The first Christmas Lights were being put up in Abingdon on 18th October. The job is done by a specialist contractor with a lot of towns to cover and so they spread the load to keep their workforce fully employed.

This year Stert Street has some new red and silver Christmas trees. One of them is above Oxfam.

Inside Oxfam Christmas is also well underway.

Schools went back today. The contractors were taking down the Christmas Lights in the Market Place this evening.

One festive light display remains across the river. I went down the slipway at St Helen’s Wharf to try to get a low angle shot but found thick mud slurping round my shoes – left behind by the floods. I hope the curtain of rippling light will stay for a while yet.

Half term week starts February 9th.

The lights were taken off the Market Place Christmas Tree. Branches were then lopped off and fed into a wood chipper.

Soon all that remained was a spiny trunk.

The Abingdon public brought their own Christmas Trees.

Some dragged their trees, others brought them by car.

The Town Council Team then fed each tree into the chipper.

140 trees were recycled on the Market Place in January 2011. By January 2012 that number had jumped to 164.

This year 133 trees had already been recycled by midday. That number had jumped to 192 with ten minutes to go. The team were intending to stop at 3:00 pm but then there was a late rush of Christmas Trees.

The team stayed a little late by which time they had recycled 205 trees. Those tree chippings will help pave walks on the Ock Valley.