Remember when you were a kid, at Halloween time, and there was that one maze down the street with the peeled grapes (mummy eyeballs, of course) and the vinyl record player in the corner playing the ghost sounds?
Cut to now, where the Halloween attraction industry is mega huge, offering all sorts of ghoulish experiences all October long.
Things change, in short.
Looks like the same thing might be afoot with the winter holidays. The yuletide season of yore was about a few showings of "The Nutcracker" (of course; it's a classic) and a tree lighting or two.
But the seasonal fun industry is growing, especially in the realm of outdoor ice rinks. SoCal has several now, and the Queen Mary in Long Beach is seeking to step up the yuletidery with its rink debut.
Called CHILL, the multi-area attraction opens on Saturday, Nov. 17, and it will include a full-on ice sculpture wonderland, complete with a cold replica of the famous Long Beach-based ship. But here's something slightly different: There's a icy slide off the bow of the ocean-liner sculpture, which bundled-up kids are welcome to slide down.
Don't try that on the real Queen Mary, though, right?
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A fairytale castle and whimsical lanterns are other features of the 13,000-square-foot Ice Kingdom. You'll want to pack warm clothes for your walk-through, note, and for your ice-skating-session.
Tubing -- yep, tubing -- and Santa are also in the house. Or, er, the dome. (You probably guessed that the ginormous dome next to the Queen Mary was involved.) We've heard of tubing on the waves in ocean, but never cold-weather tubing next to the ocean; another first.
CHILL -- that's all caps -- brings the brrrr from Saturday, Nov. 17 through Sunday, Jan. 6.
Here's a video showing the making of the attraction's ice lanterns:
