“Unveiling the Magic of Halloweentown: A Spooktacular Start to Our October Adventure!”
Welcome to Halloweentown! This is a special place in Saint Helens, Oregon, where Halloween is celebrated for a whole month. The festival is based on the Disney movie of the same name that was filmed here in 1998. The town was chosen because it was a small, somewhat abandoned town due to the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens.
We knew the Halloween vibes were strong when we pulled into the RV park and noticed many of the residents had gone all out with their holiday decor. We were feeling a little bit jealous but I have to remember that packing totes of holiday decor just isn’t in the plans for us right now, especially after we have just sold and gave away over 35 totes of holiday decor we had collected over the years before starting off on this adventure!!!
We also realized that some of us had NEVER actually seen the movie Halloweentown!
It was such a cute movie. I can’t believe We hadn’t seen it before. It was a nice G rated film to cleanse our pallets of our gruesome, gory, and horrifying Halloween films we normally indulge in…
On the second day, we went down to the town square, where we got our first glimpse of the magical Spirit of Halloweentown.
The set-up was incredible, and the attention to detail was fantastic! It's clear that the people who prepare for this festival have a great deal of love for what they do.
These pictures are from the daytime, and though everything is set up. We would soon come to see that it is a completely different experience to view Halloweentown in the evening.
My 50th birthday started off very relaxing with coffee, painting, and football—three of my favorite things! It was pretty cool for me to be celebrating my birthday in a place known for Halloween being an October baby. I’ve always felt a strong connection to all of the autumn holidays.
As the day crept into the evening, Todd and I decided to walk to a haunted pub in downtown Saint Helens. The fall weather had continued to be so beautiful! The 2.5 mile walk was really nice!
The drink list was enticing! Todd had some fancy-pants cocktail that tasted like desert in a cup; I opted for beer this time.
After drinks, it was time for a Spirit of Halloweentown photo shoot, and though this one turned out pretty darn cute. There were a few that were pretty hilarious, involving me and a tractor... those ones will never be seen on the Internet unless one of my children decide to blackmail me somewhere down the road!
People in the surrounding neighborhoods do a fantastic job decorating for Halloween as well. I mean, maybe they can never compete with the Schlegel Halloween decor of the past, but it's still pretty good!
Saint Helens may be known for The Spirit of Halloweentown, but there are some beautiful parks as well. we found some really cool biking trails to ride the e-bikes through near our RV park. I do have to say, though that Saint Helens, in general, did not feel like a very pedestrian friendly or bicycle friendly place outside of the trail system, which was a bummer.
This isn't goodbye; it's see you later. We were in Saint Helens for seven days, and now we are heading off to Sauvie Island, although only 30 minutes away. It is like a different world. It is completely quiet and isolated; none of the hustle and bustle Saint Helens offered.