This was a great holiday event for our family and friends. My friend and I took our kids on 12/21 and had so much fun. We anticipated the wait, you can see the lines along the I-17 so there wasn't a big surprise there. If you get into the line along the access road and then change your mind you can choose to forgo the event and drive out of the line but you would be missing out. We planned ahead and picked up dinner before we got there and we ate in the car while we waited to get in. Total wait time was about 45 minutes. The light show was pretty amazing and very well done.
It happened to be pretty cold and windy (winter finally arrived in Phoenix!) the night we went so we didn't spend too much time in Santa's village. We met the owner and he was super nice and took time to show the kids some of the features of the interactive play area.