It’s the most wonderful time of year in Nashville, Tennessee!! Christmas is in full gear and there is so much to do. Cheekwood Gardens has gorgeous lights and the zoo is lite up with hundreds of Chinese Lanterns and dragons! While these are all amazing to see, Nashville’s Christmas Gem is walking through the chilly wonder of ICE! at Gaylord Opryland Resort!
What is this wintery wonderland I speak of? Well imagine walking through the scenes of Polar Express, but everything is made of ice!! Yep that is ICE! at Gaylord Opryland! Inside this freezing building artists have come together to chisel the Polar Express movie into an interactive walk through full of photo ops and slides. This is the most magical Christmas experience and fun for all families of all ages.
Hours:
November 10, 2023 – January 1, 2024
Friday & Saturday 10am-10pm
Sunday 10am-8pm
Monday-Thursday 12pm-8pm
Location:
2800 Opryland Dr, Nashville, TN 37214
Ticketing:
Ticket Prices vary from as low as $28.99 Adult/$20.99 Child and as high as $44.99 Adult/$33.99 depending on the day you visit
Before you pay full price for your tickets though go on Instagram and look for deals or discount codes! We found a code for 50% off our tickets when we went! Just look for Nashville Travel Influencers or check out the resorts page for deals. @gaylordoprylandresort
Book your tickets in advance through their website!! I don’t know if I can stress this enough. Tickets are limited and sell out weeks before, so if you are planning on visiting ICE! make sure you book at least 2 weeks beforehand. You do not want to miss this!
Your tickets will be sent through email and you can either print the QR code tickets or just show them on your phone when you get there. I suggest at least downloading them to your phone cause you can’t always trust technology.
Where to find FREE parking:
Parking in the resort is SUPER expensive! I am talking $35 +tax for parking! That is insane! I mean it is a huge benefit to park closer and not have to walk near as far, but that is a lot of money to park a car!
Right next to the Gaylord Resort is the Gaylord mall! This mall is super fun and parking will be extremely packed, BUT at least it is free! Depending on where you park you are looking at a 10-15 minute walk to the ICE! event center. So its up to you, do you want a good workout or would you rather pay a ton for closer parking?
How To Find ICE! At the Gaylord Resort:
After you park the next question is where is ICE! Gaylord Hotel and Resort is HUGE! I mean you walk in and there are gardens, restaurants, hotel rooms, shops, even a river! It is very large. There are maps all throughout this place and we still got lost. The reason we got lost though is that we followed the signs and they led us a completely different direction than we needed to go.
Instead of looking inside the Gaylord for ICE! keep outside! The ICE! event is not inside the actual resort, but in the event center located on the south end of the property closer to the mall. If you put the Gaylord event center into your Google maps, it will take you right to it.
Once you are outside it is pretty hard to miss with all the Christmas lights, the ice skating rinks, stages, food trucks, and sledding hills. It is like a Christmas wonderland! ICE! will be inside the Event center. Once you enter turn left and you will get to the ticket check in.
First Impressions and The Long Wait:
I am not gonna lie as soon as we walked into Gaylord Event Center I doubted the whole experience being worth it. There were SO many people. Granted we went on a Friday and weekends are always more busy.
We stood in line for 30 minutes after they scanned our tickets before we even got to the parka area. There isn’t much to do while waiting in the line. There is a small area to touch the ice and some videos to educate about the behind the scenes of creating ICE! but the majority of the time is just standing and waiting.
This was the worst part of the whole experience, especially with little kids. So like I said the whole time standing in line, I doubted it being worth it, but it was AMAZING!
At the end of the line is where you will grab your parkas! There are workers there to help you get the right sizes for adults and kids. They even had some small enough for my 10 month old baby. You have to wear these blue parkas to go into the ICE! experience because inside the building is kept at a freezing temperature of 9 degrees! It is SO cold!
After getting your parkas you will get pictures taken and the option to purchase them if you would like. Then your group can proceed into the experience without there being a ton of people coming in at once.
Walking Into ICE
Walking through those doors into the ICE! experience you are hit with 2 things, a blast of freezing cold air to your face and a jaw drop, because of how amazing it is! The theme of this 2023 season is the Polar Express! So as soon as you walk through the doors the first thing you will see is a giant train all made of ICE!!! Everything is made of ice!!
These caribou were made out of Ice and…..
THIS,
And THIS!
And even THIS!
The experience is pretty much walking through the movie Polar Express. Each room is a separate scene from the movie.
All Aboard!
Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot Chocolate!
Caribou!
Train Ride over the ice
Naughty And Nice List
In the Present Bag
Meeting Santa
Can you hear the bell?
The entire experience is made up of photo ops. There are so many places to take pictures interactive scenes to be a part of. My favorite was the photo op of being inside Santa’s bag of presents, but you can also at the front of the train with the engineers fixing everything in front of the caribous and sitting in the seats of the train looking out the icy windows.
My kids favorite room was a room with an icy mountain scenery and cracks in the floor as the train races over the frozen lake. The reason they loved this rooms so much is that there are 4 slides in this room made entirely of ice!! You can get in line and go down as many times as you want! My kids LOVED this!
There is a height limit to the bigger slide of 42” but the smaller slide is super fun too. Make sure when you sit on your parka when you go down for a better slide and also not as cold a bum. Also give yourself a good push off if you are going down the kids slide or you won’t make it all the way down. It isn’t as steep as the bigger slides.
Another cool activity in the ICE! experience is to watch actual ice carvers at work. It was really amazing to see them in action. The last room is an incredible sculpture of the nativity scene and the true meaning of Christmas. It is breathtaking the detail and beauty of this sculpture!
Family Friendly Tips:
- Visit on a weekday for the least busiest experience.
- Book tickets in advance they go fast
- Follow Nashville travel influencers or the @gaylordoprylandresort for deals and discount codes
- Park at the mall for free parking
- Pick a time before 5, this is the busiest time of day
- Be sure to arrive on time, they can not guarantee when you will get in if you are late. You have 15 minutes before you are considered late.
- Bring something for your kids to do while waiting in line. We had to wait for about 30 minutes to even get in.
- Bring hats and gloves, the parkas keep you pretty warm, but they don’t keep your ears or fingers warm.
- Try not to bring much. There is no wear to put your stuff so whatever you bring you have to hold.
- Make sure your pants have pockets to store your phone/wallet/and such, as the parkas will not have pockets
- You can bring strollers, but I don’t advice it. They take up so much space and slow you down going through the experience.
- Wear closed toed shoes! It is really cold!
- Walk through the Gaylord Opryland Resort when it gets dark. The lights inside are amazing!
Walking Through The Gaylord Opryland
The best time to go to the ICE! experience is in the evening when it is darker because this is when all the lights are turned on and shining bright! Of course this is when the most people are here, but that is just because nobody wants to miss this experience.
After you are done with ICE! do not skip out of walking through the Gaylord Opryland Resort! This is FREE to do and such an amazing thing to see. This building is huge and inside are huge rooms all lite up with Christmas lights and the gardens are covered with poinsettias!
Each room has some sort of awe factor to it, from a giant Christmas tree, a waterfall, a river with riverboats, and a room covered in shining guitars and music notes. Walking through is such an amazing experience. Even my kids loved all the lights and things to see.
Final Thoughts on ICE! At Gaylord Opryland
When I first heard of the ICE! I thought that would be cool, but when I heard the prices I thought heck no! It is SO expensive and even going to it, I still think it was really expensive; BUT it was so worth it!! Grandparents love it, I loved it as an adult, and my kids loved it too! It isn’t very often there is an experience that all ages enjoy, but this was it!
I was in awe of the entire experience and my jaw just dropped lower and lower with each room we walked through! All the frustration of waiting in line just instantly forgotten as soon as we walked through the doors and saw that giant ice train.
The detail of each ice statue was amazing and just would make you stare! The artists did and incredible job and I highly recommend going and taking your kids. This is such a fun Christmas tradition that I hope to experience again and again!
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