John Grier didn’t attend his first balloon event until 2008, when his mom bought him a train ticket to travel from Wisconsin to New Mexico to see the widely popular Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque. He enjoyed that experience so much that he not only attended more balloon events, but he also became involved in crewing for balloon pilots. Grier, who’s been living in Scottsbluff since 2009, is now in his 12th year of crewing, and he looks forward to crewing again in this year’s Old West Balloon Fest, an event he helped re-inflate in the valley in 2015.
JEFF FIELDER Editor
SCOTTSBLUFF – Back in 2008, when John Grier was living in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, he received a memorable birthday gift from his mother.
It was a round-trip train ticket from Milwaukee to Albuquerque, New Mexico, so he could attend the annual Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, one of the largest ballooning events in the world. Grier’s mother had been living in Albuquerque for many years, so she attended many of the Balloon Fiestas herself. But she wanted her son to see the event, too, at least once in his lifetime.
“I was really excited about it,” he said. “I had never been to a balloon event before, but it’s something I had been wanting to do.”
You can read the entire story in the August 2022 issue of Nspire Today! magazine. A one-year subscription (12 issues) is only $20. You may sign up for a subscription by sending $20 to Nspire Today!, P.O. Box 454, Scottsbluff, NE 69363, or you may pay with a credit card by calling 308-220-8865.
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