How I Halloween | #5 Local Events

Local Events 

October is a great time of year for outdoor special events. The sun is usually less punishing (especially since most these are at night) and the air is fresh and invigorating. Rain can be a pain but, if you prepare for the weather it can add to the spooky atmosphere .

I promised this post would be quick and to the point, so lets get to it.


1) Fort George Ghost Tours
IMHO the best ghost tour around. No costumes, creative writing, jump scares or cheese. Great stories told in the places they are set. This is the bench mark by which I judge all others.

2) Fort Erie All Hallow's Eve
 Nice historical tour with a burning of the Guy at the end. On the down side, every time I've been there (6ish) it's been a step for step, word for word repeat of the times before.  The repetition didn't bother me when the price was very low.  With the new higher ticket price, I 'll probably skip this one for 2018. To be fair, the new ticket price comes with a movie, if that's your thing. Personally I like to watch my Halloween movies (&TV) with a Pumpkin Ale so, this isn't really my venue.

3) Drummond Hill Cemetery Tours
Not scary but informative and a chance to wander around a cemetery on an autumn night without getting in trouble.

4) Bridgeburg Haunted History Tour
 Never Been but, looks interesting.


5) Ridgeway parade
They call it "A long-standing Ridgeway tradition!". As an outsider, have only just learn of it. Now you know as much as I do.

6) Heartland Forrest Pumpkin fest
Something for kids. I would expect this to be you run of the mill community event.  Little kids will like it. Bigger kids will go but, pretend there too cool to like it. High School Kids will go to get volunteer hours and parents will go because it's something to do with their kids.

7) Purple Pentacle Samhain
 One more I don't have nay direct experience with. I I had to guess I'd say could be really cool or kinda lame. Don't think you can tell unless you go but, what do I know.

Next Time...

Recipes. I'll have links and reviews of Halloween recipes and maybe instructions for the Best Carmel Corn Ever (at least my favourite).



To see more of my Fall, Thanksgiving and Halloween photos, browse my Flickr Albums.
I even have a plans for a post dedicated to nothing but Halloween Photos (not all mine).

How I Halloween or Sharing what I like about Halloween | #1 - An introduction

This is the first in a series of  posts about how I celebrate Halloween.  I'm hope to get a new Halloween post up a little more often than once a week. 

I love Halloween and have a a big store of media & info to help celebrate the season.

My plan is to share lots of media along with some more 'real world' stuff like local events, recipes and who knows what.

Virtually everything mentioned will be low to no cost. Mostly because I firmly believe that a home-made Halloween is the most fun.

Let's start with a bit of a sampler. Each Category should eventually get it's own post with more examples, suggestions & links.

Follow the links below to start getting into the Halloween mood.

1) Librivox Recording - Famous modern Ghost Stories

Librivox is a cool project (as they say) "To make all books in the public domain available, for free, in audio format on the internet." .   What that means to us is free audio books of anything that's not copyrighted.  One of the  cool things they do is create collections and anthologies around topics, genres & even seasons.

2) OTR Show - Nightfall - Info - Episodes

OTR stands for Old Time Radio. It usually covers radio broadcasts from a time it was the only game in town and into the the early years of TV when  some popular shows had both Radio and TV versions. 
Today's example isn't really old enough to be called OTR , but it's almost 40 years old & it's really cool.

Nightfall was made by CBC  starting in 1980 and aside from being a bit dated or "of the time" it's really well done and when I read the following review I was sold. "Holy wow, who knew Canadians could be so scary? Seriously, though - this is a very well done horror series from the early 80s. Really creepy stuff!"

3) Podcast - Jim Harolds Campfire

We have finally reach a point where almost everyone knows what a podcast is, so no explanations needed.  podcasts are great, everyone loves them and I'll share some of favorite spooky & Halloween casts.

Today's podcast is the campfire. The premise is that people call in in tell about their experiences, like they where sitting around a campfire. Due to the fact that everyone tells their own story some can be a little generic and others are so full of details it can be a bit hard to follow. Then you get the story you've been waiting for. Weather you can see yourself in the situation, or it super creepy or just really well told. You've heard a story that's going to stick with you, the kind of story you'll want to retell a friend.  Instead of retelling it, tell your friend where they can listen to it too.

4)Flickr Photo Group/Pool - The Vintage Halloween Pool

Halloween, & Christmas,  seem like a good opportunity to look into the past.  Some times our past & sometimes much father than that. I love the the old photos in this group. The decorations , ads and especially the costumes. They run the gambit from some old clothes and a paper bag mask to very elaborate costumes that are the antithesis of a store bought plastic mask and smock.  
There are more groups or photo pools from flickr coming up in another post. One thing about flickr, if someone has a topic they're interested in, someone else has gathered a group of photos about it.

5) Local Event - Fort George Ghost Tour

Of all the ghost and cemetery tours this is the one I like the best and the one I keep going back to.
Of all the categories I've set up for myself, I think this will be the hardest. There are ghost tours, cemetery tours, & fort tours. Once those are out of the way it gets a little harder to come up with events that aren't just another temporary fun house.

6) Recipe - Pumpkin Fudge

If there is any holiday that's synonymous with sweet treats Halloween is it. So it only makes sense to have pumpkin Fudge as the first recipe.  There are tons and tons of recipes for anything and everything. My plan is to keep the ones I pass on relatively simple and to have tried them before sharing them. There are some pumpkin pancakes & warming adult drink I'm really looking forward to.

Tune in Again

That's the sample pack of how I Halloween. I'm not sure if it will be representative of the rest of these posts, but hopefully you found something you enjoyed. If you did check back soon for more Halloween fun.

Ghost Tour

The 1st Ghost Tour of the season is Sunday May 22nd.
That's 3 weeks from today and a long weekend.

It would be cool to go out as a group for the first one, before everyone gets  busy with summer stuff.

Being on a long weekend , might make it difficult, but  for the people that can make it , it should be fun.

Let me know what you think

Halloween Ghost Tours - Anyone interested?

I Called the Fort to see what is available for Halloween Ghost Tours.

Oct 31st    10:30 SOLD OUT

                 10:15 16 Tickets left

                 10:00 16 Tickets left

Didn't ask about earlier ones.

November 1st    7:30  Completely Open - Last Tour of the night/season
                        7:15  Completely Open

                        7:00  SOLD OUT

There are other days, but I kept it to Halloween & the Day after.

I'd be leaning towards the 10:15 on Oct.31st  as a first choice,  then 7:30 Nov. 1st as a 2nd choice.

If your interested let me know ASAP!

These numbers could be out of date by tomorrow.

***Also: Taps pumpkin Ale is scheduled  to come out some time this week!