The holiday season is a time for light shows. In addition to the joy that comes with setting up and viewing neighborhood light displays, it can be fun to see a professional drive through light show. I recently heard about a new light show display at Cunningham Lake. After browsing some google reviews of the show I was a bit dubious of the display’s quality, but nonetheless I wanted to check it out for myself. I got the chance to go through the light display twice and I think as long as you have the right expectations it is well worth the trip.
The light show is called “Magical Lights at Lake Cunningham”. Admission costs $20 per vehicle on Monday through Thursday and $30 per vehicle Friday through Sunday. You buy your tickets online and book a slot in advance.
Magical Lights at Lake Cunningham claims to be Omaha’s largest Christmas light show with over 1 million lights. You would think with so many lights it wouldn’t be hard to find, but it took my family and me a little bit of navigating to find the entrance. Make sure if you go, to navigate to the “Magical Lights…” and not just to Lake Cunningham, as google maps might just take you to a random road near the lake…(yikes!) Once we did find the right spot, the actual entrance to the light show was well marked, and had colorful lights to let us know we were at the right place. When you pull onto the road there’s a booth with an attendant that will scan a QR code you receive with your ticket purchase. The attendant will instruct you to turn your car to a radio station synced with the lights. When we got to the booth the attendant handed out a sort of “light show scavenger hunt”. Though the scavenger hunt was geared towards much younger children it was still a nice touch.
We went on a Wednesday night and there was hardly anyone else there. There was no wait to start the drive through. After the booth you simply follow the road and the signs as you begin your drive.
The first leg of the display included light up pieces for the U.S military, with light up tanks and fighter jets. When we got through the first section, we reached a field of tiny penguins illuminated with a light, which was definitely more my speed. The lightshow included a section with a “field” of light up corn stalks and tractors lining the road as a sort of homage to Nebraska and Iowa farms. After that we found displays for various Nebraska sports teams.
There was a huge diversity of different characters and display elements throughout the drive. There seemed to be a display for everyone, things ranged from light up minions to baby yoda. While I didn’t think the light displays themselves were wildly impressive, the sheer amount of light displays was. Seeing things like the minions, star wars ships, music notes, nutcrackers and Christmas trees all packed together along the whole route was pretty impressive. It was definitely fun to try and spot all the little easter eggs and characters in the displays.
In addition to the large amount of lights, It was a nice touch that there was music synced to them. At first I couldn’t tell that the lights were changing, but as we drove through the show we started to see the lights blink. Lights changed on various characters’ mouths to create an effect that they were singing the songs that the radio played.
The light show route was a loop around the Cunningham Lake campground and as we neared the end we reached the spot where we started. As previously mentioned, the show was not busy at all when we visited. One of the attendants was very kind and let us go through the loop a second time.
The website states that the drive should take around 20 minutes, but for us It seemed to go much faster. I definitely recommend going with a group of friends, not only for splitting the relatively steep cost of a ticket but also I think part of the fun of looking at lights is just taking your time and hanging out with people.
Overall, the light show is worthwhile as long as you know what you are getting into. It’s not “the best” light show in the world but it is pretty cool. If you are looking for a fun thing to do with some friends one night, Magical Lights at Lake Cunningham is worth a visit.
