Christmas in San Francisco

One last Christmas post to finish the year...

The week before Christmas the girls were on Winter break from school, so we decided to take advantage of their free time and get into the Christmas spirit by heading into the city to visit a few of our favorite festive places. 

Our first destination of the day was the Fairmont Hotel and the giant gingerbread house. To get there we caught the cable car up California Street. We don't take the cable car all that often, but when we do we almost always take the California Street line. It's just as fun as taking the more popular Powell Street lines, but without the huge lines of tourists. We always get an outside seat (or inside if we want) and the views up and down California Street are pretty amazing. That's one hell of a steep street! I always feel like the California Street line is almost like a local secret! It's definitely not as well known with tourists and, even better, the conductor usually doesn't charge up when he sees me holding out our Clipper cards to pay fare. Shh... 

Gingerbread House & Sugar Castle

Last Sunday we spent the day in the city taking in the sights of Christmas. I always love how festive San Francisco feels at this time of year. The city is filled with Christmas cheer with festive street lighting, Christmas trees, ice skating rinks, ornate decorations in windows and lobbies, and crowds of holiday shoppers and tourists.

We made sure to visit all of our favorite holiday spots: the giant gingerbread house at the Fairmont Hotel, the sugar castle at the Westin St Francis, Union Square and, of course, Santa at Santaland in Macy's.

Here's a look at the giant gingerbread house and the sugar castle...

Gingerbread House & Sugar Tree

Last weekend I took the girls into the city to visit two of San Francisco's finest hotels and their festive Christmas displays: the Giant Gingerbread House at the Fairmont Hotel and the Sugar Tree at the Westin St Francis Hotel.

Visiting these two amazing confectionery pieces makes up two of the vouchers on our advent calendar and it has become a tradition for us to visit them every year.

Ballerinas and Gingerbread

The last few days before Christmas saw a flurry of Christmas activities for our family. We visited the Victorian Christmas fair in Nevada City, were dazzled by the Zoo Lights display at Oakland Zoo, were entertained by a production of the Nutcracker and checked out the giant gingerbread house at the Fairmont Hotel. Phew, what a lot of Christmas fun! Of course, on top of all that there was last minute shopping, wrapping and decorating. It's amazing we weren't all Christmased out by the big day.

We've already seen the Victorian Christmas fair and Zoo Lights so let's have a look at the Nutcracker and giant gingerbread house...

Looking very much like Christmas at the Fairmont Hotel

Giant Gingerbread House

Just like last year one of the activities on this year's advent calendar was to visit the giant gingerbread house at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco.

And just like last year, the giant gingerbread house did not disappoint. Standing at over 22 feet high and 23 feet wide and made of thousands of gingerbread bricks it is quite a sight to see. The girls were enchanted by the masses of gingerbread with its, wait for it... two thousand pounds of royal icing and candy. My teeth are aching just thinking about that number!

Giant gingerbread house and Christmas tree in the Fairmont Hotel lobby