All year long we consider ourselves so fortunate to live in such a beautiful area. This is even more true during the holiday season. Below are just a few of the events going on the Brandywine Valley during November and December. Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast is within a 10-25 minute drive of all the attractions and we still have availability for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Not to be missed, the always enchanting Longwood Gardens. See their 52 baskets of poinsettias in the conservatory. This year they are hanging white poinsettias rather than the traditional red. For railroad buffs, there is the garden railway display. As always, the Brandywine River Museum has an incredible train display. It is one of my favorite places to go during the holiday season.
GARDEN RAILWAY DISPLAY
Imaginations embark on a journey through a marvelous landscape and fanciful miniature railway in the Idea Garden.
This year’s display features Thomas the Train along with new bridges and new water features.
The Garden Railway will operate 9am to 5pm through November 24 and then transform into the Christmas Railway from November 25 through January 9, 2011.
This event occurs on the following dates:
Daily from Tuesday, September 07, 2010 through Wednesday, November 24, 2010 9:00 AM — 5:00 PM
Daily from Thursday, November 25, 2010 through Saturday, January 09, 2010
9:00 AM — 9:00
November 20, 2010-January 9, 2011
Experience traditions of the past and dazzling holiday entertaining displays in this special wintertime tour. New this year are vignettes depicting mid-1800s Christmas celebrations at Winterthur and the January 1938 wedding festivities of Pauline Louise du Pont. Garden-inspired trees and the perennial favorite, Winterthur’s magnificent dried-flower tree, will also be on display. A full series of special events, performances, and workshops will help to make your season bright.
Winterthur is open on Mondays throughout the Yuletide season. Tuesdays, December 7, 14, 21, and 28 feature extended hours with evening tours and shopping and dining opportunities.
Tour reservations are recommended. Purchase tickets there or call 800.448.3883 or 302.888.4600.
Even Nemours is decorated and open for the holidays. Their hours for holiday tours are from 11/5/10 through 12/31/10. Reservations are definitely suggested.
A toy monkey found in the attic of the Nemours Mansion sits under a Christmas tree in the main foyer Monday. (The News Journal)
20 On The Town” – A Town-Wide Promotion! Only 5 miles from Hamanasstt Bed and Breakfast
This Saturday, November 13 will mark the 1st Annual “20 On The Town” event throughout downtown Media’s shopping district. All day Saturday, over 45 shops and restaurants throughout Media will feature discounts or other promotions focused around the number 20. The discounts and specials will vary from location to location. You’ll receive savings like 20% off everything you can fit in a bag at Ten Thousand Villages, or 20% off iZon lenses at the Media Eye Works “See 20/20/20″ event.
Look for this logo on the doors and windows of participating business. Click here to see the Facebook event page for more info!
Nov 13th is also 2nd Saturday. Media is your go-to destination for unique and authentic shopping and dining, so mark your calendars, invite a friend, and get a jump on the holiday season in Media, PA – A New State of Mind.
This year’s “Christmas at Hagley” exhibits is inspired by the winter pastimes of the property’s former residents. The exhibit is open Friday, November 26, 2010, through Sunday, January 2, 2011. The museum is open 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The holiday display is included in the cost of admission. Hagley is located in the beautiful Brandywine Valley only 25 minutes from Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast and is where the du Pont story begins. It features the original du Pont mills, estate, and gardens.
Picture the du Pont family in the winter sitting together to play backgammon, reading, listening music or drawing. Girls could practice sewing techniques. Children could entertain themselves by layering different colored sands in a glass bottle. In the Terrace Room you will see the ice skates and sled that waited to be used on a snowy slope. Visiting Eleutherian Mills for the “Christmas at Hagley” exhibit provides an intimate look into the common winter activities of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The1803 du Pont ancestral home, Eleutherian Mills, is decorated primarily in Colonial Revival style for the holidays. Dried flowers, greenery, fruits, and other natural materials create a beautiful holiday ambiance accentuated by soft lights and Christmas music. Exhibit included in regular admission.
You will also enjoy the activities on Workers’ Hill. Visitors to the Gibbons House will find recipes for traditional Gibbons’ family desserts. Children will enjoy musical instruments, playing games and making crafts.
To entice you to visit our area during this time Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast will offer a $50.00 gift certificate to everyone who books a multiple night mid-week stay (Sunday through Thursday, excluding Thanksgiving) between now and December 23, 2010. If you have already booked during this time, just mention this blog to receive your gift certificate. This gift certificate may be used by you for a future stay or given as a gift to someone you think will enjoy staying at Hamanassett. It may not be used with any other gift certificates, discounts, or special packages. Just call our toll free number 1-877-836-8212 and tell us you want our Blog Special! In addition to Hagley’s special Christmas exhibit they have many other events at this time. You can also visit Longwood Gardens and Winterthur for wonderful Christmas exhibits. We are only a short 30 minute drive to Philadelphia so extend your stay and enjoy the entire aea. To see all that is going on in the Brandywine Valley during this magical time visit our Activities page on our web site.
Longwood’s managed meadow is full of amazing wildflowers all summer. Sunflowers, goldenrod, aster, and lobelia will all bloom while moths, butterflies and birds fly through the meadow.
Get a special guided tour of this beautiful and serene part of the Gardens. The tour guides who lead you through this dynamic space are a well-informed, lively bunch that conduct in-depth, fun tours of this beautiful area. Meet at the Peirce-du Pont House porch. Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast still has rooms available for all of these dates but they are filling up fast so plan your flower adventure and then give us a call.
Well, this word “culinature” is Longwood’s word. I’m amazed how many new words keep cropping up to define the simple task of eating. But this special event is anything but simple. Take a culinary tour of the Gardens and savor an amazing seasonal feast as you travel to different Garden spots for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, dinner and dessert.
Enjoy dinner music and watch Longwood’s chefs create your meal with local Chester County and Brandywine Valley produce in “field kitchens.” Delight in the flavorful tastes of autumn—fresh from the harvest to your table. The menu includes passed trays of specialty beverages, a bar snack, passed hors d’oeuvres, and the chef’s field kitchen featuring pulled BBQ duck crepes. The first course is an apple and butternut squash bisque. This is followed by a salad and an entree of pumpkin seed French cut chicken breast, celery root, squid ink pasta cake, brussels sprout slaw and roasted carrot with Longwood thyme emulsion. The grand finale is a dessert reception. You will be invited to the main fountain garden for dessert and fountain show where you will be greeted with passed trays of spiced rum apple cider with morello cherry coulis, local wine poached seckel pears stuffed with cinnamon mascarpone, pumpkin gingersnap trifle, and cnocolate pecan tarts. Please note: menu is subject to change based on availability of fresh menu items.
Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast is only a 15 minute drive from Longwood Gardens and we still have a few rooms and the cottages available for that weekend.
$175 per person
Garden Pass Members receive a 15% discount ($149 per person)
Prices include Garden Admission. Buy tickets online or by calling 610-3885
I’ve been writing about all the activities in the Brandywine Valley and in nearby Philadelphia, which is only a short 30 minute drive from Hamanassett. Today I’ll tell you about a really neat trip that is about an hour’s drive east of us. My husband and I made the drive over to Strasburg, Pa. about 6 months ago to go through the train museum and it was fascinating. This article is compliments of Gregory Coin who writes for Wilmington Tourisn Examiner.
Great day trip: Strasburg, Pennsylvania IS Traintown USA!
Learning in Motion educational program at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania
Photo: Photo from the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania
If you or your family like trains, Strasburg, Pennsylvania needs to be your very next whistle stop – and it’s less than hour drive from Hamanassett in Lancaster County! Just follow Route 1 south from Hamanassett Bed and Breakfast and then take Route 41 north, and turn left on Route 741/Strasburg Road. There is a huge clock tower by this intersection. (If you get to Route 30, you’ve gone too far!).
It all starts with the massive Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, a world-class transportation museum with everything you (or anyone else on earth) ever wanted to know about trains. The museum houses well over a hundred vintage locomotives and rail cars dating back to the early 19th century. There’s a wonderful education center in a late Victorian period freight station on “Platform One” of Rolling Stock Hall, as well. There’s a huge model train layout. And don’t miss the exhibit of trains in classic movies, or the watercolor paintings and photographs of trains. You can even hear songs about trains – lots of them! And last but certainly not least, their Museum Store is fabulous. If it’s about trains, they’ve got it. Just up the road from the train museum are two huge antique malls.
Once you’ve immersed yourself in railroad history at the Museum, the next step is surely a ride on the historic Strasburg Railroad right across the street. Take the whole family through Amish Country on a coal-burning steam train. Ride the the minature Cagney Steam Train; operate a hand-powered Pump Car or watch the kids “steer” the pint-sized Cranky Car. And be sure to visit the Strasburg Railroad Shops, including the Thomas™ Toy Store. Plan ahead so you can enjoy lunch or dinner onboard or the Railroad’s popular Wine & Cheese Train. For a less “moving” experience grab a bite at their Trackside Café.
Don’t you just love all of the train lingo in Strasburg? Your next stop — especially if your party includes children — should be the Choo Choo Barn. It’s Lancaster County captured in miniature, featuring more than 140 animated figures and vehicles and 18 operating trains. From the baseball game to the circus, from the zoo to the operating quarry, from the Amish barn-raising to Dutch Wonderland and the Strasburg Rail Road, it’s a truly comprehensive overview of the region. They guarantee you’ve never seen anything like the Choo Choo Barn and I bet they’re right! Admission is just $6 for adults (13 and up) and $4 for kids but Choo Choo Barn is closed from January 5 to March 6, so you better hurry!
Now that you’ve experienced the hustle and bustle of the locomotive world, you might want to end your day with a calmer form of transportation. Consider a uniquely relaxing journey through Amish County in an authentic Amish buggy. Ed’s Buggy Rides offers a three-mile tour through the back roads of Lancaster County where Amish families work and play on some of Pennsylvania’s most picturesque landscapes. You’ll even visit an actual working Amish farm where you can purchase the real thing in Amish foods and craftwork.
Of course, no visit to Strasburg would be complete without dinner at the – what else – Iron Horse Inn. The Hotel Strasburg and Conestoga Transportation Waiting Room, as it was originally known, has been serving up great food and fine spirits for more than 100 years. In the spring, summer and fall you can dine on their porch to the unique “clip clop” pulse of horse drawn Amish buggies on Main Street.
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The discounts and specials will vary from location to location. You’ll receive savings like 20% off everything you can fit in a bag at Ten Thousand Villages, or 20% off iZon lenses at the Media Eye Works “See 20/20/20″ event.
