Laurel Hollow's First Weekend of December Comes Down to One Driveway Off Route 25A

On the first weekend of December 2026, three holiday events happen at two neighboring addresses on Route 25A, all between 5 p.m. Saturday and a reception on Sunday afternoon. The Cold Spring Harbor Fish Hatchery & Aquarium lights its tree on Saturday, Dec. 5, from 5 to 7 p.m. At 7:30 that night, Concerts by the Pond presents the Scandinavian vocal ensemble Trio Mediæval at St. John's Episcopal Church. At 3 p.m. Sunday, St. John's hosts its free 4th Annual Community Messiah Sing. The rest of December spreads out along Main Street in Cold Spring Harbor. This weekend stays on the pond.

Two addresses, ten numbers apart

The Hatchery sits at 1660 Route 25A. St. John's Episcopal Church is at 1670 Route 25A. Both carry Cold Spring Harbor mailing addresses, but Wikipedia lists the Hatchery as being in Laurel Hollow. Concerts by the Pond describes the church as standing beside St. John's Pond, just steps from the water.

The two properties connect more closely than the street numbers suggest. The Nature Conservancy's directions to its St. John's Pond Preserve start at the Hatchery driveway, run past the Hatchery toward St. John's Church, and finish at an upper parking lot. So one turn off 25A puts the aquarium, the church and the woods all in front of you.

That turn matters because these three events usually go on separate calendars. One is a family event at an aquarium, one is a ticketed chamber concert with a season subscription behind it, and one is a church sing-along with a reception. On Dec. 5 and 6, all three happen within about 22 hours, around the same pond.

The half hour that decides Saturday night

On paper, Saturday looks easy: the tree lighting ends at 7 and the concert starts at 7:30. The concert's seating rules make it tighter than that.

Concerts by the Pond says most performances use open seating, doors generally open 30 to 45 minutes before the start, and the sanctuary holds about 200 people. For a 7:30 start, the doors open between 6:45 and 7:00. That's the last 15 minutes of the tree lighting. A household planning both has three choices:

1. Arrive at 5:00 for the lighting, stay about an hour and a half, and walk over to the church as the doors open. You'll be in line early for an open-seating room of roughly 200.
2. Stay at the Hatchery until 7:00, then go over with the second wave. You'll still be seated before 7:30, with less choice of where.
3. Split the household. Whoever has concert tickets goes to the church at 6:45, and the rest stay at the Hatchery until the end.

The concert costs $75 general admission and $60 for students, according to the Trio Mediæval event page. The trio is a Grammy-nominated vocal ensemble from Norway and Sweden. Its program, Yule, mixes medieval carols, Scandinavian folk traditions and contemporary works. Three unaccompanied voices in a 200-seat sanctuary make for a quiet, close evening, and that's a good reason to get to the door when it opens.

Parking on the church campus is free during concerts, and the series lists accessible parking and wheelchair-accessible entrances.

For the Hatchery's part of the evening, the event listing gives the date and the 5-to-7 window. Program details, admission and any registration should be checked on that page as the date gets closer. The Hatchery's phone number is (516) 692-6768.

Sunday asks you to sing, and the ticket is free

Saturday night costs $75 a seat. Sunday afternoon in the same building costs nothing, and the audience does the singing.

St. John's describes its 4th Annual Community Messiah Sing as the Christmas portion of Handel's Messiah, with a chamber orchestra and professional soloists. The church's listing explains the format in one line:

"The audience is the choir!"

You can bring your own score or borrow one at the door, and people who would rather listen are welcome too. Admission is free. A free-will offering goes to St. Matthias, and a reception follows. The church's calendar export confirms the date as Sunday, Dec. 6, 2026, at 3 p.m.

This is the fourth year of the sing. The Saturday concert, meanwhile, is part of Concerts by the Pond's 13th season. Put together, the two days give a household two very different ways to hear music in the same sanctuary: a seated night of Scandinavian carols on Saturday, then a Sunday afternoon of singing Handel's choruses yourself.

The daylight hour behind the Hatchery

A weekend built around 5 p.m. and 3 p.m. leaves Sunday morning and early afternoon open, and the woods are right up the same driveway.

The Nature Conservancy's St. John's Pond Preserve covers 14 acres tucked behind the Hatchery. The Conservancy says it holds some of the oldest forests on Long Island. According to the Conservancy, the slopes were too steep to farm, so settlers didn't cut the woodland around the pond over and over.

The trail climbs a steep slope and then drops down to the pond on the other side. It passes giant tulip trees and big oaks above stands of mountain laurel. The preserve is open to the public. To get there, go up the Hatchery driveway, past the church, to the upper lot. The path starts at the left end of that lot.

The Conservancy also notes a December sighting worth knowing before a winter walk: a river otter was photographed at the preserve in December 2008, catching a fish in the pond's icy water. River otters had been extremely rare on Long Island for two centuries.

After Dec. 6, the season moves up Main Street

The rest of December spreads out. Most of what follows the first weekend happens a short drive east, on Cold Spring Harbor's Main Street, at the Whaling Museum at 301 Main Street. The museum's fall and winter hours are Thursday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. St. John's comes back twice, first for a swing concert in its sanctuary and then for an afternoon of caroling through the village.

The second Saturday works like a smaller copy of the first. The Whaling Museum's sea glass ornament drop-in runs at midday, and that evening Concerts by the Pond's Holiday Swing II returns to St. John's. Pianist Konrad Paszkudzki, known for his work at New York's Carlyle Hotel, brings his trio back with vocalist April Varner, who won the 2023 Ella Fitzgerald Jazz Vocal Competition. At $45 a seat, it costs $30 less than Trio Mediæval the week before. The program draws on the Great American Songbook, holiday favorites and jazz standards.

On Saturday, Dec. 19, St. John's and a brass quartet go up into the village. Caroling starts at the Cold Spring Harbor Firehouse Museum at 1 p.m. and moves down to the front porch at Pashley, finishing by 3. The church encourages Santa hats and festive clothes, and anyone is welcome to sing along. Back at 1670 Route 25A, the church's calendar lists the Annual Greening of the Church for Christmas at 3 p.m. that same afternoon.

The museum's Candle Dipping Workshop on Tuesday, Dec. 29, falls outside its usual Thursday-through-Sunday hours. If the week between the holidays is when you have family in town, mark that date.

If you want help planning around Dec. 5 and 6, or you'd just like to talk about what makes this corner of Route 25A such a good place to spend a December weekend, Nancy Rosen would love to hear from you. She's glad to share what she knows about the North Shore's season, from the Hatchery driveway to the porch at Pashley. Let's Connect.