Members of the media wait outside the Mar-a-Lago Resort where President-elect Donald Trump stays for Thanksgiving, on November 23, 2016 in Palm Beach, Florida. | Getty Trumpsgiving: A lavish feast, and maybe a few tweets Just don't ask what's on the menu.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Weeks after riding a wave of populist anger to electoral victory, President-elect Donald Trump is giving thanks this year at the exclusive confines of Mar-a-Lago, his Florida club where membership costs a cool $100,000, plus $14,000 a year in dues.

Amid the palm trees and hotel chains of varying degrees of luxury, Mar-a-Lago has morphed into a fortress. Airspace and boating restrictions are in place around the island of Palm Beach, where the club is located.


If past holidays are any guide, Trump will dine among a few hundred other club members on a feast featuring caviar, oysters and steak, according to Ronald Kessler, a friend of Trump's who regularly attends New Year’s festivities at the club as Trump's guest.

“After he eats, he’ll go around the room and greet people,” said Kessler, a former Washington Post reporter who met Trump while writing a book on Palm Beach in the late 1980s. “He just loves greeting people … just socializing.”

A general manager at the club reacted in anger when a reporter called to inquire about the menu for the Thanksgiving meal, advising the reporter only that the meal is a buffet and that no private clubs divulge their menus.

Aside from some time on the golf course, Trump is not much of one for leisure time, according to Kessler.

“That’s what he does there. He works. And that’s what he enjoys,” he said, noting that one won’t find Trump swimming. “He’ll be on the phone, he’ll be going over paperwork and, meanwhile, Melania will be having a good time.”

This vacation, in terms of Trump’s propensity for work, appears no different. The transition, already ahead of schedule in terms of appointments, was not about to slow down for the holiday. After arriving in Florida on Tuesday night, Trump announced two Cabinet-level picks Wednesday: South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley for ambassador to the United Nations and Betsy DeVos for Education Secretary.

And on Thursday, Trump took to Twitter to let the nation know he wasn’t kicking back.

“I am working hard, even on Thanksgiving, trying to get Carrier A.C. Company to stay in the U.S. (Indiana). MAKING PROGRESS - Will know soon!” Trump wrote, referring to a manufacturing company whose plans to move a plant to Mexico provided Exhibit A as he railed against trade deals during the campaign.

Trump also released a video Wednesday to wish the nation a happy Thanksgiving.

"It is my prayer, that on this Thanksgiving, we begin to heal our divisions and move forward as one country, strengthened by a shared purpose and very, very common resolve," he said.

It was a far cry from Trump's previous Thanksgiving Eve missives.

“HAPPY THANKSGIVING to everyone--I love you all, even my many enemies (sometimes!),” Trump wrote on Twitter the day before Thanksgiving in 2012.

“Happy Thanksgiving to all--even the haters and losers!” Trump tweeted the day before Thanksgiving in 2013.

The soon-to-be First Family is hoping for some privacy as they enjoy the vacation, a transition spokesman told reporters Wednesday.

The president-elect's traveling press pool will spend its holiday at a nearby Hilton, cloistered in a conference room. While aides, Secret Service agents and fellow club members will be around the incoming president, he will be shielded from the press and the public.