Certain things have made it to my bucket list solely due to Instagram. Places like, Iceland, Petra, the hot air balloons over Cappadocia, Turkey and the White Sands National Monument (crossed off!).

The Lights Festival was also one of those things.

(This is not a sponsored post)

When I found out in May that it would be taking place in Ontario on July 14, I jumped on the opportunity to buy tickets. After asking family and friends if they wanted to go, I ended up with four confirmed yeses and the mad dash to buy tickets began! Selling out quickly at the starting rate of $25, then $45, then $57 (I honestly was suspicious at the rate that these got "sold out", as they were suddenly $64 in the span of 15 minutes (with $70 tickets as the next to be "released"). A steep ticket price for a single paper lantern, wouldn't you say? But I was buying into the experience #obvi.

By the time July 14 rolled around two months later, the event was postponed by the Haldimand County Fire Department, due to elevated fire and public safety risks. An open fire burn ban had also been declared by the entirety of Haldimand, due to the dry July conditions. Disappointing, but necessary especially considering the fires in Parry Sound.

A new date of Sept 8 was provided. With that, and over the rest of the summer, the Lights Fest hype was temporarily forgotten, along with plans for picnics and route mapping.

Autumn, being the season of new beginnings and cooler temperatures, would seem the most appropriate time for firing up lanterns, Sharp-ied up with hopes, dreams and wishes and gently releasing them into the sky. But that would be the Instagram version. And I must admit, it was very magical. I would definitely do it again. BUT, there are a few fixes that need to be done.

First, the good, the beautiful, the magical, the Instagram photos and highlights....

Now, here is the REAL LIFE, reality check, the not-so-instagrammable moments that I hope organizers will address:

Weather prep: Hey, it's the weather, I get it. It changes. They did say to prepare for the weather, and we brought jackets, sweaters, blankets and socks. But, it was really cold. We even had to BUY blankets, and I sure am glad they were selling them! The ideal wardrobe would have been winter coats/toques/boots for sitting outdoors from 5pm-sunset. Lesson: be prepared for the weather.

Location: The Dunnville Agricultural grounds which was this event's location was lined with giant wind turbines, which looked super cool (and literally made for an additional source of cool wind). So, one solution could have been for organizers to install heat lamps or warming stations. There were many families with babies/kids that left before the lantern lighting started just because it was unbearably cold.

Parking: The organizers of the Lights Fest planned for early-comers (those arriving at 5pm) to park the furthest away and walk the longest to arrive on location. While late-comers parked closer, and still had their pick for spots (no assigned seating). To appease this, organizers provided a pink 'Post-it note' to say that those who arrived early would absolutely get to leave the parking lot first. Of course, they weren't fooling anyone, and by the end of the night, everyone (pink ticket or not) left at the same time and waited in the same line up of cars exiting the grounds. Lesson: no points or pluses for coming early when the weather is cold!

Lantern Lighting Instruction: They said they were expecting 5000 people, it seemed to be 2-3K instead. Still, that's a lot of people. The grounds were divided into quadrants with tiki torches at every corner of each quadrant, so people could set up camp within four tiki torches.  Even though there was a stage on the far side of the field, unless you were right up at the front, you couldn't see the "host" or "musicians". Thankfully, the sound system was really good. If it weren't for that, we wouldn't have known how to light the lanterns. Each participant received one lantern, a small black marker, a rubber wristband and keychain/point-light. The instructions are on the outside of the packet, but what might have been helpful during the wait time leading up to the lighting of the lanterns is, if instructors came around and demonstrated the technique. Or if they had demonstration tents set up around, perhaps. Just before sunset, the tiki torches were lit up by staff, and would be the source of fire for the lanterns. There was one "test lantern" that the organizers lit up, and it flew away pretty quickly, due to the winds, but other than that and the microphone instruction there were no other instructions on how to accomplish the key point of the event: lighting and releasing the lantern.

Our eventual tried and tested technique:

Open your lantern package, and write on the sides of the paper lantern with the marker (be careful not to put too much pressure or puncture the lantern). Then, when you're ready to light up your lantern, there is a small black square at the bottom of it that must be lit on at least 3 CORNERS (via the tiki torch). You must have the help of at least 2-3 people: 1 person to help hold the very top of the lantern up straight, while the other two are lighting up the square. If it's windy, you have to shield the flame so that it doesn't BURN the paper and make a hole. If you get a burned hole, that's the end of your lantern. (This happened to A LOT of people). If you burn the black square for too long, the lantern will no longer fly, as it's burnt out. Once you have lit 3 corners of the black square, pull the lantern close to the ground so that it fills with air and once you feel a very slight "tug" you can release the lantern into the sky. The tug is not terribly noticeable, it's easy to miss and if you wait too long for the "TUG", the square might burn out. Also, if you do it too early, the lantern may not have enough air inside it to fly UP and away, and instead flies sideways (into peoples heads). You can purchase an extra lantern at the time of buying tickets, but I can't remember now how much it was, and you're not allowed to bring your own lanterns or matches/lighters.

Speaking of Safety: The chaos that ensued around us was at first, comical but then, a bit scary what with balls of fire flying into the back of people's heads/hair/jacket fur. Because nobody really knew what they were doing, there was a lot of lanterns that got burnt out or had holes burnt onto the sides of the paper or flew for a bit only to land into someone's head or crash land into their belongings. A potential solution for this would be to stagger the sections that release lanterns into the sky, or simply have more staff to supervise. At least, the fire department and ambulances were on hand.

Overall, it was a hugely memorable experience and I would still highly recommend it to everyone.

Thank you to my friends Anjali, Adriana and Bonny for taking the photos of me :)

I'm sure there are other suggestions that could be made, or perhaps all of the answers were already available to me, and I didn't know. Feel free to leave a comment over here.