Iredell County North Carolina Carolina BalloonFest Festival
On the third weekend of October, the sky over Statesville fills with colour. Carolina BalloonFest is that weekend: a three-day balloon festival in Statesville, the seat of Iredell County, billed by its own organiser as the second oldest hot air balloon festival in the country.
Two rules govern a first visit: balloon operations are weather-dependent and balloons are not on display all day, so visitors are told to arrive early and stay late; and admission buys entry to the grounds, not a balloon ride.
About the Festival
Carolina BalloonFest is the annual hot air balloon festival of Statesville, North Carolina, held on the third weekend in October at Statesville Regional Airport. Its organiser, in the ticketing layer that governs, is National Balloon Rally Charities, Inc. DBA Carolina BalloonFest, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. The festival’s homepage describes the same body as host, while a donation line on that homepage gives a singular form, National Balloon Rally Charity, Inc. DBA E.P.I.C. Studios Carolina BalloonFest; both forms stand as published, with the ticketing form governing.
The 2026 E.P.I.C. Studios form is a title-sponsor edition name, never a rename, and older sponsor prefixes change by year. The organiser’s own mission wording is to continue the heritage of hot air ballooning in Iredell County, spotlight the community of Statesville, and donate a percentage of Carolina BalloonFest proceeds to local nonprofit organizations. Troutman does not host it: its fairgrounds host only the festival’s Park and Ride lot.
Quick Facts
| Item | Detail |
| Festival | Carolina BalloonFest, Statesville Regional Airport, Statesville |
| County seat and host | Statesville, seat of Iredell County since 1789 |
| Organiser | National Balloon Rally Charities, Inc. DBA Carolina BalloonFest, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit |
| 2026 edition | October 16 through 18, 2026, billed the 51st in press |
| Grounds addresses | 260 Hangar Drive (ticketing); 531 Old Airport Road (accessibility) |
| Gate hours, 2026 | Friday 3 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.; Saturday 6:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m.; Sunday 6:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. |
| 2026 advance admission | Adults fifteen, twenty-five, twenty dollars Friday, Saturday, Sunday; children 7 to 12 ten dollars; 6 and under free |
| Balloon rides | Never included in admission; tether rides twenty dollars, full flights four hundred dollars |
| Camping | RV camping only, dry camping, three hundred or three hundred fifty dollars in 2026; no tent camping |
History
A Statesville history layer records that the first National Balloon Rally was held in 1974, and that today it is known as Carolina BalloonFest. Secondary history layers name Tracy Barnes and Bill Meadows, noting Meadows’s flight-training company, the first Statesville balloon flight in 1969, and the rally founded in 1974. The year 1974 is a first-rally year in those layers, not a founding year the festival publishes for itself.
For a useful comparison, see the Hyde County North Carolina Ocrafolk Festival for another county festival.
A television layer bills a 49th annual edition for October 18 through 20, the 2024 dates, while October 2026 press layers bill the October 16 through 18, 2026 edition as the 51st. No edition number is published on the festival’s own homepage or tickets page in the layers fetched, and no edition number for 2025 is printed here as a published billing.
The standing billing is the organiser’s own: the second oldest hot air balloon festival in the country. October 2026 press gives the fuller form, the nation’s second-oldest continuously operated hot air balloon festival, and secondary history layers give the comparative form, second longest-running after the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. Donation totals are reported layer by layer, never settled: over seven hundred eighty-seven thousand dollars in an undated mission layer; over nine hundred twelve thousand dollars in a 2023 layer; and between one hundred thousand and one hundred twenty-five thousand dollars a year, about forty thousand visitors annually, and an estimated four million dollars of impact in October 2026 press, against the same layer’s memory of about one hundred thousand once.
The live story of October 2026 is the search for a new home. Airport expansion is expected to eliminate parking used by festival vendors and volunteers, and the festival is searching for roughly two hundred acres to lease near Statesville for three weeks each year, preferably north of North Carolina Highway 150 with Interstate 40 or Interstate 77 access and clear of Charlotte Douglas airspace. Executive Director Sam Parks, a 2026 press-layer name, said organisers had searched roughly a decade. The festival has not left the airport.
What to Expect
The spine of the weekend, from the organiser’s own copy, is hot air balloon morning competitions, mass ascensions, and evening balloon glows, plus live entertainment, a kids’ zone, and a marketplace and artisan village. Documented elements include three mass ascensions, two sanctioned competitions, Friday and Saturday glows, special-shape balloons, tethered and bookable flights, a Pilot Meet and Greet, a Walk In Balloon, Main Stage entertainment, a Kids Zone, an Artisan Village and MarketPlace, Eat Street, a beer tent and wine garden, a Ninja Warrior course, and a 2023 skydiving exhibition.
Mornings: Competitions and Flyovers
The 2026 flight-window layer, from a Lake Norman visitors guide and fenced to 2026, puts morning competition flyovers on Saturday and Sunday in a launch window of 8:30 to 9:30 a.m..
Afternoons: Mass Ascensions
Afternoon mass ascensions run Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 4 to 5:30 p.m. from the festival field, in the same 2026 layer.
Evenings: Glows After Dark
Friday and Saturday evenings close with balloon glows after dark, when tethered envelopes light up against the night. The event is rain or shine, but wind, visibility, and precipitation decide whether balloons inflate.
Planning Your Visit
Getting There and Parking
The festival grounds are at Statesville Regional Airport in Statesville, under two published street addresses. The address the festival’s ticketing publishes, governing for directions, is 260 Hangar Drive, Statesville, North Carolina 28677. The festival’s own Know Before You Go accessibility layer gives a second grounds address, 531 Old Airport Road, for the on-site parking field and main gate. RV check-in, at 333 Old Airport Road, Statesville, next to the festival venue, is a different function, never the grounds.
The Park and Ride lot is not the grounds. The free shuttle lot is the Iredell County Fairgrounds at 630 North Main Street, Troutman, North Carolina 28166, and it hosts parking and shuttles only; no balloons launch from there in any festival layer, and the Iredell County Fair itself is a different event. The festival’s own FAQ states that both the on-site parking field and the event site are roughly cut, grassy fields, not paved, with uneven surfaces.
Tickets and Prices
The 2026 advance ladder, from the festival’s own tickets page and governing, ran through 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, October 15, 2026,: Friday fifteen dollars for adults and ten dollars for children ages seven to twelve; Saturday twenty-five dollars and ten dollars; Sunday twenty dollars and ten dollars; Weekend Pass fifty dollars and twenty-five dollars; children six and under free with no ticket required. Adult prices increase by five dollars on event days, gate admission is not guaranteed, and the festival’s tickets are non-refundable in its own FAQ layer.
VIP Tent Access in 2026 was an add-on requiring a Weekend Pass in the cart, never gate admission: one hundred seventy-five dollars for adults and thirty-five dollars for children ages seven to twelve,. Balloon-flight prices in 2026 were kept strictly separate from gate admission, in the festival’s own words: balloon rides are not included with a general admission ticket. Tether rides were twenty dollars per person, first come, first served, with no reservations, and full balloon rides were four hundred dollars per person, booked in advance directly through the festival’s participating pilots.
Parking in 2026 was separate from admission: Park and Ride free with a complimentary shuttle from the Troutman fairgrounds lot; General Parking fifteen dollars per day; Premier Parking twenty-five dollars per day; Handicap Parking free with a placard required; Motorcycle Parking free. On-site parking was sold only with advance tickets at checkout, never separately or at the gate, and it sold out in 2026, so day-of arrival was Park and Ride or ride share only. The 2026 edition’s advance layers record Friday, Saturday, Sunday, weekend, VIP, RV, and on-site parking as sold out before the gates opened, a 2026 sales state; the festival’s own tickets page invites guests without 2026 tickets to join it in 2027.
RV Camping
RV camping is a documented festival offer, and tent camping is not. The 2026 RV layer prices East Lower Lot RV at three hundred dollars, not recommended for trailers or fifth wheels over thirty-five feet or Class A coaches; East Upper Lot RV at three hundred dollars, recommended for Class A coaches and units over thirty-five feet; and Premium Paved RV at three hundred fifty dollars. The terms, in the organiser’s own words, are that the RV fee includes two Weekend Passes, a one hundred dollar value, good for all three days; the fee applies to one vehicle for one or both days; early check-in and late check-out cost extra; and it is dry camping only, with no electric, sewer, or water services on site. RV check-in is at 333 Old Airport Road, Statesville, next to the venue, with no refunds, and all three tiers sold out in 2026. Additional campers beyond the two included passes need their own admission tickets. No tent camping, car camping, or cabin offer is documented, and area campgrounds are never festival camping.
A Sample Weekend Itinerary
A visitor with a weekend pass could spend Friday afternoon arriving by Park and Ride, walking the Artisan Village and MarketPlace, eating on Eat Street, and staying for the Friday evening glow. Saturday repays the early start: arrive for the 6:30 a.m. gate, watch the morning competition flyovers in the 8:30 to 9:30 a.m. launch window, return for the 4 to 5:30 p.m. mass ascension, and close with the Saturday evening glow. Sunday repeats the morning pattern, gates closing at 6 p.m.
Morning Flights, Afternoon Ascensions, Evening Glows: Three Ways to See Balloons
The three balloon windows reward different visitors. Morning competition flyovers are the purist’s window: pilots launch from spots around Statesville and fly in to the field, but the balloons pass through rather than rising from the field itself. Afternoon mass ascensions are the spectacle: the field fills, envelopes rise together, but the afternoon wind is the likeliest reason for a scrubbed launch. Evening glows are the celebration: tethered envelopes light up after dark and the crowd is at its largest, with no flight involved. A visitor with one day should pick the window that matches their tolerance for early mornings, crowds, and wind.
Visitor Checklist
- Buy advance tickets before the Thursday night deadline; adult prices rise by five dollars on event days and gate admission is not guaranteed.
- Plan day-of arrival by Park and Ride or ride share; on-site parking is not sold at the gate.
- Arrive early and stay late; balloons are not on display all day and every balloon operation is weather-dependent.
- Budget balloon rides apart from admission.
- Wear footwear for unpaved, uneven fields.
- Book RV lots early; dry camping only, no tent camping.
- Check the relocation news before a future visit.
Beyond the Festival Grounds
Statesville itself rewards a longer stay. The festival’s mission is to spotlight the community of Statesville, and the town that hosts the airport field is the county seat. The festival itself stays in Statesville. Lake Norman and Mooresville sit nearby in the regional calendar, but no Lake Norman or Mooresville address is the festival grounds, and the regional fall calendar’s other events are separate events.
Why It Matters
Carolina BalloonFest matters to Iredell County in two ways the record supports. First, it keeps a ballooning heritage visible in the county where the first National Balloon Rally was held in 1974. Second, it turns that heritage into money for local nonprofits: a percentage of proceeds goes to local nonprofit organizations, with donation totals reported layer by layer rather than settled. The relocation search adds an unresolved significance: whether the festival finds roughly two hundred acres near Statesville will decide where the next chapter of that heritage happens.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does the festival take place?
The festival grounds are at Statesville Regional Airport in Statesville, the seat of Iredell County. The festival’s ticketing publishes 260 Hangar Drive, Statesville, North Carolina 28677, governing for directions, while its accessibility layer gives 531 Old Airport Road for the main gate. Troutman does not host it: its fairgrounds host only the Park and Ride lot.
Are balloon rides included in the ticket price?
No. The festival’s own tickets page states that balloon rides are not included with a general admission ticket. In 2026, tether rides were twenty dollars per person, first come, first served, and full balloon rides were four hundred dollars per person, booked in advance through participating pilots.
Can I camp at the festival in a tent?
No tent camping is documented for this festival. The documented offer is RV camping only, in three 2026 tiers at three hundred, three hundred, and three hundred fifty dollars, dry camping only, with no electric, sewer, or water services. The RV fee includes two Weekend Passes, check-in is at 333 Old Airport Road, and all three tiers sold out in 2026.
Will the festival stay at the airport?
October 2026 press reports that airport expansion is expected to eliminate vendor and volunteer parking, that the festival seeks roughly two hundred acres near Statesville for three weeks a year, and that the 51st edition could be its last at the airport. No new site has been chosen, no move has been completed, and the festival has not been cancelled.
What to Expect From the Next Iredell County North Carolina Carolina BalloonFest Festival
How often is the Iredell County North Carolina Carolina BalloonFest Festival held?
The festival is annual, held on the third weekend in October in the organiser’s own pattern wording. The 2026 edition ran October 16 through 18, 2026, and the 2025 edition on October 17 through 19, 2025, at the same Statesville grounds.
When is the next Iredell County North Carolina Carolina BalloonFest Festival?
No date for a next edition is published in the layers fetched. The festival’s own tickets page invites guests without 2026 tickets to join it in 2027, while October 2026 press reports a search for a new site near Statesville. Until the organiser publishes a next edition, the pattern is the third weekend in October, with the grounds question open.
Will the dates change?
The third-weekend-of-October pattern is the organiser’s standing wording, and every documented edition falls on it, from the 49th annual edition to the 2026 edition. The dates of a future edition could shift if the relocation search moves the festival to a new site, but no such change is published.
Carolina BalloonFest is, at its best, a dawn-to-dark weekend on a grassy airport field, where the balloons decide the schedule and the town keeps the proceeds.
