06/05/2026
IMPORTANT NOTICE
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Yes, my ballooning friends, you will have noticed that a mail shot to all balloon pilots around the world has arrived inviting you all to attend a fabulous??????? new ballooning event in Umbria Italy called the “Umbrian Balloon Festival” this summer during the exact time of the year and in the same place as our Italian International Balloon Grand Prix 2026!!
Yes, this new local organisation have decided to steal our ballooning event after we inaugurated our first ever event 39 years ago during a time balloons were a very rare entity and so we had to work hard, invest even harder and hope all would go well.
Yes, for 39 years it has all gone well and we are without doubt Italy’s most important ballooning event and because of such we are now collaborating with the prestigeous USA Balloon Federation of America “America’s Transoceanic Balloon Festival”and for many years to follow.
Yes, during this 39 year period, including the COVID year 2020, we have ALWAYS organised the event with the main reason being I appreciated, and still appreciate so very much, the unique, kind and wonderful international ballooning fraternity and solely for this reason I am and was determined to make this event a MAJOR event which is also so very much loved by the Italian public even though it has cost me up to now:
1) My family home which the bank took from me because of my high debt after many years of losing money with the event and not having other incomes.
2) My marriage, although a wonderful lady, wife and mother but after 39 years she too has rightly thought and said “Enough, I am tired of tightening the belt every year with the hope things will get better financially”
3) The need to travel all year round with a scooter and not even a car as I am not in possession of one and be seen in the middle of winter with the snow on the ground as the only person driving a scooter even though I am in possession of an HGV driving licence!! 😊
NO, I will not go on any further complaining about my problems and sadness having to suffer because my dreams were not realized but it was not MY choice, but what saddens me most is because it is now the same group of people who opposed me from the very beginning by not giving reasonable help in anyway who are now doing everything possible to take the event away from me with their “Umbrian Balloon Festival” having their political backing and being exactly those who wanted to make this their political event many years ago and something I totally apposed as I am not in the least interested in politics!!......Especially Italian!!
PLEASE, PLEASE BALLOONING FRIENDS DO NOT REGISTER TO ATTEND THE UMBRIAN BALLOON FESTIVAL AS I AM COUNTING SO MUCH ON YOU ALL AND ONLY THIS WAY WILL THE ORGANISERS OF THE EVENT UNDERSTAND HOW LIFE IS AND HOW ONE SHOULD BEHAVE!! THANK-YOU ALL SO VERY MUCH.
Ralphie
(Organiser Italian International Balloon Grand Prix 2026)
PS: May I ask you to visit our website and join us here in the summer this year!! 😊😊
