Encinitas Adds a Friday Afternoon Market to Tree-Lighting Night, and the Weekend Ends in Cardiff

What time does the Encinitas holiday season start this year? For three decades the answer has been sunset, when the countdown runs and the Norfolk Island pine above Moonlight Beach lights up. On Friday, December 4, it starts at 2 p.m. The Encinitas Chamber of Commerce is opening the first Encinitas Holiday Village & Market in part of the Moonlight Beach parking lot, two hours before the Heritage Tree Lighting begins at 4 p.m., as the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

The new market's real effect is on the schedule. Friday used to be a single moment at sunset. Now it is an afternoon, and it leads straight into Saturday's parade on Coast Highway 101 and Sunday's Kringle Mingle on Aberdeen Drive in Cardiff. That turns three separate traditions into one weekend that runs south across town, in the year Encinitas marks 40 years as a city.

Friday now starts in daylight

The Chamber has said plainly what the change is for. The market is "designed to enhance the Heritage Tree Lighting celebration by encouraging families to arrive early, stay longer and enjoy an afternoon and evening filled with holiday activities," according to the Union-Tribune's account of the event announcement. Chamber CEO Carol Knight described the evening she has in mind in the same Union-Tribune report:

"We envision families strolling through a beautiful holiday village, discovering unique gifts, enjoying festive activities and then gathering for the Heritage Tree Lighting. It has all the ingredients to become a beloved annual Encinitas tradition."

The market is modeled on European Christmas markets but built small and local. The Chamber is planning about 20 vendors, with booths at $200 and preference going to Chamber members and select local businesses. The Union-Tribune listed these planned features:

• Handmade gifts, artisan crafts, jewelry, candles, holiday décor, specialty foods and children's gifts
• Hot chocolate and warm cider
• Gingerbread house decorating for kids and families
• Strolling carolers and a holiday photo backdrop
• A Visit Encinitas and Encinitas Chamber information booth

Admission is free. Overflow parking is at Pacific View Arts Center. The City approved an agreement with the Chamber for the event. The City provides the site, additional parking, staff coordination and promotion, and the Chamber plans and runs the market, according to the City's Council Rundown. The Coast News reports that the Encinitas Historical Society is a co-presenter.

The tree the whole afternoon is built around

The Historical Society's role makes sense once you know the tree's history. The Heritage Tree is a Norfolk Island pine that brothers Peter and John Danforth planted in 1952 as a 3-foot sapling. It now stands more than 90 feet tall at the corner of 4th Street and C Street, above Moonlight Beach. In 2011 the City named it one of only two official Heritage Trees, according to the Encinitas Historical Society.

The lighting started in 1994, when local resident Luis Ortiz asked the Danforth family for permission to decorate the tree and paid for the first lights himself. The Historical Society has organized the event since 2015, with support from the City, the Encinitas Union School District, sponsors and volunteers. It also handles the tree's decoration and upkeep.

Last year's lighting, on December 5, 2025, drew about 500 people to the Moonlight Beach parking lot. The program included a holiday message from Mayor Bruce Ehlers, four children's choirs, the Free Verse band and a visit from the North Pole, and the countdown landed just as the last of the sunset faded over the Pacific. That is the setting the new market adds to. Historical Society president Carolyn Cope told the Union-Tribune that the market "will add another wonderful reason to gather and celebrate."

Saturday's parade has a 40-year theme

On Saturday, December 5, the City's Holiday Parade steps off at 5:30 p.m. on South Coast Highway 101, between D Street and J Street. This year's theme is "40 and Still Fabulous," which the City says looks back at Encinitas history and ahead to what comes next.

The 40 refers to 1986, when Cardiff-by-the-Sea, Leucadia, Olivenhain, Old Encinitas and New Encinitas incorporated together as one city, as the North Coast Current noted ahead of the anniversary. The City held its main 40th anniversary celebration on October 3. It included a sandcastle exhibition, an exhibit on local history and the incorporation, line dancing, a live '80s tribute concert and an outdoor screening of Back to the Future. The parade carries the anniversary theme into December, one night after the tree lighting and a few blocks up the same stretch of the 101.

Plan for traffic on Saturday evening. For the 2024 parade, the City closed Coast Highway 101 at 4 p.m. and ran free shuttles from San Dieguito Academy and Ecke Sports Park/YMCA about every 20 minutes, with the last downtown pickup at 8:30 p.m. Check the City's parade page for this year's closures and parking before you head out.

Sunday moves south to Aberdeen Drive

By Sunday the weekend has moved to Cardiff, one of the five communities the parade theme celebrates. Cardiff 101 Main Street hosts the Kringle Mingle on Aberdeen Drive on Sunday, December 6. It is free and has a slower, morning-to-early-afternoon pace. Cardiff 101's posted schedule:

1. 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Makers Market booths along Aberdeen Drive with locally made holiday gifts
2. 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. A children's holiday craft table and live music from local musicians
3. 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Photos with Surfing Santa in his vintage Camera Camper sleigh

In-kind sponsors The Giving Treats, Starbucks and Cardiff 101 Main Street are providing holiday treats, coffee and hot chocolate. The Kringle Mingle has had the same basic format before. The 2025 event was also on Aberdeen Drive from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., with a market, Santa photos, music and crafts.

The three days, side by side

Lined up, the weekend has a clear shape. It starts with shopping in daylight at Moonlight Beach, moves to the tree at sunset, then to the parade on the 101 after dark on Saturday, and ends with a morning market in Cardiff.

Four organizers run the four events, each on its own clock. This is the first year the Chamber has filled the hours before Friday's sunset, and that afternoon is what connects the weekend from start to finish.

Before the weekend: Lightscape opens November 20

If you want something before December 4, the season at San Diego Botanic Garden, 300 Quail Gardens Drive, starts two weeks earlier. Lightscape returns November 20, 2026, and runs through January 3, 2027. It has a mile-long illuminated trail and more than 20 new installations, and the Garden is selling 2026 tickets now. Lightscape runs for weeks and sells tickets. The Moonlight Beach-to-Cardiff weekend lasts three days and is free.

The lights at Moonlight Beach have long been part of how we know the season has arrived in Encinitas, and Devon and Bunny look forward to this year's longer Friday as much as anyone. If the holidays also have you wondering what your home is worth in its 40th year as part of this city, Booth Properties is glad to talk it through, whether that's this weekend or after the new year. Request Your Home Valuation.