Kip Moore, James Wesley heat up the Festival WATCH THE VIDEO

Triple-digit temperatures greeted festival-goers Friday during the second day of the 2012 Festival of the Bells, with more hot weather to come. But festival organizers say that area residents are finding ways to beat the heat, despite some uncooperative weather.

A lot of ice cream, lemonade shake-ups and water have been sold during this week's festival, as patrons try to stay cool while enjoying the annual event.

The National Weather Service has forecast the high at 104 degrees for Saturday, with an excessive heat warning.

"Things have been really good so far," festival organizational committee president Michael Bradford told The Highland County Press. "The heat has been a little bit of a drawback for us. It has slowed down the crowds uptown and made it a little harder for people to come out. But as the sun goes down, it cools off and more people come out."

Thunderstorms rolled through Hillsboro around 9:30 p.m. Thursday, about half an hour after Christian rock band Sanctus Real took to the stage. Bradford said that for the crowd's and the band's safety, the concert was stopped and the festival closed early.

"We had a little problem (Thursday) night with the thunder and the lightening and the wind," Bradford said. "The band manager who makes all those decisions decided it was better to pull the band off the stage and cancel the concert. After about 30 minutes we did pull them off stage and close down the festival. It was rewarding to see that we cleared the center of town within 25 minutes. That made us really feel like we could handle it if there was a problem. With all the things that have happened over the last few weeks with storms and things like that we didn't want to take any chances at all."

Friday's concerts went on as planned, with James Wesley and Kip Moore.

Country singer Hunter Hayes will have the honor of the final festival concert Saturday night at 9 p.m.