The Yass Showground Roundhouse lights display has its last night tonight Christmas Eve.
Running since December 17th, don’t miss this wonderful display of Christmas cheer hosted by the Yass Valley Spin Foundation. The locally-based charity assembled a hard-working team who started preparing the themes and activities months prior for the community to enjoy.
The fun event for the whole family is proudly supported by Yass Lions Club, Yass Show Society and Agnew Hire, with a gold coin required for entry, with the Yass SPIN Foundation the recipient of any donations.
Barry O’Mara, President of the Yass Valley SPIN Foundation, said the opening nights of the event have already been well received.
“We had a reasonable crowd in on Saturday night and a bigger crowd in on Sunday. We’ve been slowly building all week long. We got a lot of positive feedback and we spread it into the two pavilions instead of just one. It’s all been positive so far,” O’Mara said.
“On Sunday night we probably had about 400-500 people through, and it would’ve been roughly the same on Saturday night.
“The main feature and highlight this year is the Enchanted Forest, we had 50 different sized and shaped Christmas trees that form a pathway that you walk through with all types of hidden things such as illuminated ponds, fairy gardens, gnomes and little creatures of the forest hidden away for the kids to find on their walkthrough.
“Once they leave the forest, they walk through into Santa’s Workshop where it’s a fully animated display of Santa’s helpers in a specially built workshop. It has a lot of history to it with the little animated puppets over 50 years old.
“They were made in Germany, they’re not manufactured anymore, so they’re very rare commodity. They were gifted to us, by a lady here in Yass by the name of Julie Johnson, whose partner used to do a really good display many, many years ago. Unfortunately, he passed away.
“She’s had them in storage and last year she gifted them to me provided I didn’t sell them and put them out on public display. That’s how the Roundhouse idea sort of came about.”
Santa also made a guest appearance at the Roundhouse on Sunday night and will continue featuring throughout the week.
“We’ve got a great Santa, he’s wonderful how he works with kids of all ages. He has that knack of getting them to open up to him and telling him what they want and get the opportunity for a photo for mum and dad,” O’Mara continued.
“The SPIN Foundation have had a busy few weeks with the Community Carols, Christmas Parade and now the Roundhouse Display, but that’s what we do it for, to see the expressions on the kids faces when they first walk in and the laughter from the puppet show. The kids just love the whole thing.
“We also have a colouring-in competition at the moment where they can sit there and colour in some pictures for an opportunity to win some prizes including pencils and colouring-in books.
“There are three categories, kindergartens to Year 2, Years 3-4 and Years 5-6.
“We also have a room set up with 6-8 Christmas trains going all at the same time.”
The Roundhouse Display has been open between 6pm to 9pm every night this week and concludes tonight, Christmas Eve.
Tim Warren
