Jack O Lantern Spectacular and Salem 2009

Friday, October 23, Dan and I went to see the Jack O Lantern Spectacular at the Roger Williams Zoo. It was so much fun! I had never been! They had carved over 5000 pumpkins, and some of the complicated designs they did were amazing! They were broken down into sections, The first section was Sesame Street Characters/Muppets/Abby Cadabby, then it was Great Writers, featuring Edgar Allan Poe, The Brothers Grimm, Herman Melville, Shakespeare, Homer, Mark Twain, and Hemmingway, amongst others. There were a bunch of carved animals playing instruments, a RIP section which had Farrah Fawcett, Bea Arthur, Dom de Luise, Patrick Swayze, Billy Mays, and Michael Jackson, amongst others, they also had famous movie characters, King Kong, Spiderman, Kung Fu Panda, kids tv shows such as Scooby-Doo, and Dora The Explorer, and popular icons like Hannah Montana and Twilight. At the end of the trail they had a tribute to the Kennedys, with JFK, RFK, Ted, and Eunice immortalized in pumpkin. It was a very fun and relatively inexpensive thing to do for Halloween, and I hope to make this a yearly tradition!

On Sunday, October 25, Dan and I went to Salem. Salem is an annual tradition for me, I love going there for Halloween! Dan had never been, so it was fun for me to take him! We arrived about 10 am, and we went straight to Salem Vintage Photos, where they dress you up as witches and warlocks and take your picture against various backdrops with different props. I always head there first, before it fills up!

After our pictures we went to Count Orlock's Nightmare Gallery. I wanted to see this last year, but after 1pm it turns into a Haunted House, and I do not like to be scared so I made sure we got there before then! It was a nice museum filled with wonderful wax likenesses of Horror movie characters. It runs the gammit, from early 1900's to current day creatures. I recommend seeing this museum! It is a nice place, and a different experience if you are looking to get away from Witch Hysteria stuff!

We stopped off at Brother's Diner for lunch, Brother's is set up cafeteria-style, but it's good food for a good price with generous portions!

When we were done with Brother's we headed across the street for the Pirate Museum. The Pirate Museum is historical, and it tells us of New England's Pirates. Some I have heard of, some are new to me. You go inside into a room where you meet your guide(Ours was Zack, and he was pretty funny!) as well as the 5 pirates in the room, including the last pirate of New England, who was a female. After this room you head into a room set up like a harbor, with a huge ship on your left, and a tavern(which was a clever way to get pirates drunk so they rattle off stories they normally wouldn't share, and then the one with the best story gets a room given to them for the night, only to wake up to find themselves arrested, as the tavern keeper would get their stories as evidence and call the police! Pretty clever!) on your right. Next to the tavern is a gallows, and a jibbets cage. Directly in front of you is a sign that says County Gaol, with prisoners on the far wall. Here we learned about the pirates Tom Tew, Captain Fly, and the pirate who always escaped whenever he was put in jail.(I don't remember his name!) After this room we "boarded" the Pirate ship, and we learned about different pirate flags, as well as the captain of the ship. The next room was the sleeping chambers, where we learned that was where the pirates divvied up the treasure, the captain getting the most of course. The final room of the ship was a scene showing a pirate getting ripped apart. After the ship we walked down into the dungeon where we saw other pirates(Blackbeard, for one!) and various things like treasure, skeletons, rats and bats, a boar's head, and a living pirate corpse. This led to the exit which was a gift shop. Interesting, and worth checking out!

After the Pirate Museum we headed to the Witches Cottage. I was excited about this, as I had heard good things and never been! "Hellboy" was in the front, wishing people welcome to the Witches Cottage. We walk in to various signs on the wall that told us facts about Salem, and the afflicted girls. The presentation is held in the Griffen Theatre. We go into the theatre and we are treated to a wonderful presentation filled with special effects, spooky creatures, and stories about Salem. I won't give too much away, because it is a MUST SEE, and anything I say will ruin the surprises! But that was probably my favorite of the museums we saw!

When we were done with the Witches Cottage we went to the 40 Whacks Museum(Lizzie Borden). This was a HUGE ripoff. When I hear the word "museum" I picture a building filled with artifacts, genuine artifacts that show you what went on during a certain time. This was a building, it had items in it, that is for sure. However, this "Museum" was basically a read-through of the Lizzie Borden history, her life, her siblings, parents, house workers, and the trial and murder. There was no artifacts from the Borden family, all the items in the "museum" were antiques that the "museum" was selling! The only things relating to Lizzie Borden was the story boards! And at the end they had a replica of the family burial plot. What a waste of money! SAVE your ten bucks!

When we were done here we walked around the Museum Place Mall for awhile, browsing and looking at the souvenirs. They have t-shirts at the Witches Tee for $5, but there were none we liked. We left the Museum (There was live music going on) and we saw a tent doing free dream interpretations, free spiritual readings, and free life readings, so we thought we would check it out. We went together, and they told me I am on a spiritual journey and that I have the gift of communication with my creator. Dan did a dream interpretation, and he told of a recurring dream he has had, and they told him that based on the circumstances of his dream they think that an ancestor has had an untimely death and is trying to communicate their wronged to him. They seemed right on me, but Dan isn't convinced. But hey, it was free!

We walked on down the street and we saw a woman on stilts dressed as a witch "living statue." She was posing for pictures, so I had Dan pose with her. She was kind of strange, but seemed nice enough!

Around 3 we went to Pamplemousse, which is a high-end kitchen supply store. They had free mead tasting. I don't drink(or try new things!) but Dan tried the three samples they offered. He liked them all! I only remember one name, Viking's Blood. The woman doing the demo told us that the vikings used to drink mead, and that they would drink it from the skulls of their enemies. Interesting, but gross! Dan also tried the different garnishes they had for dipping pretzels in, and he liked them all.

We made one final museum visit, and that was to the Witch History Museum. This was a museum about the Salem Witch Hysteria. You sit in church pews while they tell you a brief history, then you go downstairs to 15 scenes depicting the afflicted girls, Tituba and John Indian, the arresting of George Burroughs, Gallows Hill, Cotton Mather, a witch with her familiar, family members secretly removing hanged "witches" from the witches pit(a pit where they threw bodies of the hanged, as they felt they didn't deserve a proper burial) and a graveyard which featured the "ghost" of Giles Corey, who was pressed to death for refusing to say he was guilty in order to keep his land and have it pass down his lineage.

After this museum we had to head back to the bus, so we walked past the Witch Trial Memorial, and popped into a gift shop to kill a little time. We got back on the bus at 4:30. It was a gorgeous day, nice weather. Only needed a light sweatshirt. I can't believe we managed to fit in so much stuff too!