Light festival to come to Gainesville this year

Gainesville residents can save a spot to ignite a sky lantern at an upcoming lights festival.

The Lights Fest, a festival that provides lanterns and tiki torches to attendees who wish to send personal messages into the sky, travels to cities across the U.S. and Canada. The festival has no set date in Gainesville. Admission to the event ranges in cost from $25 to $55, depending on the time participants register, according to the festival’s website.

The festival started two years ago, said Madie Stone, the festival’s head of media relations. She said the event, although usually massive in size, is an experience for the individuals who attend.

“At the perfect moment, everyone ignites their personalized sky lanterns with tiki torches and lets them take flight,” Stone said. “It creates a surreal ambiance, where time slows down as your single flame rises with thousands of others.”

She said the organization is getting permits and plans to host the event in 2017.

Alex Sikoryak, a UF business administration sophomore, recently participated in a similar activity with the morale team for Dance Marathon. Sikoryak, 20, and the group wrote their wishes on paper lanterns and sent them into the air.

“Releasing the lanterns into the dark sky as a group reminded us how we must be a light and how infinite the possibilities are when we are working as a collective group because, together, our lanterns lit up the whole sky,” she said.