Ho Ho Whoa! Santa Cycle Rampage Returning Next Month
After ten years of turning heads and spreading good cheer along the streets of Minneapolis, the 11th annual Santa Cycle Rampage MSP is shooting for its biggest crowd yet on December 7th, taking off from the North Loop around 11:30am.
“I want a million Santas, an ocean of Santas flowing down Washington Avenue, a tidal wave of joy engulfing this beautiful neighborhood,” said Joel Lueders, who’s helping promote the event.
It’s essentially a pub crawl–with about five taprooms typically on the list of stops. But Lueders says it’s more about the reaction they get along the way.
“If you’re in your car and you see about 75 Santas and reindeer and elves on their bikes, ringing bells, flashing their lights, they just stop and roll their windows down,” he said. “They’re like ‘what did I just see?’ It’ll turn a Grinch running their errands into, like a joyful kid on Christmas morning.”
This short video shows how it looked last year.
There are no fees, no advance registration for this event. It’s just a loosely-organized effort put together by a group of friends after one of them visited Milwaukee’s Santa Cycle Rampage several years ago and wanted to get one going here too. They post all the details on the event’s Facebook page.
It starts at 10am with dozens of costumed characters and their bikes, meeting up at The Loop.
“We really like the breakfast there,” Lueders explained, “and Washington Avenue is just like a really big, beautiful road to park on, to meet up at.”
While they’re still working on the exact itinerary, they typically head to Surly then a few other taprooms before finishing up at Fulton in the North Loop. They ask participants to bring a toy to donate to the Salvation Army.
By Mike Binkley, North Loop volunteer
