Record-breaking attendance at Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo

HOUSTON (FOX 26) - Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo officials say they saw recording-breaking numbers for the 2017 season, with more than 2.6 million people attending.

"It's something I looked forward to since I was five years old," says Alyssa Caveness who was attending the concert Sunday night.

"This is our fourth night here and I just love seeing all of Houston out at the rodeo because it's such a fun and unique event for us," says Michelle Parrish, who was out enjoying the carnival with her fiancé and friends.

"The food is awesome, as you can tell, we bought this for her, but she really likes it," says Jess Morales who was eating funnel cake with one of his friends.

Outside the fairgrounds Sunday you could also see a few animal-rights activists out protesting.

"Maybe they should think about the interest of the animals being exploited," says Michael Battey with Vegans For Life.

"We get some support like that guy right there, we get people who yell horrendous things out the window, those people I hope will do some research and find it what it is that they are supporting," says Jeremy Fitzpatrick who came out with a sign.

Sunday night the Zac Brown Band took the stage, as fans sang along to his tunes. "You make loving you easy, that's my favorite," sang Charles Compain.

Overall Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo officials say they broke several records this year including one on Go Tejano Day.

"We had 185,000 visitors came on that Saturday that Willie Nelson preformed, then the next day Go Tejano Day set a stadium paid attendance record of all time number one, Luke Bryan's performance was number 17 of all time so we've had a fantastic year", says president and CEO Joel Cowley.