Winter Fest OC — Local services in Costa Mesa

Went with my family to Winter fest tonight. The ticket prices online were about $40 for adults and $35 for children. Parking was $12 cash/ credit. Once we parked it was a pretty quick walk into the entrance. We went on a Sunday so it was not busy. We walked in through metal detectors and that went well. Once you walk in there is a tunnel that leads you into all these lights were you can take some beautiful pictures. That was my favorite part. Once outside they had more photo areas. There was the skating rink ( not included) and some igloos ( also not included.) The tubbing and snow area was included with the ticket. The tubing was cute but the tubes themselves smelled . It was a bit of a wait and the slide was quick.They did have a VIP option but I didn’t see it on the website . A little disappointing but the kids loved it. The fest had some food vendors there that sold the usual funnel cakes, hotdogs, lemonade etc. it wasn’t a ton to choose from. They had an area that had the rides/ games. Each ride ranged between 4-5 tickets ( older rides) the smaller area were between 3-5 tickets. Ticket prices varied. The wrist bands had different point system. We got the 18 tickets for $20 . The unlimited wristbands were about $43. Seemed like a ton of money for my family of 5. Overall it was cute and my kiddos enjoyed it. That was all that mattered. I feel that it was lacking something and it was pretty bare for the prices they...

So.. it isn't what you expect. Pictures make it look way better.

It's like carnival rides in a parking lot. A few disappointing points (I'll get to in a second) and a bit unorganized.

Price: If you don't go for the bigger package, you will be spending a lot of time waiting. Even then, some of the staff got give the executive pass holders priority. example - on the ice slides, one side is for pass holders, other side is for general. General line is going to always be longer. But the people at the top of the slides need to coordinate better. We paid extra so kids can surpass wait. One of the people who was appointing people to slides keept getting a lot of slides taken up, while the pass holders would only have like 2 slides.

All food is marked up. My corndog was $16. Bathrooms were a bunch of Port-o-potties and always busy. Paid extra for mini golf... and it was small boxes in circle. Not only that, we had to wait because there were no balls available. Ice bumper cars - small space and a few of the cars handles (that moved the bumper cars) were broken. All carnival games were expensive If you wanted to do rides, $1 = 1 ticket it seems. I do want to shout out the performers there. They put a lot of energy into the show!

Lights were pretty cool near the entrance.

Reason why I didn't go to 1 star is because my kids did have fun at the expense of us...

Although my 3 yr old granddaughter had a blast, it's not worth the $35-$50 per person tickets. She loved the snow play and snow tubing. There are some cute areas for photo ops of the kids but thats it. You can ice skate elsewhere all day for half the price of their 1 hour. My 12 yr old niece and her friends were bored out of their minds. It's gotten worse the last 2 years. The areas that were supposed to be interactive seemed like last minute ideas they threw together. We saw 2 characters and no interaction from one of them at all. They offer no souvenirs for the kids and no holiday themed foods items. It's basically a high priced carnival with a holiday themed entrance. A couple of safety issues, glass in lanterns kids play with. Some of the panels were cracked and broken. Extension cord plugs were not secured. Several areas had exposed plugs that weren't pushed together with exposed metal prongs that a child could touch. If there were train rides this year we didn't see it. If they put this back on the fair property like they had a few years back it would be awesome again. Unfortunately it's in the parking lot only and the do nothing to try and hide it. More interactive themed areas are needed for the kids. I would suggest checking out free or less expensive holiday events in OC before coming here. I forgot to mention the MULTIPLE Time share sellers WTH do time shares have to do with Winterfest? AND...