Over the weekend, July 26 to July 28, the fourth annual Tralapa Music and Sports Festival took place at the Tramping Lake Park.

For years the Tramping Lake Park had no use, but in 2016 the first ever Tralapa Festival took place. During the first year the festival featured eight live artists along with a slow pitch tournament, beach volleyball tournament, and mini golf.

Four years later and the festival is still a hit! This year featuring eighteen live artists, eighteen slow pitch teams, twelve volleyball teams, and a rejuvenated 100 year-old mini golf course. The festival has a large campground and had three food trucks this year.

Although they are still adding up the amount of people who came to out to the event, Park Ranger Ryan Neumeier, said the festival had a turnout about the same as last years, which was about 1500 people.

Eighteen teams entered into the slow pitch tournament for the weekend and twelve teams entered the beach volleyball tournament. (Photo courtesy: Ryan Neumeier)

“This year we had really good weather again until Saturday, huge wind gusts came and that put a damper on the festival. The wind died though, everyone came out of their campsites into the main stage area and the bands played all night. It was a great time!” Neumeier added that the final slow pitch games had to be cancelled due to the wind.

The festival features many local artists and gives them a chance to display their talent to the hometown crowd. These local artists include: Matt Davis, a country acoustic artist from Kerrobert, Better Than Nothing, a blues/rock band from Rosetown, Stereo Playground out of Wilkie, and Mitch Larock and the 4:54 Band from Eatonia.

Other local artists also grazed the stage as the festival held an open mic on Saturday afternoon.

Each year Tralapa holds the Applause for a Cause contest, where they give back to a community and donate a town money for their own cause. This year the winner was the communities of Dodsland and Plenty.

That wasn’t the only cause they donated to, each year they raise money for different issues. In the past Tralapa had donated to Cancer Research, Suicide Awarness, and the Humbolt Broncos GoFundMe. This year they took to raising money for mental health.

“We sold shirts to raise money and also had a raffle, Smash for Cash, where the winners got to smash guitars on stage. We will be donating it all back to local causes, more details on the plan will be released later on.” Neumeier shared.

“We also had a moment of silence for all who knew someone that was affected by mental health. The entire crowd was completely silent, it was really special.”

Overall, Neumeier said that #Tralapa4 was a success, “We just wanna say how thankful we are to everyone that comes out, they support us so well!”