Wonderful, but Pricey

My family visited the Ice and Snow Festival main displays on February 15th, 2010. At the gate, one of the ticket takers yelled at my wife and then took a stick to measure the height of my 6 year old son. The guy said my son was "too tall" for the reduced ticket price (already paid at the ticket booth), but he actually measured to the top of my son's winter hat, which had a fuzzy ball thing on top. My wife tried to point this out but the ruffian was already shouting and pointing the ticket booth inside, where people had to "pay up" for their too tall kids.

We had no choice but to cough up another 90 yuan for my son. Definitely not family friendly, more like gouge 'em, get 'em in the gate, maybe gouge 'em again. My wife took the new ticket and went back and hit the ticket taker on the head with it, but he didn't seem to feel anything through his bony skull.

Despite the inauspicious start, I really enjoyed the displays, but be warned about the cold and your camera - my HD video cam gave me a low temperature warning, telling me to shut down. It was around -30 in the wind.

This is definitely worth going to at least once in your life. You will judge all future ice and snow sculpture displays by what you will see here.

Also, good luck getting a taxi to take you back to the city.