Holiday Celebrations and fireworks at SeaWorld Orlando

SeaWorld Orlando has pulled out all the stops for this year’s Christmas Celebration. From Rudolph to ice skiing, it is jam-packed filled with entertainment, all day long. In fact, there was so much to do, we didn’t have time to see it all. We’ll show you the nice and the naughty side of SeaWorld’s holiday in the park…

Trees, Decorations, Entertainment and More Trees

We’re going to go a little in reverse of our trip. So that means we’ll start off with the nighttime lights first. 

The main tree as you enter SeaWorld sparkles bright in the night.

The Waterfront is all aglow in the evening. 

The Holiday Train display is a delight by day or night.

Photo Ops

Around the park, there are quite a few locations to get an Insta-worthy picture.

Street Entertainment

There’s holiday entertainment on stages and pathways everywhere.

My son Johnny’s favorite was the jumping soldiers. They have quite amazing jump roping skills.

What Christmas Celebration would be complete without Santa? You can get your photo taken with Santa in his sleigh at the Wild Arctic. Unfortunately, Santa was out feeding his reindeer for the day when we stopped by. Plan accordingly as Santa doesn’t arrive for the day until 12:30.

Sea of Trees

The Sea of Trees is a stunning sight to behold. While continuously lit, various times throughout the night the trees put on a light show synchronized to holiday music.

Sesame Street Land

Sesame Street Land is full of the Holiday spirit. There is certainly no shortage of decorations here!

The parade float has been decorated for the season, and Elmo and friends come out and perform with a song about the holidays of the season, including Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanza.

As the show continued, it got very crowded and we didn’t stay. Guests were just too close for my comfort level. Although we experienced crowds at other times and areas of the park, this instance was by far the worst we experienced. SeaWorld really needs to do better at crowd control or just not do shows like this that entice guests not to practice safe distancing. 

Character Meet and Greet

Cookie Monster and Grover are ready for the holidays. SeaWorld encourages taking off masks for photos while having characters safely distanced and even blocked from eager kids. Characters rotate, so you may get different Sesame Street characters throughout the day.

Rudolph’s Christmastown

One of Johnny’s favorite experiences is Rudolph’s Christmastown. This is a walkthrough of the Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer story. The displays look like large pop-up books.

Of course, a Rudolph experience wouldn’t be complete without meeting The Bumble and Rudolph!

SeaWorld has been very good about spacing markers with the other festivals, and while markers were present at some of the festival booths, meet and greet lines had no distancing markers. Although groups were spaced out more than pre-pandemic, I would have felt more comfortable with the 6 feet marked spacing. As with all other theme parks we cover, guests do best when they can see physical markers, just telling folks what to do doesn’t seem to be enough. 

Ice Skating at Bayside Stadium

Ice skating outside in Florida? It’s a new offering this year! Johnny got to ice skate for the first time! You can make reservations beforehand for 30-minute time slots.

I have to say, this wasn’t Johnny’s favorite activity. However, he did enjoy sitting on the skate helpers and being pushed around. Be aware that you need reservations, socks and gloves to participate – space for this activity is limited. 

Winter Wonderland on Ice

At night the ice skating rink transforms into a winter wonderland with an ice skating extravaganza. This show is quite impressive. In fact, Johnny was in awe of all the tricks the ice skaters could do. They perform 2 shows a night with limited (and distanced) seating.

It’s A Wonderful Night: A New Story to Tell

A revamped version of the original, It’s A Wonderful Night: A New Story to Tell includes a chorus that sings over 30 Holiday songs with new surprises and laughs. Seating is limited and distanced.

Festival Booths

The booths offer a variety of food, snacks and drinks. They’re also decked out for the season— it feels very festive. And while there were not as many distancing markers, we did notice guests were doing pretty well on their own at the booths.

We only tried the decoration booth where you decorate your own cookie. Unfortunately, by the time we got to the booth, they ran out of frosting for the day. That definitely didn’t stop  Johnny from enjoying the replacement, which was marshmallows.

Hot Chocolate comes in kid friendly and adult beverage options. It comes in a reusable mug with a discount on refills.

New Night Entertainment

Here’s something exciting… starting today (December 18) is the new Holiday Reflections Fireworks and Fountains Finale. I am excited to see the return of fireworks again as the Electric Ocean Remix that ran over late summer and fall was a big hit. The fireworks show runs through January 3, 2021.

My Thoughts

I’m impressed with SeaWorld’s offerings for the Holidays and that they have added so many new things. We only had a few occasions that we were concerned about crowds and safety lapses. These would be easy issues for SeaWorld to fix, and a duty we hope they step up to.

The park reservation system is still in effect. And while I have never had a problem reserving a day, it remains to be seen how in-demand the park will be over the winter break. We are already planning to go back to see everything we missed the first time.

Beginning December 18, SeaWorld’s Christmas Celebration will run every day through December 31.