The “Ice Queen,” Dominique Colell, can be practically surgical with a chainsaw and a block of ice. But at this moment – eight days before opening – she was directing construction, not sculpting.
This year, visitors can slip into what Colell and her crew are building – an icebox showroom. There, they can walk among giant friezes set in walls of ice, sit on a frozen throne and marvel at an 11-foot-tall, 18-foot-wide ice castle and companion ice dragon.
They can do this, for free, for as long as they can stand the cold; the room can be set as low as 7 degrees Fahrenheit.
Colell, 34, is the rare former Miss America contestant who has taken up ice sculpting as a full-time profession. She owns Images in Ice in Camarillo.
The chilly museum is only half of the fair’s new Fairenheit 32° section, which organizers call “a dose of winter in the middle of summer.” Colell’s corner of that world will include 90,000 pounds of perfectly translucent, Minnesota-made ice that she and her nine sculptors will work on in the Ice Museum – the OC Fair’s first since 2010
Around the corner from the museum sits another frigid 2015 attraction: the fair’s first authentic ice skating rink. (Previously, the fair offered so-called ice skating on a specially made form of slippery plastic.)
Open all day at $10 an hour, this year’s rink can hold as many as 150 skaters at a time and freeze about 3 inches of actual, nonplastic ice, even when outside temperatures top 90 degrees.
And starting at 9:30 p.m. daily, the place will transform into a chilly club – “After Dark Skate Party” – with a DJ and flashing LED lights. Admission is $15, including skates.
OC Fair basics
Dates: July 17-Aug. 16, Wednesday-Sunday.
Hours: Noon to midnight on Wednesday-Friday. 10 a.m. to midnight on Saturday and Sunday.
Admission: $12 for ages 13-59. $7 for seniors and for kids ages 6-12. Age 5 and under is free. Free admission for kids on Thursdays. $2 Fridays: From noon to 4 p.m. on Fridays, rides and games are $2, and some food vendors will sell samples for $2. Early bird weekends: Admission is $3 for all from 10 to 11 a.m. on weekends.
Parking: $10. Free off-site parking and shuttle service available Saturdays and Sundays from the Experian parking structure, 475 Anton Blvd, Costa Mesa
Info: ocfair.com
Metrolink ofrece trenes especiales para OC Fair
Metrolink y OCTA se ofrece el OC Fair Express para los que van a la Feria de OC. Los pasajeros a lo largo de las líneas de Metrolink en el Condado de Orange y el Inland Empire pueden transferirse de forma gratuita a la ida y vuelta en autobús especial al OC Feria desde el Anaheim Canyon, Santa Ana, Irvine, y las estaciones de Anaheim-ARTIC.