Kendal’s four-year-old annual Mountain Film Festival went through a growth spurt this year as the numbers venturing into its venues leapt by 25 per cent.

According to organisers, more than 5,000 people turned out for the eight-day festival which came to a close on Sunday (November 16) – around 1,250 more than last year.

Festival co-director John Porter said Cumbrian climber Chris Bonington had summed it up when he said the festival had moved a quantum leap forward last year and had done it again this year.

“It’s also now reached the quality levels that certainly we had planned five years ago,” he added.

Tickets sales were up by 2,600 on last year to around 8,600 tickets for films, lectures, plays and courses held as part of the celebration of mountain sport and culture at The Brewery Arts Centre and Kendal Leisure Centre.

Sell-out events included premieres of Touching the Void at Kendal and Rheged – the much-anticipated film recounting the legendary survival story of climber Joe Simpson who was dropped down a crevasse and miraculously lived to tell the tale. The film, directed by Kevin MacDonald, who won an Oscar in 2000 for his documentary One Day in September, also picked up the festival’s Grand Prize.

Accommodation in Kendal had been booked solid for the main festival weekend with around 2,000 people attracted by speakers such as iconic female climber Catherine Destivelle and a whole host of Everest veterans including Doug Scott, Conrad Anker and Appa Sherpa.

“It’s hugely significant for the town,” said festival promoter Tanya Bascombe. “This being a tourist area, to have a weekend where the whole of Kendal is booked out of season is fantastic.” The sales statistics are a long way from the festival’s beginnings in 1980 as a pocket money earner for Mr Porter and festival co-director Brian Hall to subsidise trips to the Himalayas.

Through the ‘80s they staged a few festivals but shelved the idea for a while because it was getting too hard to organise. Mr Porter and Mr Hall then kick-started the format again in 1999 when around 1,000 people came to Kendal to watch 42 documentaries and short films.

The event is now the second largest film festival in the UK and has become an important platform for adventure film makers as well as a welcome earner for the local economy.

It is set to go ahead again next year, although the team of unpaid volunteers who run it will be reconsidering the format. At the moment the idea is to maintain the main festival weekend as it is but with more add-ons.

The Extreme Film School that was featured this year offering technical and artistic guidance to aspiring filmmakers was likely to have a life of its own outside of the festival, predicted Mr Porter.

“I think the festival is a juggernaut we can’t stop now although how we go about it and who does it are other issues,” he said. “We need to develop other festivals from this - an education festival, a mountain culture festival as well as continuing the feature film festival. That will create different audiences at different times of year, increasing the audience without busting the limits of Kendal.” l For full results of the winning films from this year’s festival see: www.mountainfilm.co.uk .