Look up in the sky! Photos from one of the most unique traditions in NJ

This past weekend I went to the New Jersey Lottery Festival of Ballooning, and I was absolutely blown away.

I have always wanted to do the 6 a.m. mass ascension of the hot air balloons, but for the past couple years I was either working the event or I was too busy to go. But this year, I was ready to go, I woke up at 5 a.m. and got dressed and headed to Solberg Airport in Readington, New Jersey.

Once inside the festival, I headed over to the field where the balloons would be flying from. There was a great crowd of people all prepared with their chairs, blankets and way too many cameras to count! Also, the sunrise was absolutely stunning on Saturday morning.

The balloons did get blown up in the morning, with the panda being the first to inflate and the first to be taken down, sadly. It was too windy for the balloons to fly, but many of them still inflated and they were spectacular to see.

I went back later in the evening on Saturday for the 7 p.m. ascension since I didn’t get to see the balloons fly in the morning. The field was packed with people, all anxiously awaiting the balloons take off.

The first balloon to take off was the Wonder Bread balloon and they kept on coming from there.

Watching all of the balloons float off into the distance was one of the most gorgeous sights I’ve ever seen. Here are some of my favorite pictures I took at the festival, they captured a lot of the balloons drifting off and how blue the sky was.

The festival also has so many amazing local vendors, they had so many different things to offer including guitar string jewelry, pottery, vintages clothing, hot air balloon replicas and more. Check out some of the vendors that were there:

The post above reflects the thoughts and observations of New Jersey 101.5's Jordan Jansson. Any opinions expressed are her own.

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