05 October 2008

Red Bull Soapbox Bullsh!*

At about 11am Saturday we went up to see the Red Bull Soap Box Race. The race course was fenced-off through the heart of Mt. Adams. I didn't know anything about the race, so we had to ask when it started. When they told us the didn't actually start for 2 hours, we thought we would just look around and maybe get a bite to eat.

It was pretty empty at the bottom of the hill, where the race was going to end. They had loud music, about 50 port-o-lets, a paramedics booth, but not much was going on, so we hiked on up Wareham, Hatch and St. Gregory and saw the starting ramp. Then we went on up Pavillion to the top of the hill where some booths were set up to display the cars and sell some refreshments. Every step of our way up the hill, it kept getting more and more crowded, and less and less pleasant. We looked at a couple cars, but the crowd was so tight, there was no food, and we could barely move. We decided to get out of there, and maybe sit at the bottom and watch the cars there.

So we walked down Monastery past the old school, turned left down the hill, and the crowd kept getting more and more impossible to navigate. The race still wasn't starting for an hour and a half! We decided to get the hell out of this trap.
 
We navigated down the western sidewalk of St. Gregory, and at Hatch it was super crowded with pushing and stuff. With all the barricades up for the race, we were trapped. You could not cross the street. We continued heading downward only to find that at the bottom of Hatch, the sidewalk was completely barricaded with NO EXIT! At this point we considered knocking over the barricades and crossing the street. A couple behind us was also trying to leave the place and couldn't believe what a mess it was. All we could do was turn around and push our way back up the hill.
 
After much duress, we got back up to Monastery, up the hill and then we went back down towards the Celestial and cut down some steps through the woods and viola, we were back down by Elsinore street and home free. The whole time we were trying to leave, there were hundreds of people walking up the hill adding to the crowd. When we got to Gilbert, it was getting close to 1:00 and hundreds of people were still parking way down there and starting their trek up. They had no idea of the mess they were walking into, and I felt sorry for them.

Here are some pics I took before it got real bad:

Crowd at 11:30:
 


Gnome:
 


Pacman:
 


Football car:
 


Gorilla Glue Drivers:
 


Mr. Kidney:
 


Back at the bottom, Elsinore Condos:
 

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's too bad you didn't stick around to enjoy the race. Everyone I was with had the time of their life. It was by far the most exciting event to come to Cincinnati I've ever seen.
We were VERY fortunate that RedBull chose to come here.
The event turned out to be a huge success.

Anonymous said...

That sounds like the Seinfeld episode where they get trapped by the Puerto Rican Day Parade..

Randy Simes said...

I'm glad there was a good turnout. Looks like a fun time.

Dan said...

I'm glad there was a good turn out, sorry that it seemed a little unorganized in spots. Thanks for sharing your pictures though!

Anonymous said...

We went up early (11:30) but had to leave for the boy's soccer game (around 12:40). Parking at CAM was easy...the pits were pretty claustrophobic...and, while the sidewalks were pretty easy to navigate at first, it was easy to see how they could become human funnel nightmares. Our trip back down St. Gregory was tight...19th century sidewalks don't have a lot of setbacks. Seems like they could've alleviated it a bit by encroaching on the street a bit more...but, eh...whatever. While Mt. Adams handles equally or bigger crowds for the fireworks, it makes a big difference when everyone can simply walk in the streets. All in all, though, it was a pretty good event for the city.