Celebrating Spooky Season

By LILY TINOCO and SARAH SHMERLING

There is no shortage of ways to celebrate Halloween across Los Angeles, and the Palisadian-Post has readers covered with our annual round-up of spooky-themed events. From pumpkin patches to festivals, the Post has highlighted a few options to celebrate this year.

Halloween Spooktacular

Offering a day of family friendly fun, Halloween Spooktacular is returning to Palisades Recreation Center from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, October 28.

Festivities include free carnival games and prizes, as well as crafts, cookie decorating and the opportunity to create your own slime with the Post.

Palisadian magician Greg Victoroff will be on hand for a magic show starting at 10:30 a.m.

The rest of the day will feature a “Trunk or Treat,” inflatables and a coloring contest, with the winners announced at 1 p.m.

Bruster’s Ice Cream will have a truck on-site, and additional food will be available for purchase.

Palisades-Malibu YMCA Pumpkin Patch

The Palisades-Malibu YMCA annual patch is back this year with two flat bed trucks’ worth of pumpkins at Simon Meadow. The patch officially opened with a pumpkin carving ceremony on Sunday, October 1.

This year’s patch features “very cool new things,” Palisades-Malibu YMCA Executive Director Jim Kirtley explained to the Post.

Part of the assortment will be knucklehead pumpkins, warty minion pumpkins, “show stopper” Big Mac pumpkins, and, for the first time, white pie pumpkins. There will be corn stalks, along with ornamental corn.

A select number of pumpkins will be sold that were grown at Simon Meadow: Some of the pumpkins that had rotted last year melted into the ground, Kirtley explained, and because of the rains, the seeds started to grow.

“Summer day campers made it a project where they would water them as part of the camp,” Kirtley continued.

The patch serves as one of YMCA’s biggest annual fundraisers, alongside the tree lot, which will return this year as well. In part, the fundraisers support the day camp.

“This goes to help all kinds of programs,” Kirtley said of the fundraising efforts. “It helps provide financial assistance for [Youth & Government], it goes to senior memberships … everybody and anybody who is in need.”

The patch will be open from 3 to 6 p.m. Monday to Friday, and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, until the pumpkins are sold out.

“[The patch] allows us to be able to do the impactful programming we have,” Kirtley concluded.

Natural History Museum

The Natural History Museum in Exposition Park is embracing “spooky season” with different events and programs for Angelenos of all ages.

The Natural History Museum’s popular immersive Halloween light-up attraction Boney Island kicked off on September 28 and will run through Halloween, October 31.

“This hauntingly whimsical interactive experience for all ages will feature familiar sights for long-time Boney Island fans—skeletons performing rope tricks and levitating through hoops, shadow puppetry and more,” according to a press release. “NHM will add its own spin with artistic performances, real fossils, live animal presentations, trick-or-treating and other ghoulishly glowing installations.”
Boney Island will run Thursday through Sunday nights from 6 to 10 p.m., with additional and adjusted hours on certain nights. Tickets cost $20 for museum members and $25 for non-members. To purchase tickets, visit nhm.org/boneyisland.

The Natural History Museum’s annual Spider Pavillion is open to the public through November 26. The seasonal pavilion is described as a “one-of-a-kind” opportunity to get up close and personal with hundreds of orb weavers and their webs.

“Plus, you’ll be able to peer into the habitats of some eight-legged legends, like tarantulas, wolf spiders and jumping spiders,” the press release stated.

Timed tickets for Spider Pavilion are required and free for museum members and $8 for non-members, in addition to the price for general admission.

For more information, visit nhm.org/spiders.

Nights of the Jack

Production and event industry veterans Ben Biscotti and Tony Schubert recently announced the return of their “Nights of the Jack” Halloween event for a fifth year at King Gillette Ranch in Calabasas.

“Nights of the Jack is the ultimate Halloween attraction for Angelenos and has become a staple of the Southern California Halloween season,” according to the event poster.

Nights of the Jack offers an interactive walking trail with thousands of hand-carved, illuminated pumpkins, spanning three-fourths of a mile through the history-filled ranch. While there, guests can also enjoy hot and cold seasonal drinks, seasonal cocktails from the “Spookeasy” bar or festive treats.

This season’s event has new additions to look out for, including collaborations with Nickelodeon and the LA Rams. Guests can help themselves to free Halloween-themed face painting, choosing characters from “Monster High,” “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” “Spongebob” and “Paw Patrol.” Attendees can also enjoy an interactive experience of Rams scarecrows, a Mariachi Rams photo wall and a Rams jack-o-lantern display.

In addition to these collaborations, Nights of the Jack also introduced new lantern art, “pumpkinized” photo opportunities, Jack’s Pumpkin Pursuit—a new scavenger hunt—and more.

The family-friendly event kicked off September 30, and runs from 6 to 10 p.m. select evenings through October 31.

Weekday general admission tickets start at $29.99, and weekend general admission tickets vary between $39.99 and $44.99.

For more information or to purchase tickets, visit nightsofthejack.com.

Marquez Elementary Halloween Festival and Pumpkin Sale

After a three-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic and changes to the campus, Marquez Charter Elementary School invited the community to the return of the Marquez Halloween Festival on Sunday, October 22, from 12 to 3 p.m.

The event is “back in full force,” Marquez mom Caitlin Machol said to the Post.

“The Halloween Festival is a Marquez tradition and we are thrilled a committee of parents could bring it back to its glory for 2023,” she added.

The Marquez Halloween Festival will be complete with carnival games and concessions, as well as a haunted house, executed by this year’s fifth-grade class who will be in charge of building, decorating and scaring other students. The haunted house is considered fifth grade’s “biggest fundraiser of the year,” helping fund an end-of-the-year culmination ceremony, field trips, parties and more, according to the school’s website.

Marquez also invited the community to its annual pumpkin sale. Community members are invited to pre-order a pumpkin and pick it up on the day of the Halloween Festival, October 22. Orders must be submitted by October 15.

The school will be offering fresh pumpkins from Underwood Family Farms in Moorpark. Prices of the pumpkins range from $12 for a medium—approximately basketball-sized—pumpkin and $16 for a larger pumpkin.

All proceeds will go directly to Marquez fundraising efforts for its students.

For more information or to pre-order a pumpkin, visit friendsofmarquez.com/halloween-festival.