The festival will run from Boxing Day until Sunday, January 8. Photo credit: Facebook/Ancaster Fair
Food truck organization Street Eats is teaming up with a sustainable wooden structure company called GRIPBlock to bring a winter festival to Hamilton’s Ancaster Fairgrounds. The event, starting on Boxing Day, features a giant winter maze as its main attraction.
The festivities also include food trucks, a hot chocolate bar, a live DJ, marshmallow fire pits, scavenger hunts, winter-themed games, and miniature train rides. There will also be multiple photo opportunities.
The Ancaster Fairgrounds, located near Wilson Street West and Trinity Road South just west of Ancaster Business Park, will host the 120×120-foot wooden maze. The walls will be seven feet tall.
The maze will be constructed by GRIPBlock from recycled wood pallets. The group also makes hockey rinks and a wide range of other structures. Their website states that GRIPBlock blocks are “100% green, 100% reusable, and 100% recyclable” and “can be placed precisely like a children’s building brick.”
Running from Monday, December 26 until Sunday, January 8, the maze will be open daily from 11AM until 4PM.
Despite both organizing bodies being located in Toronto, they chose Hamilton for the event.
“Hamilton is a great city that has a lot of growth potential for festivals and events. As organizers, we invest in cities that encourage more events which is why Hamilton was selected,” said “The Giant Maze” founder Philip Suos.
He wants to take people away from their screens and into “an old-school maze with a twist.”
Admission is free for children aged 0-2, $9.99 plus tax for children aged 3-12, and $12.99 plus tax for those aged 13 and older.
The event requires pre-purchased tickets, which are only available for online at www.thegiantmaze.com. Tickets are not available at the door.
All tickets must be booked by time slot in order to manage capacity, but once event-goers are inside there is no time limit and visitors can stay as long as they like in order to take part in all featured activities.
Food and beverages are available for purchase inside the event area at extra cost and miniature train rides are an extra $5 per person. Another important detail to know is that the event is cashless.
While no pets (with the exception of service animals) are permitted, strollers and wagons are allowed and the maze is wheelchair accessible. On-site parking at the fairgrounds is free.
Based in Hamilton, he reaches hundreds of thousands of people monthly on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. He has been published in The Hamilton Spectator, Stoney Creek News, and Bay Observer. He has also been a segment host with Cable 14 Hamilton. In 2017, he received the Chancellor Full Tuition Scholarship from the University of Ottawa (BA, 2022). He has also received the Governor General’s Academic Medal. He formerly worked in a non-partisan role on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.
