Kamloops homeowners bring their Halloween spirit to life with frightful displays

What began with a few lawn decorations has turned into a family production. Her dad helps build the props, her husband helps put it together and long before most of us have picked out a pumpkin, they’re already at work.

“We start at the beginning of September. It’s scary, but people bring their young kids through anyways, and honestly, I think the parents enjoy it more than the kids do,” Whitford adds.

Over on Renfrew Avenue, Brad Finnen knows how this goes — with his project starting as a small walkway in front of the house.

“It took us like two hours to set up, and we had 100 people [at the first ever house.] [We] then [were] like, ‘Oh, that was fun, let’s do bigger next year.’ So, we did this whole little — nothing big — it took maybe a minute and a half to walk through it. We did that and we had about 200 people through,” said Finnen.

Then came the 400 people last year, now his backyard “Scare-a-thon” is almost twice the size.

“For me, it’s the creativity, because I just keep building and building and building and then, you know, this year I realized it was building too much. And I said, ‘oh, I only got two weeks left,’ so I need to kind of button it up a bit… so I’ve been scrambling to button up all my creativity stuff,” Finnen adds.

Admission is free, but for Brad, the pay off comes when people walk through the entrance doors. With some even coming back for a second or third helping.

“Honestly, the biggest thing I think is just watching people have fun and it’s just a whole community thing, just have everybody come together.”

Brad has also built a way to find the next freight on your Halloween route.

His website, “Kamloops Halloween Map” lets people find haunted houses, yard displays and even events around the city.

“It’s just a lot of fun to kind of bring everybody together,” says Finnen.

“It actually has a really nice neighborhood party feel to it,” adds Whitford.

Months of work for a few good scares, but behind everything designed to keep you away are the neighbors inviting you over.

Happy Halloween!

by Jeremy Russo

Kamloops homeowners bring their Halloween spirit to life with frightful displays

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