Does Father Christmas do a tour of your town / village on Christmas Eve? (as organised by local Round Table or similar)

[DadDadDad]

I must be getting soft starting a Christmas-related thread.

In our town / large village, every year at this time, a festively decorated flat-bed truck comes round with Santa on the back. He visits every road ringing his bell, and it's quite the event with over-excited children rushing outside to cheer and wave. It's just happened in our road (we're pretty much the last road, so he must have started hours ago).

I was just wondering how unusual this is. Does it happen where you live? (Without completely outing myself, I'm near Cambridge).

Yes we do in our village although their last day was yesterday. It takes them a week or so to work through the route, doing a different bit each evening.

Yes, organised by the rotary club. I absolutely love it!

There are loads of these in my area, pretty much everywhere has one, I didn't realise it was unusual, usually they do it over a few nights with a schedule of streets.

Yes always, organised by the Rotary Club. They post the day's roads on FB so everyone knows when to expect them, but they say don't tell the DC just in case. They don't go out if the weather's bad.

Yes, and this year it cheered me up no end! Was in bed with a chest infection and heard him coming so I scrambled up and saw it go past.

They knock every single door with the bucket collection, not sure about that bit. They only ever used to collect from people that had come out when they heard the music.

Yes! And they go right outside our house too. It's lovely.

No but we've just had the village carol concert in the square and he comes to that and collects donations of gifts for needy kids

Yes, in the weeks leading up to Christmas. It's magical.

I also happen to work for a charity that benefits from the money they (Round Table in our case) raise. They make up hampers which they give to many local causes for distribution to those who would benefit the most from some community cheer.

Son-in -Law got roped in a few years back. Their town's sleigh is on a trailer. SIL drives trailers for a living, took it down cul-de-sacs, narrow housing estates, pub car parks and places that it had never been before (no issue for him), they were raising money for charity - took three times the amount they had collected the year previously!

Yes, the village association organises it. But it was on Friday and we were still at work/nursery and wouldn't have been home early enough to be part of it.

Yes, our local one raised over £8k for charity over only a few nights.

Yes and I totally forgot . It was DS's last day at his nursery (moving to a pre school closer to home and he's been a bit under the weather so was totally exhausted. By the time they came knocking t9see if there was anyone home who would like to see Santa it was ten past 8 and he was fast asleep! Oh well next year...

Not where I live, but there is one where DMum lives (medium sized town) organised by the local Lions (I think)

There were a couple of years when we were there at the right time. Lovely!!

Yes rotary club around here ( market town in the Pennines) does it every year

They do it here too, not Christmas Eve though. It's great, they collect for charity and so when my dd started to question Santa I said that Santa was a way of making sure all children had a present on Christmas day not just the rich ones. Softened it a bit and explains why there are so many around 😁

Yep. I remember it as a child 30 odd years ago, and it still happens now. Not on Christmas Eve though, it usually takes them a few weekends to cover the whole town

He does but not on Christmas Eve. Santa did his tour a few weeks ago in our village.

Here is Santa from the local rotary club keeping the magic of christmas well and truly alive for the kids. Watch with the volume turned up.

Yes, organised by the local Lions club. I'm in a suburb/small town of a large city.
Of course, every year there's the usual angry moans that they don't come down every single street

Rotary do it here, but a week or so ago. They have a sled that looks quite real pulled by a car. I gave Santa a whisky one year as it was freezing.

Yes, local fire brigade do ours.

Yes we have it - about 2 weeks to cover our town and the one next to it but there's always people that moan it doesn't cover their road. I helped for a couple of years - great fun!

Yes, the local Lions club does it, throughout December. Reasonably sized town. I love it but missed it this year as was working.

Our local Lions do in the run up to Christmas but this year the itinerary had to be continually altered because of poor weather.
They didn't get round all the roads/streets they usually visit.

I think they raise a fair amount as they knock on every door in the road.