The annual Carved event is bringing Halloween chills a little early this year in Riverside.
Carved – this year featuring a haunted circus theme - will run from 5:30 to 11 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 15 at Renner Brenner Park and on the Jumping Branch Trail. Admission is free, but some activities such as the haunted trail, fortune tellers and food vendors will have a separate fee. Parking is available near the site. In case of rain, the event will be moved to Sunday, Oct. 16.
Hosted by the Riverside Chamber of Commerce and sponsored by the City of Riverside and its partners, the event is the brain child of chamber executive director April Roberson.
“I’m a huge Halloween freak,” she said. Her grandmother created a haunted house in her garage when she was a child and Roberson said she never outgrew her love of the holiday. “When I started having my kids I would do the same thing for them.”
In 2018, the event was launched in the E.H. Young Riverfront Park, and has since changed locations twice to increasingly more accessible and higher-traffic areas of the city.
With her position at the chamber, Roberson thought Carved would be a good addition to the events offered around the Northland at Halloween, and give families an affordable option.
“I wanted to create an event where a family with a 17-year-old and a five-year-old can go together and there is something for everyone,” she said.
To that end, the chamber and its partners will offer a magician, fortune tellers, fire twirlers and side show performers as well as the “Tavern of Terror” and “Freaky Food Truck Court.”
The main attractions, however, are the two paved trails — the kids spooky trail featuring little ghosts and goblins who like to play, and the haunted trail, which will cost $20 per ticket.
Staffed by paid actors, the haunted trail promises nearly a half mile of scares and is recommended for teens and older.
While Carved was in its formative years, the trail was made up of whatever might make the blood run cold, but this year the event is themed, featuring a 1930s circus gone wrong:
“In 1930 a circus made camp on an old unknown burial ground. There the performers were exposed to an evil that lurked, waiting for a chance to escape. Local lore suggests the existence of the dark entities was brought forth by a local witch who was said to use the old burial ground for power to bring the Devil into this realm. As the circus performers wandered about the camp, the demonic spirits found an opportunity to possess the physical world in an unsuspecting way, as who would suspect a bizarre circus performer to be possessed... As the circus decamped and continued on to the next town, so too did the demons. Moving across the country, spreading evil and possessing unsuspecting patrons of the circus. Beware, you may think you are in the presence of a performer until it’s too late.”
The theme came from Roberson’s own aversion to clowns, but she’s not afraid to head up the cast of characters involved. Roberson said the range of performers is made up of spooky folks from many walks of life, including those interested in theater, Kansas City Renaissance Festival performers and artists from Kansas City Aerial Arts.
Tickets for the haunted trail are available online or at the event. For more information, check carvedexperience.com or the event page on Facebook.