Oglebay Festival of LIghts

After having dinner in the Wilson Lodge at Oglebay, we set out in our car to see the Festival of Lights. The drive through the light display is over six miles of winding road that loops around the park. You can see it by driving your own vehicle or you can purchase tickets for the trolley that leaves from the lodge. Our weekday package at the lodge included our donation ($25) to the festival and we had received four sets of 3-D glasses. There was a booth set up for those who came into the park where they were asked to donate.

As we drove, we tried to figure out where the start was and finally determined that there really wasn't a start and finish exactly. It was hard to tell where we'd been and where to go next. There were arrows on signs to indicate direction but cars were going both ways on the roads so there really wasn't just one way to go. It was impossible to follow the map and see the lights at the same time. We gave up and just followed the traffic and continued on until we began to see a repeat of displays.

What really had us confused was the set of 3-D glasses we had. We would try them on and look at displays but they really didn't seem to do much but make the lights blurry. At one point though, I had the glasses on and was looking at the car in front of us. "Oh my gosh!" I said to Bob. "That car's tail lights are reindeer heads!"

The glasses I had made the car lights and street lights look like reindeer but the glasses Bob grabbed made them look like snowflakes. We exchanged glasses and tried out the others. One pair was another snowflake with a different design and the other just made lights into a prism. If they were supposed to enhance the actual light displays, we never figured out how but they were fun and we saved them to have some fun with our grandkids later.

When we were done, we returned to the lodge and went up to the big gathering room and enjoyed some wonderful hot chocolate before calling it a night.