Just confirming, you were going, but now aren't as it's too expensive? Not at all, just remember the early days with Gail when it was free for pilots and then a donation in the past few years but if you are flying down in your own aircraft by yourself because you have a bit of camping gear it gets a little bit expensive..
One of my best memories ever was New Year's Eve when they had catering that canceled without notice and had to pull in someone at the last moment and we were all sitting there at midnight unfed and chanting "We want food" because the replacement caterers arrived with empty gas bottles and nothing was cooked until about 2am... They were great days back then ! Some here will remember that event because we had pilots from as far as Melbourne that flew in.
Fly in for free.... if it wasn't for the planes it would be nothing on display at the airshow..... Sure you can have a few display aircraft but people like to look at all the odd varieties of aircraft out there and many of them are one seat or two seat aircraft. not five seaters
They were talking at our club today and many were not going because of the cost because 99% of the aircraft at our airfield are two seaters.... and will be flying alone because of carrying camping gear, but I still expect that many will be going and they were just using the cost is a reason to stay away or have a winge.