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Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Review- ICE at Gaylord Palms, Orlando, Florida


ICE at Gaylord Palms
Below freezing temperatures in Florida? Not a chance right? While you would think no, the answer is actually YES! Well, if you visit ICE at Gaylord Palms, that is. Below is my review of the ICE spectacular as it took place in 2018.

The theme is A Christmas Story. The iconic tale of a young boy who wants a Red Rider BB Gun for Christmas.. But you know what they say.. You’ll shoot your eye out! 
A Christmas Story sign


My family and I went to Gaylord Palms on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. While Disney and Universal were packed to the brim, ICE was empty. This was the PERFECT weekend to go! We decided to stay on site for one night. The hotel was amazing from its decorations to its staff and we are so glad we got the opportunity to take it all in!

I requested an early check in for 8:30 am with an Atrium view room. To my surprise I was notified that my room was ready before we even got to the hotel. What a nice surprise to be able to bring my bags upstairs and not have to worry about dealing with obtaining them in-between activities.


Our schedule looked something like this:

10:00 am Story time and cookies with Mrs. Claus
11:00 am meet the big man on campus, Santa Claus
12:00 pm was a break for lunch
1:00 pm snow tubing
2:00 pm view the ice sculptures
3:00 pm Build a Bear holiday treats
4:00 pm gingerbread cookie decorating with the gingerbread man
5:00 pm Santa’s Snow Throw
5:30 pm Reindeer Post Office to write our letters to Santa and confirm what we asked for earlier
6:00 pm Dinner
7:30 pm Christmas Tress Stroll, Scavenger Hunt and cirque De Soleil Dream of Christmas Light Show
8:30 pm Sugary Sweet Story Time with the Sugar Plum Fairy

Phew, are you tired yet? Believe me, I am exhausted just typing out this schedule and we thought for sure the kids would be dead by the end of dinner on this kind of schedule.

Of a special note, much like Disney, you can buy an ICE photopass. It is $99 for unlimited photos. It is good from the day you buy it until the last day of ICE so use it! We bought it and in 1 day they took 60 pictures on it.

I am pleased to report that we waiting in next to NO lines and by 11 am we had completed Story time, Santa, tubing and lunch. In fact, we had allotted 1 hour for tubing during the day. The kids went back all day long to go down those slopes. For Florida babies this is as close as they were getting to real runs and they had the best time!
Meeting Mrs Clause and Snowflake

Mrs. Claus read the children ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas with her elf helper, Snowflake. If any of you have seen Frozen Sing A Long at Hollywood Studios, Snowflakes’ act was much like the Royal Historians. It was such fun! Adults and Children were given chocolate chip cookies and milk to enjoy during the story.
 
A special talk with Santa
Santa was one of a kind. He spent individual time with each child and made sure we got lots of pictures to take home. He also took multiple family photos and nobody felt rushed despite their being other people in line behind us. He even gave each child a good luck token with his picture on it to take home.
Family pic with Santa

The actual Christmas Story ice sculptures were amazing! The detail that goes into this exhibit is like no other. See photos below for just how awesome it really is!

Christmas Story Ice Sculptures




      Build a Bear has a pop-up shop set up right outside of Santa so be sure to be prepared for that! They do not honor coupons but do honor Build a Bear gift cards. This trip each of the kids was allowed to get 1 holiday theme friend to bring home.

 
Ugly sweater cookie
The sweet shop offers multiple different options for gingerbread decorating from houses to men to ugly sweaters. We chose the sweaters as 6 came to a box and that meant one for each of us.

We ended the night with the Sugar Plum Fairy and the Nutcracker Prince reenacting the Nutcracker story. This was very entertaining and a fun interactive way to get the kids involved with some songs. All adults and children were provided with Sugar Plum flavored hot chocolate in a fun take home glass mug.

All in all, the ICE spectacular was just that, spectacular. We are already looking forward to next year and we can’t find to find out what the theme will be!
"I double dog dare you!"

By: Rachel Hollingsworth
Rachel@traveltimetravel.com

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