Festival Media Director Dawn Hartill said the festival’s board of directors is ecstatic about the success of this year’s Great Falls Balloon Festival.
Harold Brooks, head of logistics for the festival, said “the success of the 24th Annual festival is largely contributed to the positivity of this year’s spectators.”
The theme of “The Force Takes Flight” brought in lots of new spectators, Hartill said.
“Besides the winds on Saturday and Sunday evening, we couldn’t have asked for better weather,” he said.
According to Marcus Talarico, rides coordinator, “Each launch was at capacity for passengers.”
Twenty-two of the 23 scheduled balloons launched this weekend — 15 from Simard-Payne Memorial Park and seven from Lewiston High School.
Longtime festivalgoer Vicky Wiegman’s favorite part of the weekend is the balloons themselves.
“The balloon festival never disappoints,” she said. “There is something enduringly magical about watching the balloons fill and rise in the air.”
Event Treasurer Mell Hamlyn said it was a banner year for the nonprofit groups.
“It was really great to see the thousands of people coming from all over to see the balloons and support area nonprofit organizations,” Talarico said. “The Force Takes Flight theme was just wonderful, and the excitement festivalgoers had toward it was seen all weekend, during the costume contest, the parade, and just folks roaming around festival grounds joining in on the fun.”
Food booths, carnival games and rides remained open for people even after the launches were canceled, although the crowd had thinned out quite a bit by then.
Many balloon crews kept their baskets out for kids to see and play in, but no more took flight due to the wind conditions.
The Darth Vader balloon crew was a crowd favorite Sunday morning. They let kids help to deflate and roll up the Vader Balloon after it landed, and according to the crew, the kids’ parents were thrilled.
The crew said it wouldn’t be going back up, whether the balloon launches were officially canceled or not. Wind clocked in at 15 mph before 6 p.m., and it only gets stronger as you go up, a member of the crew said.
Vader pilot Benoit Lambert was happy with the weekend, though.
“It was good,” he said. “We got in two morning flights and two moonglows. we’re lucky to be able to fly two times.
“And this is a nice play to fly,” he added. “The landscape is nice.”
It was Lambert’s first time in Maine.
The Great Falls Balloon Festival will be back next year.
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