Thousands turned up in Darwin's city centre this weekend for a Christmas pageant marking the start of the Top End's festive season. The humid weather didn't stop a parade of floats, dancers and performers – which ended with the lighting of a tree.
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00:00There's still quite a few sleeps until Christmas, but the streets of Darwin came alive this
00:07weekend.
00:08More than 50 floats from top end schools and community groups made their way through the
00:14city centre for this year's Christmas pageant.
00:17Onlookers each with their own traditions for a day as hotly anticipated as the first summer
00:22storms.
00:23Bring on the lightning.
00:24Who needs Christmas lights when we have thunderstorms.
00:25So I've lived here all my life.
00:26I have Darwin Christmases every year and this is amazing.
00:32Well we always come to the parade and we always go to carols and we all go out and hum
00:37and do for Christmas day.
00:40Between roaming troops of performers, young and old, local businesses also showed their
00:46creativity in a parade of colourful floats.
00:49I just think the effort that everyone's put in is amazing and some of them I know have
00:53been working on them for months so you know, good credit to them.
00:56Alongside his helpers, the jolly old man in the red suit waved to his fans who had
01:01some fairly straight forward requests.
01:03To spend time with family and friends, get presents.
01:08Opening up their presents.
01:10Yeah.
01:11And eating dessert.
01:12There's been floats of all shapes and sizes in this year's pageant from local schools,
01:19community groups and local businesses.
01:21And now that the tree is lit, it's officially Christmas in the top end.
01:26And for organisers, it won't be long before it's time to do it all again.
01:30We'll start talking about it and go, what do we want to do differently, what did we
01:33love, what do we want to do more of.
01:35Merry Christmas!
01:39A shining start to the festive season in Darwin.