Magician in Albuquerque

Albuquerque is a flight from Milwaukee. There is no sensible way to make it a drive, so travel is either built into the package or itemised on your quote, agreed before anything is booked, and the date gets locked along with the flight.

It is a market with a particular mix: national-lab and defense people, a large university, a film and television industry that arrived in force, and a resort-casino circuit north and south of town running an events calendar of its own. Rooms range from convention-centre ballrooms to Old Town courtyards.

What gets booked in Albuquerque

Sandia National Laboratories and Kirtland Air Force Base anchor the professional audience, and Intel's fab up in Rio Rancho adds an engineering crowd on top of it. That means a lot of technically minded rooms, which suits mentalism — people who want to work out how it happened pay closer attention than people who do not.

The Balloon Fiesta owns the first half of October. Hotels sell out, companies build client hospitality around it, and anything else scheduled in those two weeks competes for the same rooms and staff. Conference work otherwise clusters in spring and late autumn, once the heat has gone.

Getting there

A fly-in date from Milwaukee. Flights and time on the ground are either built into the package or shown as a separate line on your quote, agreed before anything is booked — never added afterwards.

Also covered nearby: Rio Rancho, Corrales, Bernalillo, Los Lunas, Placitas, Tijeras.