When you decide to take a vacation to participate in the Kentucky Derby Festival there is considerable planning involved to make the trip possible. One of the first things is ticket acquisition.
Most of the festival events are free with a $5 Pegasus Pin, but several key events require tickets or you need tickets for preferred seating. Of course the big event is the Kentucky Derby itself. Unless your plans are to party in the infield, you will need to acquire reserved seating at Churchill Downs and they won’t be cheap and they won’t be around for long. Once it sells out, the tickets will only get more expensive on the aftermarket sites. Tickets start becoming rare in February. Since many packages also include Kentucky Oaks tickets as well, even that event sells out quickly. If you want on the Belle of Louisville for the Great Steamboat Race, you need to hop on that early too as well as reserved seating for the Pegasus Parade.
