Santaland: Earls Court December 2005

We went as a family to this event on Monday with some trepidation. We'd heard very mixed reviews from friends and the forums were feeding back that it was a waste of money - we'd already bought our tickets. We even considered not going because of the travel costs getting there. The good thing about it was that we got a nice photo of our two kids with Santa. Apart from that it was shit. Here's a list of my gripes:

1. Long walk to Earls Court 2 (right at the back of Earls Court)
2. People were herded into the "Christmas market" to spend money there
3. Carpets were dirty and were red and green - where's the feeling of snow?
4. Coat attendants were grumpy and it would have cost two pounds for our buggy and coats (we didn't bother)
5. We were herded into "channels" where families could see Santa simultaneously
6. We had to watch a boring video outlining the story behind collecting Santa's magical ribbons
7. We had to watch the video and watch a crap entertainer do his best to cheer up a silent audience of bored adults and kids
8. The Santa we eventually saw dropped my daughter's Santa letter and picture on the floor as we were leaving him (and I don't think he even noticed)
9. The main arena was just a few fairground rides randomly distributed (the kids were given 6 coins to exchange for six free rides - one of our kids lost their bag)
10. There weren't enough ribbons being handed out

So, you can see, it was all a big rip-off. Oh well, been there, done that, won't do that ever again.