Would you pay this?

[esho]

Local light trail, looks very festive. £20 per adult and free for our baby. I know baby won’t really know where we are but love Christmas and it’s our first as a family so want to build in festivities. The light trail is about a mile long and there’s lots to see, and street food type stalls.

In the back of my mind though £40 is ridiculous isn’t it?

YABU -rip off, plenty other festive activities
YANBU - would pay it

It really depends on the light trail - I've done a couple and they've been really good. That being said my children were over 18 months at the time and could get something out of going. It's just lights at the end of the day and might be a bit boring just the two of you with a baby that won't really engage/interact?
Plus it's dark and the lighting might scare the baby! I saw plenty of screaming young kids at the ones I went to 😂

It doesn't matter if I would pay it; is it worth £40 to you and have you got £40? If so, go for it. It sounds as if you want to!

I'd pay, it sounds lovely, and could become a Christmas tradition for your family.

Inflation has played merry havoc with my sense of what is a reasonable cost for lots of these things. Apparently £15 in 2014 would be £20 today. Prices have gone up a lot.

I think £20 each is pretty good actually. We’ve paid £25 each for one this year and I thought that was good value.

Our local trail is £17.50. I don't think £20 is too over the top.

In general terms, it’s a massive rip off. However, does depend on the trail and sometimes you have to get ripped offed to do stuff.

I would 100% pay it, our local one is at the Botanical Gardens in Birmingham, it's a similar price and I don't have an issue with it, I love Christmas and doing things like this, it's only once a year!

I love a light trail and that pricing sounds pretty normal. You will probably spend about the same amount of time there as you would spend if you went to a movie or out for dinner, but this if for something special you can only do at Christmas. I'd think of it as "what can I afford to spend for a nice and slightly different night out?", not "what are lights worth"?

Also, these things are easy with a baby who will sleep in a buggy or sling, but can be much harder to do with a cold grumpy toddler, so I'd do it this year while the baby is easy and free, and then you can make an informed decision about doing it in future years.

I see things like this as investing in the local tourist economy, a bit like buying the rip-off ice cream at my local theatre is supporting that.

Would you and DH spend more than £40 on a meal out / trip to the cinema etc that you no longer go on? Do you both want to go? Would it be an issue if baby slept through it and can you just view it as a nice evening out with your partner?

If you enjoy them and can afford it, why not. You could spend £40 on a few drinks in a pub for you both so it's just a different type of evening entertainment.

If you're not that bothered or think it's too expensive, you could wait and see if there are any deals. A couple of years ago we went to one at a local wildlife park and they were doing discounted entry combined with a light show ticket so it made it a lot cheaper - we saw both the lights and went in the wildlife park for less than the cost of normal entry for the park.

Depends if you will be up for it when it comes to it. I have only done a light trail in a big group. I wasn't blown away by the experience. But for me the worst bit was leaving my cosy house to get there in the dark. We went to Kew and we couldn't drive. It was a damp evening. Nothing would make me do it again.

A thing you could do with your baby is find a paint a pot studio and at Xmas you choose a Xmas baubles or ornament for the Xmas tree and paint it. Then it gets fired in a kiln and you collect it 2 weeks later. They do a lovely thing with babies hand prints making them like reindeer antlers. A permanent reminder of babies first Xmas. For light s my neighbourhood is very lit up in gardens as well as in windows. When they were very little my DGC used to think Santa lived at one house it was so lit up. In December I can walk for 30 mins with lights all over the outside of virtually every house and it cost me nothing.

The vendors should be paying
£20 per adult is too much,

You will buy some shit mulled wine for £8 each and generous hangover

Go to dinner instead

They look amazing but they're so overpriced I refuse to go