Santa’s Seabright village: The wonders of Farley’s Christmas Wonderland

With all due respect to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk’s “Winter Wonderland,” the Holiday Lights attraction at the county fairgrounds, and the 101 fabulous and impressive displays in neighborhoods from Davenport to Pajaro, the center of gravity in Santa Cruz County when it comes to holiday lights is in Seabright, in the narrow streets a short walk from the trestle bridge over the San Lorenzo River. 

That’s the home of longtime and well-known surfer and former surfboard shaper Pat Farley and the site for what’s known as Farley’s Christmas Wonderland.

It’s there, in a fenced-in outdoor patio space no bigger than the typical Santa Cruz backyard, where dazed bedazzlement occurs many times per hour every night (when it’s not raining) from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day.

Farley’s Christmas Wonderland is flat-out stunning, no less for the annual visitor than for the first-timer. It represents the accumulated material from Farley’s year-round obsession with the iconography and imagery of traditional Victorian-style Christmas. It’s a fantasyland and museum. It’s an enchanted garden and an antique fair. It’s too much for the eye to behold and not enough for anyone who is (or used to be) a child. It is the Western/secular concept of Christmas made manifest. The only thing that’s missing is a gentle snowfall.

This is not a commercial venture. It welcomes all comers, and it’s free — though there is a donation bucket, given that PG&E doesn’t generally behave like Santa Claus. The hours are a bit slippery, opening shortly after sunset until 8:30 or 9 p.m. It’s also open every day, Christmas Day and New Year’s Day included.

On a recent weekday night, Farley, 75, stood near the front entrance welcoming visitors like Santa’s disheveled California cousin. This is the 19th consecutive year that Farley has opened his home to strangers (as well as neighbors and friends) in what is an enormous undertaking. 

“It takes me ‘til March to get everything down,” he said of his yearly ritual. The place is full of animatronic mechanical figurines from elves to reindeer, which means there’s always something that needs fixing, refurbishing, rebuilding or repurposing. When he’s not doing that, there’s a lot of painting and cleanup to do. 

That’s just the stuff he already has. He spends much of his year either building new toys or hunting down and buying collectibles.

“It’s a year-round job,” he said.“I’ve got something to do every day.”

The sheer volume of things to gaze at in wonder defies any kind of comprehensive description. A tunnel of vegetation takes the visitor into the fairyland grotto, featuring one absorbing hand-built tableau after another of glowing fairies and wood sprites. There are life-sized figurines of carolers, larger-than-life Nutcrackers, head-bobbing reindeer, and an actual sleigh built for getting around in actual snow that dates back to 1885. If you look for it, you can easily find the elf rescued from Santa’s Village, a Christmas-themed amusement park in Scotts Valley that closed in the 1970s. There are angels and teddy bears and candy canes and hobby horses and little Victorian miniatures depicting a Dickensian Christmas village. 

Families with kids mingled with young people in pairs and trios, many from the neighborhood, more who had been here in years past. A few years ago, Farley opened a tiny gift shop in the back that sells apparel and other goodies. And this year, he’s even dedicated a small room as a Christmas museum, featuring Christmas cards from the 19th century as well as antique Christmas lights and other artifacts. 

Of all the dizzying assortments of the trappings of Christmas, Farley’s place doesn’t include any religious iconography. “We’ve got four churches within a mile of here,” he said. “So, I figured, let’s just let this be Santa’s land.”

The attraction has generated media attention over the years, and it’s attracted crowds even during the pandemic. 

It’s a passion that has enveloped Farley’s life, but, even at 75, he finds no reason not to continue devoting his energies to his constantly changing playland.

“No, I gotta keep busy,” he said. “I like making things. I used to make surfboards and sandals. I make all the little houses [in the Christmas Wonderland]. And I’m already thinking, what am I going to do for next year? People are always saying, ‘Hey, whaddya got that’s new?’ So, yeah, I gotta stay on top of it.”

“Farley’s Christmas Wonderland” is open every night until Jan. 1, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at 108 Seaview Ave. in the Seabright neighborhood of Santa Cruz. 

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