The Cornwall Christmas Fair has been put on ice until 2021.
The festive charity event had been due to take place at the Eden Project on November 12, but will now not go ahead due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Co-chair Jane Hartley explained: “Despite the brilliant team at Eden working so hard and generously to accommodate us with proper distancing and a new stall geography, it became sadly all too apparent that the magic of the event would not be there this year.
“This decision has of course been made all the harder by the knowledge that Cornwall’s communities need our support so desperately at the moment.”
However, organisers have come up with a unique alternative to raise funds for the Cornwall Community Foundation. Instead on November 12, they will be staging a set of sponsored challenges – Fair on Ice – where teams of fairies, elves, Father Christmases, snowmen, turkeys, Christmas trees and stars will be racing along England’s fastest and longest zipwire, braving the ice rink on skates, testing resilience in the humid rainforest canopy with a yoga session, skipping around the Mediterranean biome and running the perimeter of Eden.
Hartley added: “We very much hope that, instead of attending the 2020 Cornwall Christmas Fair, our loyal visitors will support our Fair On Ice initiative and sponsor us to at least the tune of the ticket price, safe in the knowledge that the funds will be going direct to the communities of Cornwall in their hour of need.
“In addition everyone who supports us will be entered into a prize draw to win a one-night break including a three-course dinner and breakfast for two at the fabulous Pig at Haryln Bay.”
Alongside this team effort, an online auction will be staged on the Cornwall Christmas Fair website, again raising vital funds for Cornwall’s communities
The Cornwall Christmas Fair will return in 2021, on Thursday November 11.
