My Balloon Festival Review...

For all that wanted to know

Ok, so get a $5 coupon if you can! Parking is $10 which is a little pricey. I mean, there is no guy in a suit taking your car and letting you off at the gate

The Monster Trucks were neat, the Motorbike Show was pretty impressive, and the skydivers were AWESOME!

The balloons never went up which was a TOTAL dissapointment. I paid a lot of $$ to see balloons and it didn't happen.

If you go, defintely bring your own chair! People practically fought over chairs in the food tent. If you are lucky to find a chair, don't let go of it.

It was a nice day out so it was worthwhile to go, but kinda not worth $25 + $10 parking not to even see balloons!

Hopefully if you go tomorrow, they will actually go up.

Honestly though - if you are looking to go JUST to see the balloons and are not interested in the rest of it - Pay the $10 to park and just sit in the parking lot. You can see everything just as well from there and not have to pay the $$ for "admission".

It was fun - I got a little sunburn and I am happy

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I just posted my review on the parenting board. Did you stay and see the balloons inflate? Even though they weren't flying, it was still neat to see I thought.

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They inflated about 4 out of 50 and then put them down not too long after they inflated them. I think the wind was too much so nothing happened. It started at 6 and by 7:45 nothing really progressed, so we left. By that time it was turning dark so I didn't theink the balloons would really go up at that point anyway.

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All I know is we went about 7 years ago and will never go back. We spent a lot of money and never got to actually see balloons either. We very disappointed with the whole "festival".

Message edited 8/11/2007 11:03:11 PM.

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That's kinda how I feel. If they do this again another year - would I pay to go back and not see anything AGAIN??

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But they didn't go anywhere right?

I saw a bunch inflated during the day when they did the rides, but I went there to see them GO somewhere...oh well

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Ohhh I gotcha now. I honestly didn't think we were going to see them lift off. I thought they did that in the morning and we would see them come back down later in the day. I kept looking around and didn't see any coming back in and was wondering what happened, but I guess if they never left it makes sense! It was pretty windy though and I think it's dangerous to fly them when it's windy.

I remember growing up in MI and the balloons were always landing in my grandma's backyard. Many of them veered off course because of the wind and would sometimes almost land on the railroad tracks that were behind her property.

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We went today also. I was not that impressed. The parking $10?! Ridiculous! You pay less for parking at Yankee stadium! The admission to get in was ridiculous too. I will never go back.

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The parking was a bit $$. We went today and had a good time. We were able to hear and see Pat Benatar without paying the exta $$. Here are a few pics of the balloons http://www.lifamilies.com/community/album/?ID=2286

Message edited 8/12/2007 10:26:33 PM.

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We went today too... I must say that we will not be going again next year!! I found the whole thing to be very disorganized, right from getting there the parking lot was a mess, they had us park 10 rows back when there were tons of open spaces all the way in the 1st rows, my DH moved our car later... we never got to see a balloon AT ALL, I was under the impression it was a "balloon fest"... we got to see the motorcycle and bike stunts, but couldn't get near the monster trucks because there was only a couple bleachers for a TON of people, my son was VERY dissapointed with that... then we didn't get to see the circus because the line was sooo long 1/2 hr before it even started... then we went to the carnival and got tickets just to realize that the lines were so long that we sold them to someone else for half of what we paid and left. We were TOTALLY dissapointed with the whole thing

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I was not impressed either. I will not go back!

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It was not a good experience for me and DH on Sunday. Food and drinks were very overpriced. Parking was expensive too. The vendors, events and attractions were disappointing.

DH and I spent $130 to see Pat Benatar in the reserved seating area. Not enough tickets were sold so right before she went on, people were allowed into the reserved seating area for free and sat in the same and better seats than we had paid for. We were so outraged it ruined the whole day for us. Not to mention the fact that the balloons went up at the same time as the concert and it was impossible to fully enjoy either.

All around it was a pretty crappy experience and I will never go again!!!

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We didn't go, and I'm glad we didn't. On our way home from my grandmother's last nigth we saw all the balloons taking off anyway

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what time did the balloons go up? we passed by there yesterday on the way home from Atlanis around 430pm

the traffic on the lie getting off at 68 was horrendous!!! at 130 in the afternoon it was backed up for miles!!!

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We went last night too. We got there around 5 pm. We walked around a bit, saw the monster trucks which were pretty cool. Then we watched them fill the baloons. This was pretty cool.

We pre-ordered our tickets and used a coupon code and got 2 for $30. Then we did have to pay $10 for parking which was a little steep.

We got to see Pat benatar which was incredible. Next time I will bring my own chair though. It was incredible watching the balloons go up while listening to Pat Benatar. It took a little while to get out when it was over but not too bad. I thought it was fun.

I agree that some things were overpriced but overall we had fun!