Helston’s festive season begins tomorrow with the switching-on of the town’s Christmas lights at 5pm.

The festive fun will include a street market on Meneage Street and Coinagehall Street until 9pm, musical entertainment, late night shopping and children’s rides and activities.

Father Christmas will be visiting the Cancer Funding for Cornwall charity shop in Coinagehall Street between 6pm and 7pm.

The shop will have a grotto set up, where children can meet Santa and receive a small gift for £1 entry.

The switching-on ceremony at 7.30pm will be followed by the traditional firework display.

Roads will be closed until 9.30pm.

Friday is also the start of the Christmas Town Trail, which consists of identifying 20 shops from teaser poems and visiting each shop to discover a poster with a simple question.

Once completed the town trail form can be posted into one of the two red letterboxes in town, which will be revealed on Friday night.

On the trail leaflet there is also a space for a letter to Father Christmas, who will be coming to collect his post at the town’s second Christmas event on December 14, which is also the closing date for trail entries.

A pamphlet containing the town trail questions, together with more information on the events happening over the festive period, has already been delivered to school children in the area.

The Helston Business Improvement Partnership (HBIP), which has arranged these events, thanked all the primary schools for their help in distributing the pamphlets.

The HBIP has also thanked the volunteer Helston Christmas Lights Committee members, who spent the last month putting up lights despite the recent bad weather. People have been asked to support the Christmas lights fund by donating money into the collection pots found in the majority of shops, or by giving to fundraisers on the night.

Organisers say the more donations received, the bigger the event can be next year.