By Steve Johnson, Public Information Officer, Bullhead City

The biggest festival in Bullhead City for the past seven years is the River Regatta in August, a nine-mile float down the Colorado River. It began in 2007 when about 900 people on inner tubes and rafts set off from Community Park and floated down to Rotary Park. In 2012, 27,000 people joined the Bullhead City Regatta!

The event requires a lot of support from the city, community and businesses. Local department stores, sporting goods stores, even hardware stores– that might not otherwise carry watercraft — offer tubes, rafts and life-jackets for this annual festival on the water.

Competition: teams, inspired by a different theme each year, create floats as wild as their imagination and as big as a bundle of inner tubes or Styrofoam will take them, compete for cash prizes and trophies. Over the years, the Colorado River has carried grass huts, birthday cakes, huge floating alligators, even pirate ships along its cool, rippling currents under the August desert sun.

Riverside residents are also encouraged to compete by decorating their homes and cheering on the floaters, many of whom are visitors from around the country.

Bullhead City River Regatta participants fill hotels, restaurants and stores, infusing hundreds of thousands of dollars into the local economy during the weekend event.

Regatta revelers hold parties and cheer on floaters

Thousands prepare to launch from Community Park