Christmas time at the Gaylord Texan Hotel In Grapevine, Texas
TAKEN FROM THE GAYLORD TEXAN WEBSITE: November 12, 2010 - January 3, 2011
Gaylord Texan’s annual holiday events are back and better than ever! The awe-inspiring ICE!™ attraction — carved from 2 million pounds of ice — will for the first time showcase A Charlie Brown Christmas by Charles Schulz! Additionally, Lone Star Christmas at Gaylord Texan will provide a winter wonderland including 1.5 million holiday lights, a 52-foot rotating Christmas tree, a life-sized Gingerbread House, 12,000 ornaments, and Santa Claus himself, just to name a few. You're invited to enjoy a magical holiday experience your family won’t soon forget!
Spectacular Christmas Decorations
Nowhere is the warm glow of the Christmas season brought to life in more vivid
detail than at the Gaylord Texan Resort. Dozens of lavish holiday displays
inside the resort and across the surrounding campus showcase 1.5 million
lights... 5,600 feet of garland... 2,300 wreaths... and 12,000 ornaments. Yes,
we counted!
Seven-foot ornaments hang suspended from the glass ceiling of the indoor atriums. Model trains--evoking fond memories of childhood Christmases past--weave intricate paths around, under and through a 52-foot, rotating Christmas tree. Don't miss our life-sized — and oh-so-tempting — gingerbread house is fashioned from 5,000 square feet of gingerbread. And, of course, Santa Land, complete with Santa's throne, giant toy soldiers and 30ft wreath!
Lone Star Christmas
Lone Star Christmas at Gaylord Texan will provide a winter wonderland including 1.5 million holiday lights, a 52-foot rotating Christmas tree, a life-sized Gingerbread House, 12,000 ornaments, and Santa Claus himself - plus much, much more!
Rudolph's Reindeer Roundup
The most famous reindeer of all needs your help! Put on your light-up red nose
and help Rudolph locate all of his 8 reindeer buddies in time to pull Santa’s
sleigh on Christmas Eve. Solve the puzzles with your secret message decoder and
let your nose guide the way as you journey on this fun and magical quest
throughout the resort atriums. When you’ve located his team, find Rudolph who
will want to thank you for all of your help…and enter you in a drawing for a
great prize! Daily $8
YOURSELF as an ELF
A Family Holiday Adventure – A fun and interactive adventure for the whole
family! Do you have what it takes to become one of Santa’s little helpers? Enter
the ELFINATOR 5000, and shrink to Elf size as you and your guide, Edgar the Elf
explore the magical world of Santa’s workshop and North Pole base camp! Daily
10am – 9pm
Cookies & Milk Story Time with Mrs. Claus
Snuggle up in a blanket with cookies and milk as Mrs. Claus, reads a classic
Christmas story, performs magic tricks and introduces her special puppet friends
from the North Pole. Kids get to take home a special book autographed by Santa’s
favorite lady. Held at 8pm Friday and Saturday Nov. 26 – Dec. 17 and daily Dec.
17 - 25. $25 for one child including one accompanying adult.
Gingerbread Corner, Breakfast with Charlie Brown, Photos with Santa, and more! (Available for additional fees.)
SNOW!
Who says it never snows in Texas? Grab a tube and get set for the RIDE OF YOUR LIFE as you speed down our EXTREME 8-LANE hill covered in REAL TEXAS SNOW! Also includes a mini bunny slope for small children to join in the BIG fun!
ICE: ICE!™ Come along as Charlie Brown rediscovers the true meaning of Christmas through interactive ice sculptures and displays of this beloved children's classic. Experience the Peanuts gang in favorite scenes such as the rehearsal hall practice, Snoopy's decorated house and Charlie Brown selecting the perfect Christmas tree. All hand-carved from 2 million pounds of ice!
ICE! will be created by dozens of artisans who migrate to the Dallas / Ft. Worth area each year from Harbin, China to craft this elaborate attraction out of nearly 2 million pounds of ice. It takes them nearly an entire month of 12-hour shifts to transform the refrigerated tent where the exhibit is held into a remarkable icy wonderland.
Making of ICE!™
From an incredible land of ice and snow halfway around the world, a remarkably
talented team of artisans travels to Grapevine, Texas - just to create the
amazing ICE! attraction at the Gaylord Texan Resort!
This band of master carvers spends nearly a month of 12-hour shifts inside a 9-degree freezer, transforming two million pounds of ice into a breathtaking winter wonderland. Sound extreme? It is... but to them, it feels much like home.
From Harbin, China to Grapevine, Texas
Our troupe of ice-loving artisans hails from the city of Harbin, located in Northeast China, where relentless winter winds blow across from neighboring Siberia. While the average summer temperature hovers at a moderate 70 degrees, winter temps fall dramatically to an average of only 2 degrees... sometimes plummeting to -36. Harbin stays below freezing for almost half the year.
Beginnings - Ice Lanterns to Light the Night
The story of ICE! begins long ago and far away - in fact, on the opposite side
of the globe.
Ice Lantern Festivals can be traced back as far as the late Ming and early Qing
dynasties of Imperial China. Five hundred years ago the far northern province of
Heilongjiang had an indigenous population of hunters.
During long winter nights, getting lost in the forest was a real problem for the hunters. The frequently overcast skies obscured the stars, and without a compass, navigation was nearly impossible. So, the clever Chinese came up with a novel solution... allowing water to partially freeze in wooden buckets. Once overturned, this formed an ice block into which a candle would be placed. The ice surrounding the candle sheltered the flame and acted as a type of lens, magnifying the light from the candle -- creating an ice lantern. The hunters strung these lanterns each night, leading from their homes to the hunt site.
A Modern Frozen Festival
In modern times, an Ice Lantern Festival began to be held every winter in
celebration of these brave hunters. As part of the Festival, citizens of Harbin
would cut blocks of ice out of the Songhua River to do some simple carving
before placing them on display among intricately constructed ice lanterns.
During the seven-month-long winters, one of the highlights became informal
competitions between families to see who could create the most impressive
display of sculptures and carvings for the Festival.
In 1963, the Mayor of Harbin was so impressed by many of the amateur ice
displays that he decided to create a formal competition, encouraging adults and
children to create more refined and extensive displays of ice for the following
winter. The Mayor's goal was to stimulate the artistic and cultural natures of
his populous during the long, dark winters, a time that otherwise saw little
activity. Organized in the public parks as a government-sponsored event, the
family-created displays of 40 years ago have now grown into mammoth creations.
A Recipe for Ice
While the citizens back in Harbin cut their ice from the Songhua River for their
festival, Texans are less likely to find the local waterways frozen solid. So,
where do you find two million pounds of ice in the great Southwest? At an ice
factory, of course!
The ice for ICE! is created using a special "recipe" (yes, this ice has a recipe!), and it arrives in approximately 36 truckloads over a 3-week period... 2 trucks a day for 15 days, which is about as fast as the ice factory can produce it. Large blocks of ice are delivered on pallets via refrigerated tractor-trailers, then moved into place by forklift.
Three types of ice are used in the making of ICE!
Clear, "crystal" ice is the most difficult to make. It is created using highly filtered de-ionized water. It takes 3 days to freeze the 45 gallons of water used to create each 400-pound ice block. By freezing it slowly, the molecules are able to line up perfectly, similar to a diamond or crystal. In fact, this ice is so flawless it is often compared to Waterford Crystal.
White ice, which looks like compacted snow, makes up a small part of the attraction, but is invaluable when carving a snowman. This ice is frozen quickly, giving it a cloudy look, much like the ice made in a home freezer. By freezing quickly, the molecules do not have time to perfectly align.
Colored ice, dyed one of nine brilliant colors, is used for highlighting and
accenting many of the ice sculptures. These giant popsicle-like blocks are made
with simple food coloring that is added during the freezing process. Though it
may sound simple, there's a catch... The water must be stirred constantly to
ensure a consistent color throughout the block when it is cut. This year, the
colored ice takes the cues for its hues from the mind of Dr. Seuss. And, you're
sure to be seeing lots of Grinch-y green!
Glue for an Igloo
Placing all of these amazing pieces together to construct the intricate
creations inside ICE! is an art in itself, with quite a bit of ingenuity thrown
in. What holds each piece in place?
You guessed it... ice.
At 9 degrees cold, ordinary water freezes quickly, adhering one piece to another and forming a solid bond. After slicing a piece of ice from a larger block, an artisan sprinkles the surface to be bonded with "snow." He carefully pours water onto the piece and then lifts it into position. It sticks with no problem!
You can bet these guys are smart enough not to lick the ice.
Sara, the girls and I met Divya, her mom, Zara and her nephew Jay, Anca and Natalia and my cousins, Linda Leee, Tracey and Elisabeth. We were also celebrating Elisabeth's 5th birthday. WE had a great time