We were invited guests of the intu Trafford Centre.
Over the weekend we headed off to the intu Trafford Centre for a visit to the Christmas grotto. This year the grotto in Barton Square has a Polar Expedition theme.
We arrived early in Barton Square and grabbed hot chocolates from the little Christmas market they’ve got there. At the appointed hour we joined the queue and had our names checked off the list by a friendly elf.
Our group were shown into a room decorated like a log cabin. The children sat at the front (adults on benches at the back) and an elf chatted to the children about the reindeer and about Christmas magic. We all repeated a rhyme, the door swung open and we magically arrived in the North Pole.
We then waited in a room with animatronic polar bears and a lovely snowy enchanted arctic wonderland. The elves chatted to the children while we waited and the kids really enjoyed watching the polar bears.
After ten minutes or so of queuing, we moved onto my favourite part of our visit – the augmented reality experience. This was very well done and we spent a decent amount of time perched on an piece of arctic ice interacting penguins, seals, killer whales and polar bears. It was fab.
We then moved on to queue up to see Father Christmas, the queue was fairly fast moving and the room we were queuing in was as festive as it gets and very pretty. Very soon we were ushered through to meet Father Christmas who had a quick chat with the boy and gave him the gift of a little Playmobil set. We also had our photo taken which we picked up at the end.
Tickets to the Polar Expedition experience are £7.50 per child and £5 per adult. We were on the tour for around an hour and the boy really enjoyed his visit and chatting to the elves. I think it’s good value for money and the augmented reality part in particular was a real winner for us.
The Christmas grotto is open until Saturday 24 December and it’s probably best if you book ahead if you can. You can find out more about the Polar Expedition and buy tickets on their website.