IT’S A BOUNCE PALACE
Record-setting inflatable hits town
Big Bounce America, which is billed as the largest bounce house ever built, will be at Balloon Fiesta Park this weekend.
You know those quaint bouncy houses that parents rent for their kids’ birthday parties and which sometimes become airborne in a strong wind? Well, this ain’t that. Big Bounce America is a 10,000 square foot bounce house that is billed as the largest inflatable bounce house ever built. In fact, said Big Bounce deejay and spokesman Douglas Dorrington, the folks from Guinness World Records are in the process of qualifying its record-setting size.
The attraction can be visited through Sunday at Albuquerque’s Balloon Fiesta Park, where it, and a separate 10,000 square foot Bounce Village, are set up on the far north end of the field. Wristbands can be purchased on-site.
Big Bounce America is the brainchild of two Scottish guys, said Dorrington. “They were at a music festival in the U.K., where there was a bounce house, and they noticed that adults kept sneaking into it. They thought about how to one-up that and came up with the idea of a massive bounce house,” he said.
Two of the ginormous attractions are touring the United States and are expected to visit 60 locations around the country through November.
The main bounce house is anchored by a DJ booth at the center. It is surrounded by colorful stylized
minarets and castle-like battlements and contains an assortment of stationary palm trees, cones, a giant panda and other whimsical characters. A ball pit and a slide are contained in two attached side structures.
Outside and on the north side of the main bounce house is Bounce Village, providing another 10,000 square feet of inflated bounce attractions, including a Ninja obstacle course, a giant ball pit and a monster slide.
“This is cool, I would have liked this when I was a kid,” said David Jaramillo, who was visiting the attraction with his 3-year-old son Donte. “This is insane. I’ve never seen anything like this, and he’s having a blast,” he said pointing to his son. “His eyes just lit up. He was so excited.”
Kat Elwell was with her 6-year-old daughter Kailyn. “Once they start bouncing they can’t stop. They don’t want to come out. It’s addicting. I love that it’s out in the open but also enclosed, so you can just let the kids go and run around, and there’s a shaded rest area where I’m going to go and kick back and eat my chicken nuggets from the fabulous food truck parked over there. They have really good tacos, too.”
Kailyn was also enthralled with the attraction. “I really like the obstacle course. It wasn’t that hard except for the ones you have to jump up on, but then you can start over,” she said.
“It’s pretty fun,” said Yoselin Vasquez, who was accompanying her 3-year-old brother, Nick. “I’ve never seen one this big. It’s crazy. My brother has only seen the small ones, like at birthday parties, but I think he’s a little overwhelmed. He’s asking for his mom.”