Room rate for the show was $230...a bit much so we opted for a day trip instead. This weekend was very nice weatherwise, as it was supposed to be in the mid-upper 80's. A perfect drive right? Well, the 10 bazillion other LA and Orange County residents must have had the same idea...go to Santa Barbara for the Art-Knife show.
Got on the freeway and for every 5 miles of free flow at 65 MPH, there were 5 miles of 15 MPH speeds or slower. Can we say tedious in redundancy?! By the time we reached Santa Barbara, over 3 hours had passed. I like our car but I can enjoy only so much seat time when the drive is dead like this. Something about the slugging makes my 6 unhappy.
Anyway, after that battle, I got to the show to find easy access. Uh-oh...a knife show like this should not be easy to grab a nice parking space. After paying my door fees ($20, more on that later) without any others, I entered the room. Was that a tumble weed that just blew by me?! Did I hear the crickets?! Looked very much like a Sunday at a knife show.
At Solvang, the makers we know will be sold out in a matter of 30 minutes-1 hour that first day. I actually got to look at knives on a Saturday! Some nice ones to be seen. Sad, saw some not so happy faces...knife makers.
I had hoped to catch-up with some of my fellow collectors buds but they didn't come to this show. That bums me because Solvang is the only time I see them.
Oh well... I did enjoy but it wasn't the grand meeting like it usually is.
*$20 day pass. As nice a location this is, $20 pushes the door fee a bit much IMO. $5-$10 is no brainer but trying to weed out tire kickers by having such a rate just limits noob traffic. $20 thumb-down. At least throw in a coke or glass of beer as cover charge then.
If you can look past the $20 door fee, there are still some nice knives to be seen/had. Except Ken Onion, he sold out. Happy for him.
If you breeze through the show, play tourist and enjoy SB since you made the drive.
After battling traffic for some 110 miles and on such a nice day, the 10, million otehr LA residents must have wanted to also take a drive.