Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Happy Kwanzaa! What have I missed? Oh yeah… Merry New Year from Cameroon. That last one is one of my favorite Eddie Murphy lines from one of my favorite films, Trading Places. You might have guessed that I’m feeling a bit festive and the main reason is that I just returned from a week at Walt Disney World. I know there are many reasons to visit the World at different times of the year but this Holiday period is one of my favorites.

We have visited in December only once previously but we’ve had many January trips that allowed us to catch sight of the Christmas decorations at the parks and resorts before they came down. It was because of those fond memories of our Christmas-time trip of 2003 that we booked this one… and we weren’t disappointed. The parks, resorts and Downtown Disney are done up as only Disney can do them.

In this article, I’ll attempt to give you a flavor of the Holiday Season at the Happiest Place on Earth – focusing on what’s different at Disney during the holidays. While I need to show a few of the favorites, I’ll also try to show you a few things you might not have seen before. I’ll offer a little verbiage, just to set the scene, but I’ll try to deliver the “feel” of this special time through photographs. If a picture is worth 1,000 words then this article should be as valuable as War and Peace.

If you’ve visited Disney World during the Holiday period previously, then I hope this will stir some of those memories for you. If not, hopefully you’ll catch some of the flavor and be inspired to plan your next trip at Christmas-time. Either way, pour yourself an eggnog, sit back, relax and let me take you on a tour of a Walt Disney World Christmas.