The displays are glowing and the suspense is growing as organizers put the final spooky touches on the displays at Enchanted Halloween at Heritage Acres.
The annual event sees hundreds of families attend Heritage Acres the weekend before Halloween. This year, the event will span two weekends.
“We have had huge attendance in the past so this year doing it over two weekends we hope to see even more people able to come out,” said founding producer and artistic director Alice Bacon of Shine*ola Communications.
Bacon has been at the helm of the event since it started and has an extensive background in organizing such events.
“My background is in event production,” Bacon explained. “My family and I always enjoyed Heritage Acres as community members and we started to fantasize about how great it would be for someone to put on a Halloween event there. That someone ended up being us.”
Bacon, who lives in Brentwood Bay, gathers her team each year and begins the set-up for the event at the end of September, although preparations begin in the summer, she explained.
Bacon said the premise of Enchanted Halloween is to put on a family friendly event that benefits a good cause.
“Our interests are both creative events and also events that have an element of social enterprise, something that benefits the community on a larger scale,” Bacon explained, adding that the Children’s Health Foundation of Vancouver Island is the charitable recipient of all the funds raised.
Enchanted Halloween is designed for the whole family, continued Bacon, and doesn’t include anything shocking, gory or violent.
This year Enchanted Halloween will feature, as Bacon calls them, “beautifully eerie” displays, train rides, live music, costumed actors and much more.
“We change it every year and improve it so even if people have been before it will always be a new experience,” she said.
Enchanted Halloween runs Oct. 18 to 20 and 25 to 27 at Heritage Acres in Central Saanich. There is no parking on-site (except disabled) and a free shuttle runs between the dedicated parking at Gateway Park at Keating X Road and the event site.
For information on ticket pricing and hours visit www.enchantedhalloween.com.