Annual San Antonio Stock Show And Rodeo

Awesome! I’ve never been to the Rodeo here in San Antonio before and went a couple of weeks ago. Parking was a little difficult but once we got inside there was so much to see and do! The Rodeo is a great place for families and adults alike to see animals and have fun. There’s a wide variety of carnival type food stands and rides of course. We went on a weekday so it wasn’t as crowded but there were large school groups and lots of kids. FYI they have clean and convenient restrooms in the expo hall. I definitely recommend it as a must-​do for San Antonians.

Just took a ride with Über driver Jeffery, while our friends drove in another vehicle. We beat our friends to the San Antonio Rodeo by 1 hour! Way to find a shortcut, Jeffery! Go Über!!! Visiting from Anchorage, AK

It’s that time of year again! Rodeo season is here! First off, parking is pretty easy. They have huge lots for 10 dollars right by the AT&T Center. Overall the site itself is much smaller than the Houston rodeo. There’s a carnival, a food court, exhibits and a bunch of vendors. It’ll take no more than two hours to go through it all. Food is pretty standard with your overpriced fried goodies, turkey legs etc. If you go on dollar hot dog/​popcorn/​cotton candy day, be aware that the serving size is small, that’s why they’re a dollar! The concerts are always fun to check out. However, the time posted on the ticket is not the start time. For example if you bought a ticket for a 7:30 show, 7:30 is actually when the rodeo starts. The rodeo lasts around 2 hours, then you have around 20 minutes for them to set up the stage and then the performer comes out. So if you’re there for the concert you can show up two hours later and still have plenty of time to get situated before the music starts. Good thing about the rodeo is that the stage is a rotating stage so don’t worry if your seats don’t face the performer ! Overall, the rodeo’s fun. It’s a great way to get some cheap tickets to see that performer that you’ve always wanted to see and at the same time enjoy all of the festivities going around!

Here’s the story, I’m Asian and even though I was born in Texas, rodeos are foreign to me. Year after year I’ve heard about the rodeo and I finally decided to check it out this year. I didn’t know what to expect.
First stop, Sheep Skillathon. Despite the event name, there are no actual sheep involved. It’s an academic event for kids to test their knowledge on all things sheep. We should have read the event description first. Rookie mistake.
Now time for snacks. We had the fried Oreos, freshly squeezed lemonade, cheesecake on a stick, and sausage. Nothing gourmet here, just some good old fashioned fair food. I must go back and get the maple bacon funnel cake!
The petting zoo was a lot of fun. That experience further supported my decision to get a pet pig. There was one llama (see picture) that I would watch out for. Once you turn your head away, he pops up right in front of you. Oh and he spits too!
On to the actual rodeo. Honestly out of all the events, the mutton busting was my favorite! If I was 5 years old, I would definitely sign up to ride a sheep! Bareback riding was exciting and I was impressed by the skill level of the riders.
Next time I’m going to check out the horses, carnival rides, and of course eat more fried food!

Let’s Rodeo San Antonio!
This is such a fun event! The Rodeo goes on each and every year down at the AT&T Center and the Joe & Harry Freeman Colosseum, and the grounds around there. It’s really quite an amazing site. They have these huge buildings where they show off the prize winning cattle, pigs, chickens, and all sorts of other animals.
There’s a midway full of rides and games. If you go on the right day, they have these package deals where you can ride an unlimited number of rides. Of course, the carnival games are always fun– you can go and win your own Spongbob Squarepants! Wooot!
The rodeo is a real professional rodeo sanctioned event. Look online for their schedule to see what events are going on. The events do change, based upon who’s competing. But usually, you get all the regular events, like Mutton Bustin’, and Bronco riding, and so on. It can be a bit cruel to see them mistreat the animals like that, but I guess it’s all for the Rodeo. Sigh.
After every rodeo, they offer a concert that comes with the ticket price. The performer comes out to the middle of the AT&T Center, where they haul a rotating circular stage out to the middle of the dirt floor. With the performance going on in the middle of the floor, there are no bad seats in the house!

This review is for the Largest Indoor Rodeo for the last 10 years! Go San Antonio!
I gotta be honest, because I always am in my reviews, and bluntly. The HEB Fan Zone might be a nice option for families on a budget or buying more than a few tickets; however, it is not for me! Too many people, too close together, too high up, too much alcohol in the blood… just too much everything. We DID have fun at the rodeo I the Fan Zone because we were with friends, but we won’t be buying those tickets again! (Well, actually, we won’t buy them ever, because these were given as a work gift.)
Rating system:
5 stars = I’ll drive across town specifically for this, and rave to all my friends about it!
4 stars = Would recommend visiting.
3 stars = Average, acceptable, positive.
2 stars = You might be able to drag me in.
1 star = I will not be returning.

Parking reasonable at $ 10. No traffic. We were given tickets to concert at Rodeo as a gift. The tickets were virtual tickets so when we got to the entry, we assumed they would scan the barcode. No, were sent to first ticket box who in turn sent us to SW ATT Box Center. Mind you, we had driven from The Woodlands and spent two nights on the hotel to attend this concert. We get to this site where a family of 8 were having problems with their paper tickets. Only one scanned. They were with two elderly parents had driven for 12 hours to see there daughter ride in for the last time in 20 yrs of working with the Rodeo Committee. They did not get into the Rodeo although one of their tickets scanned. The others didn’t. Well, our time comes… We pull up tickets on our phone. Man behind counter said we can’t scan. I would have to call my son in WA to get him to call Ticketmaster to allow them to release tickets to ATT and Rodeo. I called my son who couldn’t get thru to Ticketmaster. Luckily, my DIL was quick in thinking enough to call the ATT SW box office directly and a woman saw that I was on the phone with her. Long story, we got the tickets. Overall, the Rodeo was intimate and we were able to see everything and eat everything we wanted too. The venue is old and small and is where the Spurs play. Rodeo closes early (6:30p) and when we left their was no traffic… great experience overall.

Parking at the AT&T center is $ 10.00 but if you are going to a Rodeo Show its difficult to get out of the parking lot when everyone leaves at the same time… I would recommend parking at one of the off site lots and walking, its much better than sitting in parking lot trying to exit at the same time.
We grabbed a turkey leg and a corn dog in the carnival area however all of the «deep fried rodeo food» and the REALLY unhealthy stuff is by where the livestock shows are.
If you are going to the rodeo they have a car seat valet outside the arena which is really cool!

Taste smorgasborg, tons of rides, suggest to go early to avoid long lines. We visited the Petting Zoo enjoyed alcoholic beverages and recommend to purchase wristbands. Pricey but only comes once a year. My only complaint was Nausea; after too many rides!

It was Dollar Day. $ 1 admission, popcorn, small lemonade, cotton candy and hot dogs. Carnival rides also $ 1. Not a bad deal, but the lines can be pretty long. We were behind a man who ordered 21 hotdogs and lemonades. Took a while. The best part was not having to pay the $ 10 admission that is let’s face it, way overpriced. It was still $ 10 to park, though.

Named nine time large indoor rodeo of the year, this my all time favourite rodeo to attend along with the Stock Show. It still has somewhat of a small own atmosphere, though I nice days, very crowded. The food prices are very expensive, but I suppose that is part of being on the grounds these days

I love everything about the San Antonio Stock show and Rodeo.
I’ve gone every year since I was little. To me, it never gets old.
This year I went to see Lady antebellum and they were fantastic!
I love getting there early to watch the different events before the concert starts. Of course what could be better than seeing and watching all those cowboys :)
The grounds are always fun but very busy.
Yes parking is crowded but just remember, thousands of people are going to the same event you are. If you expect good parking, then go early and get it. No one is going to feel sorry you had to walk all that distance because you got there late. And yes, I have gotten there late plenty of times and had to walk. Its not that bad.
You definitely want to buy your tickets as early as possible because sitting that high in the AT&T center isn’t that fun. Although you can still see pretty good. We sat pretty high up for the Lady A concert and I still felt like I was closer than I was.
I agree with others who say the food is hit or miss. There are a ton of places to eat so everyone definitely has their favorites.
I love going to the rodeo every year. If you have never been, it’s definitely an experience you need to have!

2013 rodeo: mediocre
Was expecting so much more and such a better time.
Line up was average, no stellar acts, food was ok at best.
Of all the food and beer booth there, there was really nothing exciting, minus the huge, chingon bowl of roasted potatoes with sausage and the chicken and waffles. As for the beer and alky-​hol, nothing that made my inner Dean Martin lick his chops.
Oh well. There’s always an icehouse and food trucks around the corner.

The San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo is one of the reasons I just LOVE living in San Antonio. The past two years I have gone on Family Day (the last day of the rodeo) and it’s in my opinion, the absolute BEST day to go. As long as you stop by a Chick-​Fil-​A location beforehand, you can grab a coupon to get free admission into the Grounds and you also get $ 5 (discounted) parking at the AT&T Center. We usually get there right when it opens all of the fun festivities start (at 10AM) and it’s really the best time to go, if you have things planned that you want to see/​do, but you don’t want to wait in the long lines to enjoy them.
I have a kiddo, so my priorities are in the «Family Fun» section, which include: HEB Buckaroo Farms, Huggies Petting Zoo, Home Depot Workshop, Carnival, and others. We got there right when it opened and we had no problem flying through everything without waiting in line. When we left (at 1PM) we passed a majority of these places and it was crazy how long the lines had got. Definitely didn’t envy those people!
The Carnival ticket booths at the entrance of the Carnival had the longest lines ever. Needless to say, people (including us) didn’t realize that there were ticket booths on the inside of the Carnival with NO LINES, tip for next year.
Food is always a hit or miss. We try not to eat at the food booths because last year we tried the «Gyro» food booth in the food section and paid $ 15 for a greek salad and a gyro (that had little to no meat in it) when we tried to return it, the guy said he wouldn’t give us our money back. Total FAIL! Thankfully this year there was Lagniappe Today food truck and we were able to enjoy their yummy chiwaffle, so we didn’t have any food issues. We also got pizza for our little one, but that’s not too hard to mess up! ;)
This chart is a good one to go by incase you are trying to avoid the crowds as best as possible, it is 2012, but I’m sure it’s similar in the sense of the amount of people per day:
:)

So much fun.
I am ashamed to say that I have lived in San Antonio for over a decade and this is my first time to go to the rodeo. It will become a yearly tradition. What fun and excitement! The food leaves a LOT to be desired if you eat anything other than fried food but it is overall a wonderful experience with great art from young artists, beautiful animals and cool displays and shows!

Didn’t make it to the rodeo. I went for the stock shows. I was totally overwhelmed by the number of entries but this us Texas. I would totally go again. My only complaint is the food. Subpar even for a stock show

The best indoor rodeo in the world! The competition was up to the challenge tonight.
Toby Keith put on an outstanding concert. It was really great that he brought some of our military up on the stage for a couple of his songs!
Only complaint — wish they had more space between the rows of seats.

I was here on 2÷6÷2013 for the Hospitallity Committee Meeting. I am looking forward to FINALLY getting a chance to not only go to the rodeo, but to work it as well.
For those of you who don’t know yet, Friday’s is $ 1.00 day, Presidents day (Mon, Feb 18^th) will also be dollar day, and Military and Seniors get discounts as well. Visit their website to find out for sure. I don’t want to give the wrong info accidentally.

Y’know that really long road trip the San Antonio Spurs take every February? Yeah, that’s their RODEO road trip because the SA Rodeo takes over the AT&T Center. And while I’m a 6 or 7 year veteran of the Houston Rodeo, 2012 was my first trip to the SA Livestock Show and Rodeo.
The laser light shows and loud music let me know that the SA Rodeo is supposed to be one of the best in the country. And they didn’t disappoint! Everything was awesome — from the mutton bustin’ to the bull riding (only one guy went 8 seconds that night!) to the sold-​out, rocking MIRANDA LAMBERT concert afterwards on the stage that spun a FULL 360 DEGREES (take note Houston!)
We went on a Tuesday and got there midday — $ 10 parking was easy to get to and no shuttle was necessary to reach the grounds. Had plenty of time to look at the carnival (smallish) and the TONS of shopping booths, some of the livestock, and the food.
Ohhh the food. Started with the «beef sundae» where the beef and gravy was «topped» with a scoop of mashed potatoes and cheese «sprinkles» and a cherry tomato. Moved on to the RED VELVET funnel cake — highly recommended btw — and then a chopped bbq baked potato from the Fajita and Rib Corral. Finally, ended with the chicken fried bacon with honey mustard and ranch… which felt and tasted gross by the way. One bite wasn’t bad, two was a little too much, and anything more was just disgusting. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not afraid of fried foods — I’ve had fried snickers, oreos, pb and banana sandwiches, smores, and butter (Texas state fair FTW). But I am NOT doing the chicken fried bacon again.
I’ll be back, baby.

Went to the Rodeo for the first time yesterday. We had to park quite a distance away ($ 10 at a lot on Grambler), but the free bus shuttle was great and picked us up/​dropped us off right by our car.
We arrived in the late afternoon, so we really didn’t get to see the livestock and exhibits, but the actual rodeo was a lot of fun. Lady Antebellum was the featured concert and they didn’t disappoint. I am not a country music fan at all, but I think I’ve just been converted… a little!
I will be returning to the Rodeo this week with my 2^nd grade class… now THAT should be fun!

The rodeo is the happening place to be in February. There is lots to see, do, and eat. Go early to take it all in! Since rodeo tickets are such a high demand, all that’s left are nose bleed seats. All the seats closer to the ground are reserved for season ticket holders. My game plan for the 2012 is to purchase a season ticket package, keep the tickets I want, and sale the rest at «face value»! Can’t stand people who sale $ 32 tickets for $ 100.