HULL/20 SpacewaysSleighport Passport office
Painting: the night sky route of flight UFX-1225, a dotted cream course climbing from Gate 20 past a ringed planet to a little lit outpost with a striped pole on the snowy top of the world.

Air mail from Gate 20 · Flight UFX-1225

UFO Express

Letters to Santa leave Gate 20 by saucer at 7:00 and 8:00 pm, every night from 1 to 24 December. There are two ways to post one, and neither needs a stamp.

Next pickup 7:00 pm Gate 20 time.

Two ways to post a letter

The UFO Express mailbox: a mustard box on a post with a saucer for a lid, its flag up and a letter in the slot.

The mailbox at Gate 20

A mustard mailbox with a saucer for a lid stands beside the Gate 20 screen. The slot is at kid height. Post your letter, then raise the red flag so the crew knows there's mail.

Any paper, any crayon. Fold it once if it's big. Write your first name so Santa knows who it's from.

Planet Hopper · from 1 December

Dear Santa, via UFO Express

Six crayons · draw or write · undo

Write one in Planet Hopper

The Passport Office has a letter page from 1 December. Big crayons, room to draw, and prompts for kids who aren't writing yet.

  1. Open your passport in Planet Hopper and choose Write to Santa.
  2. Write or draw your letter. Take your time; it waits on your phone.
  3. Scan the code on the Gate 20 screen to post it. You get the UFO Express postmark and a tracking card.
Open Planet Hopper

Your letter never leaves your phone. Planet Hopper doesn't upload it or put it in a link. The postmark and the tracking card show only that a letter was sent.

What happens to your letter

HULL/20 Spaceways · Air mail

UFO Express

Letters to Santa · Flight UFX-1225 · Tracking

  1. Posted at Gate 20
  2. Picked up by the saucer
  3. Left Earth orbit
  4. Crossing the Arctic
  5. Arrived, North Pole
  6. On Santa's desk

1 letter · 1 drawingFor Santa's eyes only. It never left your phone.

No. UFX1225-SPECIMEN

A specimen card. Yours appears in Planet Hopper when you post at Gate 20, and moves along on your phone's own clock.

Paper letters

The box is locked. The crew empties it at pickup time and brings the letters indoors the same night. Nobody photographs or posts them.

After 6 January the letters are shredded.

Phone letters

Never uploaded, never in a link, never seen by any server. A letter stays in Planet Hopper on your phone until you delete it. The tracking card says how many letters and drawings were sent, and nothing more.

Return mail

North Pole Operations sometimes writes back to paper letters, a few nights after your letter goes up. Replies go in the Return Mail pocket, folded, with your flight number on the outside; your name stays inside. Keep the numbered stub from the mailbox so you know which reply is yours.

Passport office

Your passport is at Planet Hopper

Letters, stamps and the passport itself are kept by Planet Hopper on your own phone. Sleighport never sees them.