugh. We’re a family.”
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