Westlock-area residents looking to have the pants scared off them at Halloween this year unfortunately won’t be able to count on a long-time spooky staple, the Clyde haunted house.
Organizers decided, for a variety of reasons, to take the year off. The decision is by no means permanent, however, and work is ongoing for next year’s show.
“We will be back, and we will be back bigger and better, hopefully,” said Cheryl Charabin, who along with her husband Tony, has been the been the major driving force behind this event.
There are many reasons for the decision, but it ultimately comes down to a lack of available volunteers to spread out the workload.
“We had a meeting here in about April, and we had already decided to not do parades this year to give our crew some time off,” Charabin said.
“It was brought up about the haunted house, and we can’t get any volunteers to help us with it. And it gets tiring.”
The haunted house event has been a big draw to the village for many years, drawing hundreds if not thousands of visitors from as far away as Fort McMurray and Calgary. Following the event, organizers have historically brought in loads of food for the Westlock Food Bank as well.
Charabin said while there will be no official central venue this year, the Village of Clyde won’t be lacking in Halloween decorations — some of the volunteers have decided to instead put their efforts into decorating their own homes.
“A couple of the members are decorating their houses in town; this will be a first for them,” she said. “We might be doing something at the school, at Eleanor Hall, but we still have to sit down with the principal and talk about it.”
It has been difficult for the members to relax at this time of year, since normally it would be getting busier and busier with organizing the haunted house. That feeling first hit home during the Westlock & District Agricultural Parade in August.
“The worst is when we went to watch the Westlock parade, and my granddaughter looked over at us and said, ‘No dress, no stress,”” Charabin said. “I thought, ‘We’re on the wrong side.’”
The break this year could ultimately prove to be a good thing, since next year’s haunted house will benefit from two years of hard work — even without an event planned this year the creative minds behind the event are still plugging along unabated.
“That never goes away. It never ends. If Tony’s mind ever stopped, that’s the only way it would ever end,” she said. “We’re still tinkering.”
For more information on the Clyde Haunted House or to get involved as a volunteer, visit the group’s Facebook page.
