Reindeer Games

This year, a new holiday festival debuted in St Petersburg – Enchant Christmas. Enchant Christmas is a scavenger hunt in a maze of Christmas lights. The goal of the scavenger hunt is to find Santa’s reindeer, who have gotten lost in an enchanted forest. Since I love anything to do with Christmas trees and Christmas lights, on Sunday night Ron and I drove down to St Petersburg to see it.

At the entrance to the maze, we were given a scratch-off card with the names of all the reindeer. Each time we found a deer, we scratched it off the card. Finding the reindeer was more challenging than you might think. Even though we could see the huge reindeer antlers rising over the top of the maze hedges, we still had to find the right paths to get to them. But that was part of the fun because there were surprises hiding around every corner. There were snowflakes and snowmen, a giant wedding ring, tunnels of hanging strands of lights and a pathway paved with square tiles that lit up when you stepped on them. At the center of the maze was an 80-foot tall, golden tree surrounded by towering icicles. It was really magical. It was also really CROWDED.  We probably should have gotten tickets for a weeknight instead of a Sunday. Ron tried valiantly to take a picture of me without people in the background with no luck. I finally told him to just take the picture and quit worrying about the people. :-)

As we left the maze, one of Santa’s elves handed us chocolate coins as our reward for finding all the reindeer. Enchant Christmas is great fun for kids and for kids at heart.

Travel tips: Enchant Christmas runs through December 29 at Tropicana Field in St Petersburg. In addition to the maze, there is an ice skating trail, a marketplace selling crafts from local vendors, and food booths. The concession area is small with few places to sit so I would suggest having dinner before getting to the stadium and sticking with drinks or snacks at the event. Parking is $10, credit cards only, no cash. For more information and to reserve tickets, see the Enchant Christmas website: https://enchantchristmas.com/.