Canterbury Travel
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Underwhelmed
Underwhelmed. We did the 4 days / 3 nights in Suomo Early Dec 2024. The kids did enjoy the trip first off. However, it just all felt too rushed and for no real reason. It is heavily scheduled, but it felt we were picked up very early in the day to accommodate the scheduling of other coach loads (we were coach 1 so guess we were first). Despite the rush there is then a lot of hanging around. The activities felt very transactional, lacked any Christmas sparkle which is our comment for the whole trip. It feels like you are transported to an activity, a coach load go through the activity then back on the bus again. There are errors - we were told on the way to the snowmobiles (Where the actual ride lasted a couple of minutes) children need to be 140cm minimum to go on as a passenger, so we had a disappointed child who watched her older sister go on. They were told they would therefore be pulled on a sleigh by snowmobile, but again this was not available when we got off. This was frustrating as promising something to a child and then not having it creates a lot of disapointment. We found Santa very early on the second day (way before our 11.30am lunchtime slot), and the build-up and excitement to finding Santa was minimal. Finding Santa again was underwhelming. We were left hanging around for 40mins before it was our turn to walk up the path. Met him for 4minutes, then the kids were shown the door and told to keep it quiet – they had just been given presents!! It could have been much better. The highlight was meeting the Huskey dogs and having a ride round the track. However, there is no trip to Santa’s workshop, no ice skating, no hot chocolate or toasting marshmallows, no ginger bread, no story telling with elves, no walks around the location, in fact very little freedom at all, and the activities were challenging. Communication was lacking, Christmas magic was lacking, it felt rushed (but too much hanging around in the cold) and all very transactional, which is a shame as it is a lovely location with so much potential. We did have a lack of snow for early December, but I don’t feel this is a great excuse. There was very little contingency, and the scheduling seemed very messy and last minute. It is a lot of money, and I do not feel on this occasion our experience justified the cost.