Holiday light show at Arts Center was a big disappointment

Every year my family has certain holiday traditions. These traditions include driving around listening to holiday music and looking at over-the-top houses with thousands of lights and moving figurines.

Another tradition is visiting the annual drive-through light displays. This year my family chose to go to PNC Bank Arts Center, Holmdel. It’s not the first time we’ve been there, so the children were excited to see some of their favorite displays.

We arrived there at about 6:30 p.m. on a Sunday. We knew there would be a line in the parking lot, so seeing the traffic backed up to the parkway exit was not a surprise. We tried to turn on the facility’s radio station, 1640-AM. To our disappointment, it wouldn’t come in. We thought maybe we weren’t close enough to the entrance.

The children noticed there were more lights in the parking lot this year. I thought that was great — keep the children occupied while we wait in line. Approximately 20 minutes later, we arrived at the cashier’s booth. I paid my $15, and we proceeded to drive through. Once again, we tried the radio station — it still wouldn’t come in. So much for holiday music. We overlooked the two Toyota lights that were out; we were more interested in seeing Santa and snowmen and stuff.

Then we noticed that there were more displays not lighted. The children were getting upset. If a couple of lights were out, we understood that things happen. As we approached the back of the arena, we thought we were going the wrong way. Only one side of the road had displays lighted, and they were few and far between, to say the least. The whole right side was not lighted. We could see what should have been there, but there were no lights.

As we arrived on the other side of the building, we could see that we were at the end of the show. The only place to go was out. Needless to say, we waited more time in the parking lot than it took to go through the show.

To anyone thinking of going, save your $15 for something else. You can see more lights in your neighborhood.

Shirley Zdanowicz

Spotswood