Saanich Fairgrounds — Local services in Central Saanich

Lots of animals, music and other events make the fairgrounds a fun outing for all ages. Decent food options at expectedly high prices. Midway can be a lot of fun, sad to see fan-favorites "Himalayan" and "Fireball" not at the fair this year. Also not thrilled with the new "fast-pass" option for the fair. The already expensive rides had an increased wait time due to this new feature where riders willing to pay 68$ instead of the 48$ can queue in their own line and expect some degree of priority. However, although at times the fast-pass queues did seem to move quicker than the regular lines, there were times where the fast-pass queue was just as long as the regular. Leaving a pretty congested junction/merge at the entrance gates to many rides. I personally stood in line for over 1 hour to ride the zipper today (no fast-pass for me). And heard numerous reports from others of up to 2-3 hours for other rides like this years top thriller "Speed". An internet outage completely shut down one of the primary food vendors within the Midway section which left many of us standing in line for over 45 minutes wondering what was taking so long. Only to find out once we finally got to the ordering window "Our machines are down and we do not accept cash". Not impressed that with over a hundred people patiently waiting to get food, not one of the staff came outside the food shack to inform anyone of what was going on. All in all, fun little endeavor with my partner. Loved the equestrian events, Stellar Steppers always put on a wonderful show. Worth going to the fairgrounds even if only to...

I hear alot of complaining about the Saanich Fair this year. The lines are too long, the wifi isn't working, to name a couple. The fair is run by volunteers. The people you see collecting garbage and making sure you are safe do not get paid. The lines are long because the services and attractions are excellent. The shows I saw were amazing and so much fun I went twice. Where else can you see headliners like Prism and all the other entertainers for that low price. You can be there from opening to closing and never be bored. I know, I was there for 3 days with the Metchosin 4H. Our barn, the RCMP barn was busy from opening to closing. As for the wifi, seriously, wifi hasn't been a thing for that long. Leave your phone at home and enjoy the shows and your kids. Facebook ect will be there when you get home, as for wifi at booths, it's a country fair, bring cash, it still exists and is still accepted. It was probably the best Saanich fair I have been to in years. The people who organize and run this event did an amazing...

A fine fair to end the summer. The admission price seems a little high, but children under six are free. There are so many different animals to look at, flower and produce contests, and a small marketplace of products to buy like honey and fruit. The different food stalls offer variety. There are enough bathrooms around. It was easy to wheel a stroller around.

Update: There were huge lineups both to buy tickets and to have your online tickets scanned. The lineups were not very clearly marked or at least they were only marked at the head of the lineup and at the back you couldn't tell which lineup was which. There seemed to be more chaos and disorder this year. I hope next year they come up with a better way for scanning QR codes on the online tickets so that one does not have to stand in a giant lineup when they already have a ticket. Also the traffic control leading to the parking lot was chaotic and disorganized and left some people waiting for longer than...