What Goes Up Just Came Down : ‘Slaugh,’ the Hard Work of Dismantling Rides, Follows Fair’s Closure

In a flurry of hissing hydraulics, grunting carnival workers and clanging wrenches, Conejo Valley Days ended Sunday night, and the “slaugh” began.

Slaugh--it rhymes with cow--is short for slaughter. Carnival workers use the term as either a noun or a verb.

As in, “I can slaugh this ride in two hours.”

As in, “the faster you get done with a slaugh, the faster you can relax.”

As a result, the pace of a slaugh is fast and furious.

The carnival workers, who operated the rides all five days of the Western-themed festival, planned to stay up all night Sunday slaughtering the soaring metal skeletons and cramming them into the trailer trucks that serve as coffins.

Elsewhere at Conejo Creek Park on Sunday, visitors headed for the exits, and Conejo Valley Days officials prepared for the end of the annual community-sponsored event.

“What I’ve heard is there’s a real empty space, like all the air’s been knocked out of you,” General Chairman Tom Glancy said.

Overcast, cool weather kept crowds down slightly from last year, but Glancy said the festival’s first year under the direction of a nonprofit corporation (instead of the Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce) had been a success. The final count will show more than 60,000 attended Conejo Valley Days, he said.

Among the visitors were Rich and Trina Herrera of Thousand Oaks. They came to Conejo Valley Days with son Cody, 5, who was firmly gripping a plush orange-and-white stuffed ram, a trophy for pitching accuracy in a carnival game.

“We’ll be back next year,” Rich Herrera vowed as he exited. “It was fun.”

While Conejo Valley Days organizers and visitors could anticipate going home to a good night’s sleep, the 60 carnival workers were confronted with the slaugh. And the slaugh is “just a lot of hard work,” said Dave Henderson, a supervisor for Shamrock Shows, which ran rides at the event.

The workers must lift steel plates weighing hundreds of pounds. In addition to demanding strength, the grueling job requires close cooperation between workers.

“There’s probably more teamwork in this industry than in any other industry except for the military,” Henderson said.

If a team member slips or is distracted while helping another worker heft hundreds of pounds, the results can be grave.

“There are so many people that have hurt me bad,” said Greg Shesterkin, 40, raising his hands to better display ugly scars. “These are a year old and they still hurt.”

The carnival workers approached their work with stoicism, despite the dangers inherent in the job.

“We really don’t worry about it too much. We just do it. It’s like waking up in the morning,” Henderson said. He said that the addition of hydraulics to most rides during the last decade has made the slaugh quicker and safer.

So, workers scrambled to take apart the Rock-O-Plane, the Sizzler, the Fun Slide, the Zipper and the Skywheel--the only ride that needs two trailers.

They said they felt more like parents relieved to be leaving the carnival than like children begging for one last ride.

“We’re happy to get on to the next spot,” Henderson said, looking forward to a Cinco de Mayo event next weekend in Oxnard.

Shesterkin said he just wanted some rest.

“As soon as we’re done, we’re off,” he said. “The sooner we’re done, the sooner we’re out of here.”