Enjoying Balloons and Tunes UK

Were I lived in America, we had hot air balloons all the time. It was normal to be driving down the road to the shop and see hot air balloons flying in the summertime. My cousin, right now, in America, drives hot air balloons. It’s always been something that felt magical and fun! In the United Kingdom, it more rare to see hot air balloons, as it always seems too windy for them – but we were excited to attend the Balloons and Tunes UK event, specifically their Essex one, as they are bringing balloons, tunes, and entertainment all around the UK.

Balloons and Tunes UK does have an entry fee, so pre-booking tickets before they sell out is a good idea. We grabbed our tickets when they were on an Early Bird discount, but even out of Early Bird, they weren’t very expensive at all. In the ticket price, you will be able to watch the shows on the main stage, listen to talks about Hot Air Balloons, check out a dino section that’s designed for toddlers, and enjoy the shows at the bike stage. There is also a giant fairground, with tons of games and rides, which isn’t included in the ticket price. These rides start at £4 per person, with some being £6, for an idea of pricing. There are also a bunch of food stands and a small area of shop stalls, which primary had bucket hats, Lafufus, and smaller bulk-purchased trinkets, so we didn’t spend long at the shop stalls.

Main Stage at Balloons and Tunes UK

The main stage events at Balloons and Tunes UK was a mix of tribute acts and children’s entertainment, which is always a fun time at a festival! Party Peeps, which is one of our favorites, spent a lot of the day on stage. When we first wandered over to the stage, they were hosting a bunch of games, where music was blasting and children were dancing, doing red-light-green-light, and having a rave. This rave did not have foam, as that was later, but Robin had a great time getting out her energy dancing about! When we came back a bit later for Sabrina Carpenter’s tribute act, it turns out that the act had been cancelled, and instead one of the balloon piolets was on stage, answering all sorts of questions about hot air balloons, which was very interesting! Later, we returned for the Ariana Grande, which was very well done, as the singer did a fantastic job of capturing the spirit of the performer. We saw the Greatest Game Show, where kids were encouraged to sing for a biscuit, which Robin tried very hard at, then adults needed to have a themed dance off. There was a show that included animals and a magic act that we ended up skipping, but sounded fantastic, and we of course came back for the foam rave where we loved playing the games and getting covered in foam. The main stage is well entertaining and a great time.

We also spent some time on watching the bike show, which had people preforming tricks on BMX bikes and on quad bikes. This was entertaining and quite fun, with the announcer always engaging with the audience! They had smaller time slots, kind of like the hot air balloon time slots, where they were doing stunts on and off throughout the day. The balloon stage had balloons rising and falling throughout the day, along with talks on what the balloons were designed after, how they blow up, and how to control them in the air. We got to see five different hot air balloons fill up and showcase at the festival, which was fantastic!

Rides and Games at Balloons and Tunes UK

When it came to rides at Balloons and Tunes UK, it felt a lot like a fair ground, but with a lot of different rides. There were giant swings, spinning rides, dodgems, haunted houses – basically anything you could think of. I do wish they had the US concept of wrist bands, where we would pay a one time fee and get to go on as many as we want, but we did have a fun time going on them anyway. The scrambler was extremely fast and quite long, Robin got to drive Dodgems for the first time, and the amount of bouncy castles that you could go on for one price was very fun. When it came to the games, they had like five hook-a-ducks, one ring toss, one darts game, and two impossible knock down tin can games. I do wish there was more variety when it came to the games itself, but still it was fun to play hook-a-duck and win some prizes.

Food at Balloons and Tunes UK

We let Kai, Amelia and Robin all go off and find a dish for everyone to try, then rated them on flavor. Everyone actually came back with fries as Balloons and Tunes UK had a lot of fun loaded fries vans. I quite liked the cheese sauce – we ended up getting even more fries as Dann and I then went out to grab some offerings and bring them back to be rated, before we did it all over again later in the day, but with desserts. We had loaded bacon and cheese fries, loaded hoisin duck fries, katsu fries, chicken and cheese sauce fries, two lots of covered donuts, chocolate covered strawberries and more. It was fun to try so many fair foods and to just enjoy eating some new stuff! Despite there not being a huge variety for us, there were a lot of classics like burgers, sausages, and even a Chinese van too.

We all had a fantastic day at the Balloons and Tunes UK festival and would go back next year! The different performances were very good, we all liked the number of rides, especially Amelia who said they had all her favorites, and it was so much fun to see the balloons go up throughout the day. It’s a fun, family day out that just feels like a good use of sunshine.

You can check out our other Days Out to see what else we’ve been up too!