A Victorian Christmas

Last weekend we traveled back in time to the Victorian era.

Ok, night quite, but we did travel to the Victorian Christmas in Nevada City. Despite the name, Nevada City is actually a small town in California - not a city in Nevada! It is located in the Sierra Nevada about a two and a half hour drive north-east of San Francisco. Every December the town plays host to a Victorian Christmas fair. The setting could not be more perfect. Being an old Gold Rush town, Nevada City is full of beautiful Victorian architecture. Broad Street which forms the main thoroughfare of the Christmas fair is particularly pretty with views over the surrounding forest.

At 2,500 feet above sea level Nevada City sees much cooler Winter temperatures than the Bay Area. While it was quite a pleasant day when we visited it was clear from the piles of snow that we spotted around the place that it had recently been much colder. How beautiful would it have been had it snowed lightly while we were there? That would've been amazing.

The Christmas fair attracts huge numbers of visitors as you can see from my photos. The fair features many local vendors and old fashioned entertainment including musicians, carolers, jump rope and ring toss games for the kids, balloon artists and many people dressed in their finest Victorian attire - even Santa and Mrs Claus.

Ava receives a candy cane from some of the Victorian characters strolling the fair

The girls with Victorian Santa and Mrs Claus

Lots of visitors

Ava catches a ring

Lola catches one too

Ava has a go at jump rope

Lola jumps high

Balloon sword fight

Swashbuckling Ava

A sword and crazy hat for Lola - until she popped them both and had an hour long tantrum!

There was lots of music

Cheesy photos are always a must!

As the afternoon wore on and became evening the temperatures dropped substantially. We headed towards a large fire pit to warm ourselves and try delicious roasted chestnuts - my favourite. The girls then had a play in a tiny pile of left over snow which was so compacted it was more like ice. Needless to say Lola slipped over in it many times but that didn't stop her attempts at making snow balls out of it!

We checked out the beautifully lit Christmas tree before making our way back to the car. It had been a long day for the girls and they fell asleep pretty much as soon as we started on our drive home.

Twilight

Beautiful Christmas tree

Nevada City is such a pretty place and I look forward to visiting it again. I imagine that it would be a lovely place to spend a weekend during Spring or Summer. Or even Autumn or Winter for that matter!