Christmas At Beamish Museum Review : Festive Days Out

We’ve been aware of the Christmas nights at Beamish for a while now as they’ve been running for quite a few years (and will be running again in 2020.) Visiting Beamish at Christmas has been on our wish list for a long time. We’ve had some great festive days out, including Chester Zoo Lanterns and Christmas Woodland at Blakemere, but we knew Beamish was going to be something special. In previous years the tickets sold really quickly so this year we were finally organised enough to book ahead. The Christmas At Beamish events run in the evening so we decided to go to Newcastle for the weekend so we could visit on the Friday night.

Christmas At Beamish Museum : Location

Beamish is an open air museum that tells the story of North East England in 1820s up to the 1950s. It’s situated in County Durham and it was just a 20 minute drive from our hotel near the Angel Of The North.

Christmas At Beamish Museum : Prices

We paid £14 per adult and £9 per child (aged 2 to 16 years old) This includes access to the evening event and allows you to see the shops, stalls, ride on the tram and much more. There’s the option to pay an extra £6 per children to visit Santa and there was also an ice rink charging £5 per adult and £4 per child for a 20 minute turn.

Christmas At Beamish Museum : Our Experience

The event ran from 4.30pm until 9.30pm and we decided to go a little later and have something to eat at the hotel before we left. We had read reviews that had mentioned just how busy it could get. We therefore arrived around 6pm in the hope it would be slightly less busy.

After parking our car, which was relatively easy despite how busy it was, we made our way in. There was a huge Christmas tree as you approach the main entrance, which made even the outside look lovely and festive.

After we were admitted we decided to head straight to where Santa’s grotto was located as we had prebooked tickets. The area was decked with lights and another lovely Christmas tree. Even if you have prebooked the tickets for Santa you still need to join the queue as quite a few tickets are sold for each allotted time. We queued for around 15 minutes but the queuing area was as pretty as everywhere else.

When we reached the front of the queue we were taken through to Santa. I just loved the old fashioned decorations and general feel as we made our way through. The children met Santa in front of a fireplace and discussed their wish lists. The room was underwhelming in comparison to the rest of the site but the experience was unhurried and Santa was great with the children.

After visiting Santa we made our way over to the reindeer. You don’t need to have paid to see Santa to see the reindeer so as you can imagine they were very popular! There were bags of reindeer food for sale but each of our kids were given some for free from Santa. We weren’t expecting real reindeer and it was really magical for the kids to not only see them up close but to feed them too.

After fussing the reindeer we visited the nearby house where we could explore the dimly lit rooms and imagine what it would have been like to live in age before electricity. There were children’s crafts in the kitchen and the opportunity to try some (non-alcoholic) festive punch which myself and husband enjoyed – the kids, not so much! There was also live Christmas music playing from one of the rooms which just added to the lovely festive atmosphere.

We caught the tram to the main street and it was just like a trip back in time. The old fashioned shops were wonderful to explore and we bought some old fashioned sweets from the sweet shop.

My eldest son (and husband) particularly enjoyed seeing the old cars and bikes in the replica 1900’s garage. He couldn’t believe that people actually rode around on a penny farthing!

The whole street was just beautifully lit up and we were so glad we had visited in the evening. We had never visited Beamish before so we had a great time entering all the shops, the Masonic hall and bank. We also visited the stables were the kids were thrilled to see the horses inside. As we walked down the street there was music playing which again made for such a lovely atmosphere.

We explored the Christmas bazaar which had unique little stalls selling decorations, gifts and condiments. We bought some jars of jam and a particularly lovely cranberry and orange curd. In the centre of the bazaar was a bandstand with a brass band playing Christmas carols. This was a particular highlight for me. I love a brass band, especially at Christmas time.

Christmas At Beamish Museum : Summary

We had a fantastic time enjoying Christmas at Beamish museum. We didn’t do everything, including the ice-skating, so would love to go back again. It was the perfect festive evening out and all three kids enjoyed it as much as us adults.

Beamish has a variety of events running throughout the year, check their website for more details.