By Lauren Henry

Nearly 8000 people poured through the gates at the Grampians Grape Escape on the weekend.

The three-day food and wine festival at Halls Gap Recreation Reserve gave the region’s winemakers and food producers an opportunity to showcase their products.

The festival started with ‘Feel Good Friday’ – this year dedicated to bushfire-affected communities in the Grampians region as organisers and sponsors enabled free entry and travel for Pomonal residents to enjoy a night out. 

The fun followed on to Saturday and Sunday, with the festival buzzing with a huge crowd enjoying a day out in the sunshine, sampling food and alcohol while being entertained by a line-up of music and cooking masterclasses.

Festival director Kate Kirkpatrick said Friday night was the highlight of the weekend for her as local bands entertained a mostly-local crowd.

“That formula seemed to work and it was great to see, especially as we’d offered free tickets to the Pomonal community for Friday night and buses thanks to some sponsors,” she said.

“It was really encouraging to see around about 150 Pomonal residents enjoy that night post the fires and just that sense of community – that was really good.”

Ms Kirkpatrick said organisers were pleased with the attendance numbers, and vendors had also experienced an increase in sales compared with previous years. 

In the lead-up to the event, organisers
had been concerned that cost-of-living pressures would affect ticket sales.

“I was very happy with the event, given the visitation after the bushfires,” she said.

“We’re extremely pleased to see crowds out and the weather obviously helped with that immensely. It was just a very happy vibe all weekend.”

Organisers have already turned their attention to next year, with the event dates of May 2-4, 2025 already being advertised.

“We just like to encourage people to get there. A lot of people when they leave the region, they generally tend to book year-on-year for their accommodation, which is really encouraging,” Ms Kirkpatrick said.

“Once we debrief with the board, do our reporting and budget again, we can set our ticket sales in a few months.

“There are no other venues in our region that would be able to cope with that in Halls Gap, so our festival site is set as home for the moment.

“Obviously the programming, it works, and we know our partners and sponsors are really supportive of that. 

“We’re obviously always tweaking things each year, but the program caters for newborns right through to the older generations, and there is something for everyone.”

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