A Winter Wonderland event in Northern Ireland has been cancelled just two days after opening due to a slew of complaints.

The event, held at the Clandeboye Estate in Bangor, was due to run until 23 December, but was cancelled on Sunday for falling “way short of our expectations", organisers said.

Pictures taken by attendees showed a plastic ice-skating rink, inflatable equipment left airless on the floor, and a shabby-looking Santa’s grotto.

Tickets for the event were priced at £17 for children and £49 for a family ticket, according to the Winter Wonderland NI Facebook page.

Angry parents voiced their opinions of the event on its Facebook page, calling for immediate refunds to be made.

Jolene Houston called the event a “fiasco” and claimed the website displayed the wrong postcode for drivers attending the venue.

“The whole thing from start to finish was just diabolical and the disappointed faces of the kids… well that you could never reimburse for," she said.

Another attendee, Tammy Rea, said she had an “absolutely shocking rubbish day” at the event, while Andrew Webb called the event “chaos!” on Twitter and “without doubt the worst experience”.

Mr Webb told the BBC that children did not want to go on the ice rink and “it smelled of chlorine”.

He said the queue to see Santa was large and strewn with litter, while his children were handed gifts well below their age range, and some of the decorations in Santa’s grotto were held up by Blu Tac.

Ben Hershaw, who appeared to have paid to run a craft stall at the experience, questioned whether he would and other traders would receive a refund.

He wrote on Facebook: “We paid for four days and had no chance of selling anything given how shockingly this was run. This is people’s lively[hoods] ruined at the busiest time of year.”

However, one woman said she and her family enjoyed the event.

Writing on the Winter Wonderland NI Facebook page, Jennifer Neill said the ice rink was "a bit rubbish” but that she and her family would not have used it as her son is two years old.

“He had the bouncy castle to himself for a good while, Santa was nice, staff were very friendly,” she added, adding that she is glad they made the trip.

Cancelling the event after just two days, organisers released a statement saying: "Winter NI would like to apologise for the Bangor Winter Wonderland event which has fallen way short of our expectations.

“For this reason it has been decided to cancel the event from Monday 18 December.