Last night we booked a trip to see Santa at The Brigg Garden Centre for 2yr old Eve, can’t say I remember ever going before especially not at Christmas. But I suppose Trent Valley was closer to home.

First appearance of the Garden centres exterior was quite dismal and unimpressive so we weren’t quite sure what to expect.We obviously chose a quiet period as we went in the dark around 5pm.

As you walk into the garden centre, as you will know if you have ever been it is rather large. Anyway we followed the arrows and signs to the rear of the garden centre and from a distance you could see the sparkly Christmas delights and illuminations.

When you finally reach the Brigg garden centre ‘Fairytale Christmas’ you are quite overwhelmed, not by the price of the Christmas trees although they are something to be quite overwhelmed by, but by the grand display of Christmas trees, lights, decorations and effort.

For a small child it was more than exciting and a lot to take in.There were a lot of seat and comfy sofa benches set about the place some of which were seated directly in front of a quite specular polar bear band. Mechanical polar bears, larger than life playing the piano and other instruments.Impressive.

You then continue down the path, following the signs to Santa’s Grotto and the Yuletide train. We reached the gate and were greeted by some very happy and smiley elf’s. We confirmed our booking and were told we could ride the train and play on the two bouncy castles and then take a place in line for Santa when we were ready.

When booking the Santa experience online and seeing it was £8 it seemed quite expensive but once seeing what you got for the £8 it was definitely well worth it.

So after a merry little train ride around the track and a bounce on the castle it was off to see Santa, guided by the friendly Elf your taken to Santa’s door and told to knock, his voice bellows ‘Come In’. Another good thing about this Santa visit is upon booking you enter details about your child i.e. their name and it personalises your child’s visit.

So the usual Santa chat happens in a nice little room and he passes your child a golden ticket and they are told to visit his toyshop, you exit from the back of his room and sure enough there is a lovely little toyshop, including some mechanical Santa’s little helpers imitating the toy making process.

This golden ticket entitles your child to pick ANY toy in the room and there is a wide variety.Little Eve couldn’t quite decide as I think she was probably a little over taken by the amount of toys and the choice options. So silent and bemused was more the word to describe her reaction. The toys were all good quality not rubbish you might pick up at the pound shop.

The option of printed memorabilia was presented at the end via a keyring, snow globe etc.

There is a lot of other things around as well such as a talking oak tree and large over scaled animals to sit on. There was even a line of funfair mirrors to have a laugh at.

Overall this was a great experience for any child and worth the trip and the money.

You can book online here: http://www.britishgardencentres.com/centres/brigg/