Where does the queen spend Christmas?

Answer 1

In the third week of December, Victoria traveled south aboard the royal train to Portsmouth where she boarded the 160-foot-long, 370-ton paddle-wheel steamer Alberta. The steamer bore the queen across the silent, gray waters of the Solent to the Isle of Wight, landing at East Cowes. Her Majesty then set off in a carriage through the small town, following York Avenue as it wound its way up the hillside, past the prosperous brick houses of her courtiers, and between a pair of granite piers adorned with bronze stags. The passage of her carriage down a gently curved drive flanked by the bare-leafed trees of winter sent a flagman scurrying up a twisting staircase to the top of a tall tower. He raised the royal standard. The Queen had arrived at the Italianate seaside palace, Osborne House.

A creature of habit, and more so since Prince Albert's death in 1861, Queen Victoria regularly returned to Osborne to celebrate the holiday. Her schedule rarely varied: she visited the mausoleum at Frogmore on the anniversary of Albert's death and soon departed for Osborne, arriving a few days before Christmas, and remaining until the middle of February. Once there, the schedule included: afternoon drives in her pony cart despite inclement weather, with a brief stop at nearby Barton Manor, where members of the household, together with Victoria's grandchildren, would gather to skate on the frozen-over lake. Unlike her other children who regularly joined her there for the holidays, the Prince of Wales preferred to celebrate with his own family at Sandringham, finding Osborne "utterly unattractive."

Christmas at Osborne was celebrated with all the festive touches of previous royal holidays at Windsor, though the widowed Victoria always regarded the celebrations somewhat wistfully. Footmen and housemaids spent hours decorating the house: chimney-pieces were draped with boughs of holly, yew and ferns, woven with cloves and set with candles to provide a sparkle; garlands of evergreen, dotted with holly and ivy, framed doorways; and poinsettias glowed red against the pastel walls.

Answer 2

Queen Victoria enjoyed writing. She wrote in her journal all the time and even published two books based on her life in the Scottish Highlands.

Answer 3

In her bed eating a box of cadbury's milk tray, and reading one of Charles dicken's novels.

Answer 4

celebrated like normalbitchChristmas