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Celebrating the holidays at Gaylord Texan has become one of our favorite family traditions. Although, my girls are getting to the age where they don’t still love some of the holiday activities at the hotel that are geared towards younger children, there is still plenty that they do enjoy. The Christmas Experience at Gaylord Texan has some great activities for all ages.
Just walking around the beautiful hotel is an experience in and of itself. The Gaylord Texan is transformed into a spectacular winter wonderland with acres of twinkling lights, 2,000 poinsettias, and 200 Christmas trees throughout the resort. There is a miniature train that rolls through the atrium and employees dressed in costume that interact with the kids. It will definitely put you in the holiday spirit.
The hotel features ice skating, snow tubing with 2 million pounds of real snow, a Christmas carousel, gingerbread house decorating, a Christmas village, Christmas craft studio, I Love Christmas Movies interactive experience, and much more.
This year the girls did the Christmas Craft Studio. They were able to paint a canvas or holiday wood project. They both chose to do the canvas and had a lot of fun doing it!
We also did the I Love Christmas Movies experience. This journey took us through over 13 scenes from the Christmas movies Elf, The Polar Express, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, A Christmas Story, and The Year Without a Santa Claus. The hotel did a very good job of social distancing during this experience.
Tip: No food or drink allowed in the movie experience. We stopped at Starbucks right before our movie tour and they told us that we couldn’t bring our drinks in. We had to quickly gulp them down before entering.
The hotel restaurants and eateries are open as well as their stores that are full of great gift ideas and local Texas themed products. There is the cutest little Christmas-themed Candy Shoppe that my girls loved!
The hotel did a great job of enforcing masks, social distancing, and cleaning. They had hand sanitizing stations throughout the resort. They also provided hand sanitizer and sanitizing wipes in our hotel room. There was a notice in our room that no employees would enter unless we asked for them. I also noticed the employees were fantastic about cleaning throughout the hotel, and we felt very safe there.
You don’t have to stay at the resort to enjoy all of the holiday festivities. You can just come for the day. They do charge the following rates for parking whether you stay at the hotel or not:
Parking Fee
0-2 hours $17
2-4 hours $19
4+ hours $22
Overnight parking $22 per day
Valet parking available for hotel guests
There are so many events. You could easily spend a couple of days here and not get bored. The Gaylord Texan provided a safe and enjoyable holiday experience for us. We all deserve a holiday escape, especially after this crazy year, and I highly recommend the magic of the Gaylord Texan!
Have you been yet? What was your favorite thing?
Click here to read about another one of my favorite hotels in Dallas and some of our favorite restaurants there.
