Ballunar Festival

The annual Ballunar Festival was this weekend. The organizers really did themselves a favor a few years ago when they moved it from August to October — the weather is a thousand times more pleasant, although wind was a problem this year.

Meryl and James made the trek down to Clear Lake and the four of us went over on Saturday night. We got a little caught up in the traffic, but finally got parked right as the balloons were flying over. There weren’t that many in the air; I’ve seen many more in years past. It was the wind, again.

After sunset, they began inflating a field of tethered balloons for the balloon glow. It was fun to watch them inflate the balloons. A good team can get them up really quickly, using a fan at first to begin the inflation, then moving to the burner when the balloon is larger.

“Um, is that the BUTT of the Energizer bunny?”
“Why yes, I believe it is.”
“Hmm … They really should have turned him around.”
“Why yes, they should have.”

I didn’t take my “good” camera, so these photos are all from my point and shoot. My first photo of the “all burn” was overexposed, but still cool. The all burn is my favorite part of the balloon glow.

We found Gavin and Carina and talked to them for a while too. Carina seemed to like the balloons, although I have to say she seemed to like her hot dog and the idea of going back on the “spinny ride” more.

Gavin took precautions to make sure Carina didn’t get lost — and if she did, her name and phone number were conveniently taped to the back of her shirt. Though this actually seems like a good idea, I still had to laugh. It was funny.

The balloon glow went on for a while. Some balloons definitely glow better than others — warm colors like red and orange and yellow looked particularly bright and beautiful.

After the glow, we headed over to BJ’s for dinner. It was fun to have Meryl and James come down for the day (they got to see our house and watch some of the Penn State game before we headed to the festival).