Page 1 of 1

2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 26th, 2017, 12:54 pm
by Skillet
Last weekend I went to my first balloonfest. Apparently there are a couple on the East Coast and this one was timed right for my days off. It's a 2 1/2 day event and I went on the half day of Friday and stayed all day Saturday. It was hot during the day but nice and cool at night. I stayed at a winery which was really nice and quiet. My bucket list goal is to see the Albuquerque event, since it's the world's largest, but that'll have to wait until I retire. It's a neat thing to see and I highly recommend you see one somewhere at least once.

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 26th, 2017, 12:57 pm
by Skillet
Here's a few more. I took a ton so these are just the highlights.

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 27th, 2017, 8:39 am
by Kirah
Very neat. That crab balloon cracks me up :lol:

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 27th, 2017, 10:08 am
by Skillet
Not a lot of unusual-shaped ones, but here's the largest balloon that was there (the dog). And another view of the crab and dog...

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 27th, 2017, 4:46 pm
by Blue~Go
Looks fun. I haven't been to a balloon festival during the day, but I just happened to hit an evening "glow" event in northern Arizona and it was really cool! (ABQ was a couple of weeks later, so they were all probably on the way there.)

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: October 27th, 2017, 9:22 pm
by chin_k
I bet if they use hydrogen, these balloons will be lighter, and be able to fly much higher and faster.... ;)

Seriously, the pictures are awesome! So colorful. I think the closest one around here is in Temecula. Maybe I will go check one out if the schedule works.

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: December 7th, 2017, 4:36 pm
by OldDragon
Great pictures. I lived in NC for 10 years. didn't know there was a ballonfest.

Re: 2017 North Carolina BalloonFest

Posted: December 8th, 2017, 11:54 am
by Skillet
What's neat, and I don't know how many fests these happen at, but apparently there's an international competition that's scored like NASCAR (they said). A huge grid is placed on the ground and between certain hours of the morning the competitors fly over and drop weights with streamers attached. Certain grids are worth so many points. Some guys were so good they'd come over the horizon and hover just feet off the ground to drop their streamers. If you touch the ground you're disqualified. The ones that cut it close and were minutes from the closing time sailed over at incredible speeds and dropped them from very high. One guy came over from Japan (didn't float over) to compete and the crowd gave him a great cheer when the announcer said who he was. What's so neat is how quiet everything is. Except for the sounds of the jet of hot air blasts, it's so peaceful and nice to watch them all go by.