Today is Boxing Day. I guess it got started when the servants who had to work on Christmas serving dinner to rich folks got the following day off and they got boxes of gifts. I think this is true???

But i'm more interested in whether all things are closed or most on Boxing Day in the UK - does transportation run - three years ago i was planning on going to London from Paris but learned that once there there would be very few mainline trains running. True?

How about local transorts - tube, etc. Reduced schedule?

Are shops open - any at all...pubs i assume are open or at least some.

Boxing Day Sales are famous at stores - does this mean they are open on 26th or do the sales start on 27th?

Thanks for any other comments on Boxing Day practicalities as per travel in Britain.

What do most Brits do on Boxing Day? Lay around the house?

Just curious.

The trains weren't running here in Maidenhead and the train station itself was closed. But our local bus service was running on a not that reduced schedule, which surprised me. Most stores were closed, but Boots, Costa Coffee, Clarks, WH Smiths, and a few others were open.

like said...some things open, some closed.

as for what most people do on boxing day...we walk.

we also either eat leftovers (turkey curry, etc) or go to a pub for lunch.

was in the park today (great windsor park) and it was very crowded with walkers...you could hardly move. children out with new bikes and scooters, etc. pub car parks were overflowing with cars.

walkingaround

that's cool!

sorry, that's 'windsor great park' (of course).

"I guess it got started when the servants who had to work on Christmas serving dinner to rich folks got the following day off and they got boxes of gifts. I think this is true???"

Probably not.

The earliest certain use of the term is very late indeed: 1833. There'd been loads of references earlier to St Stephen's Day (indeed the Irish landlady of my nearest boozer was very dtermined this lunchtime, during the traditional Boxing Day pub quiz contest, to point out that that's how it's still referred to over there): but - for all the hoke about mediaeval present giving - no-one got round to writing down any use of the term till most Britons were working in textile mills.

And we can be pretty certain that no Guglielmian or Victorian mill owner went round giving presents he didbn't have to. Truth is, there are lots of theories about where "Boxing Day" comes from, but there's no certain explanation.

What do we do these days? Pretty much whatever we damn well please. Chain store owners try to get us to hit their sales. Lots of Britain - trains, many museums, some shops - remain closed all day. Lots of Britons discover activity: the road to our nearest ancient pathway was fuller today than I've ever seen it, and normally - when I'm I'm not at a quiz contest - my Boxing Day lunchtimes consist of cheering on our local foxhunt, just before it abandons the pretext it's (legally) draghunting.

Race meetings and football matches usually get exceptionally high attendances; pubs are often chocker. And main roads are stuffed with people trying to get to the "other" family in time for Xmas lunch II.

Meanwhile, we all discover the art of creative use of leftovers. Talking of which, I've just found a recipe for goose, cold parsnips, bread sauce and stuffing...

Cheers flanner - looking forward to another year of your enlightening me to English, if not British, culture. Sincerely. PalQ

I was almost sure that the Boxing Day explan i had presented sounded completely sane - rather disappointed after having told others for years this now seemingly fable.

funny when Googling Boxing Day Derivation one site says the bit about servants being given gifts in boxes and that's all yet others cast doubt on that like flanner points out:

"Boxing Day
Nobody seems to know for definite why Boxing Day is really called called Boxing Day, though it is often the subject of Boxing Day dinner conversation. Most likely the name came from the middle ages where it may come from the opening of church poor boxes (alms), the contents of which were then distributed amongst the needy. Another possible derivation is that the name is taken from the clay boxes with which apprentices collected money from their masters' clients. From the 20th century onwards it has been customary in England to give a 'Christmas Box" to tradesman, the dustbin men, postman etc.

Boxing Day is the day after Christmas day (26th December) and is a UK public holiday.

Many places in Britain host charity events on Boxing Day. The Boxing Day Dip is one such event. 'Dippers' make there way to the many coastal venues hosting dips and join other dippers in a mass immersion into the Icy North Sea."

<<< Boxing Day is the day after Christmas day (26th December) and is a UK public holiday. >>>

It used to be the first weekday after Christmas Day.

And the bank holiday gets moved if it is at a weekend, just like Christmas Day & New Year Day(s)

Last year in London on Boxing Day, we got up and had coffee/breakfast as usual at a Cafe Nero near by. Then went to the TKTS booth in Leicester Square and got tickets to a matinee of WE WILL ROCK YOU and an evening performance of GLORIOUS. There were lots of other show options. We did fish and chips lunch at a Harry Ramsden's, and after the evening show had a wonderful dinner at Boulevard Grill in Covent Garden. The streets were quiet, but we certainly didn't feel the city was shut down by a longshot.

Major shops (and places that sell sofas) tend to be open on Boxing Day

If it's anything like the shop I was in today (thanks GF, her sister & mum) then businesses must have coined it in today hand over fist - and despite what the Vancouver Sun says, Boxing Day: ISN'T a uniquely Canadian shopping binge, perhaps their journos should get out a bit more

http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/n...9-e74160e37607

Transports--bus and tube working as in regular weekend services. National rail almost all closed down not because it's boxing day per se but because of engineering work coinciding with the holiday weekend.
Stores--Sale starting today for some shameless retailers like Selfridges, Next, Debenhams. M&S and John Lewis closed today, sale begins 27th. Harrod's first day of sale is 28th 9am (Eva Longoria opening the door). Harrod's 10% off weekend for Amex card is 13/14 Jan.
Activities--for us, it's a good day to visit friends and relatives, especially as we can afford to drive around London without the congestion charge. Traffic wasn't that bad at all, except for congestion near Brent Cross shopping mall. We also like feeding swans/ducks at Regent's Park early in the morning. Very Hitchcock as birds are quite hungry not being fed by tourists on Christmas Day. ;-)

By the time Boxing Day had arrived in UK, they already had the bad news about the English cricket team's collapse on Day 1 of the Boxing Day test in Melbourne!

They spend the time inside, in mourning, in darkened rooms!

Yesterday morning I told my 4 year old daughter that it was Boxing Day so everything was closed and Daddy didn't have to go to work. She started crying and said, "But Mommy, I don't want to box up all the new toys that Santa brought me!"

>>They spend the time inside, in mourning, in darkened rooms!<<

No we don't. Beating the Australians is only important to us when we actually manage to do so. The rest of the time, we merely congratulate ourselves that we have more important things to interest ourselves in. Well, those of us that have a life, that is.

[And yes, I do realise that posting here may not necessarily be evidence of having a life......]