Countdown to Halloween

This is the first of October, so the begining of our official Countdown to Halloween. As I am a Cryptkeeper, this blog will now be all about my favourite holiday. I hope you don't mind. A lot of my post will be about scary stories, but all aspects of the holidays will be touched. And to kickstart the countdown, I thought to share this picture taken at Sundown Adventureland back in 2019. That year, they had spooky Halloween displays (especially a Halloween house, where I took the photo) as early as September. I love that attitude. So enjoy the countdown and watch this space.

Dr Quack's Elixir

Like many pictures I shared here in the last few days, I took this one at Sundown Adventureland. As usual I am sharing it today just because. It was of course in the western section. You know that in the Old/Far West there used to be quack doctors selling dodgy elixirs that cured everything. They were a common trope in western and parodies. These phoney doctors were of course more charlatans salesmen than doctors. This one at least had the honesty to call himself Dr Quack. I thought it was quite funny when I saw it. In a way, it is quite a topical photo: I am sure they have modern Dr Quacks during the pandemic making a lot of money out of gullible people.

Le Loup, déguisé en mère-grand

J'ai pris cette photo à Sundown Adventureland, lors de notre visite là-bas en septembre 2019. J'ai l'impression que ça fait très longtemps. Il y avait une section sur les conte des fées, sans doute ma partie préférée du parc d'attractions et celle où j'aurais aimé passer le plus de temps. Vous voyez bien entendu le Grand Méchant Loup qui attend le Petit Chaperon Rouge. Je trouve que le Loup a l'air à la fois joliment grotesque dans son déguisement qui ne trompe personne (sauf les peites filles innocentes) et délicieusement sinistre. Si mon souvenir est exact, mon petit loup à moi n'a pas trop aimé.

Giant Shark

I took this picture at Sundown Adventureland and I am sharing it today just for fun. I was checking my old pictures and this one struck me. This critter is right by the Jolly Pirate Boat Ride which was not open when we visited it. A shame, but there were so many cool attractions there that I didn't mind. That shark was very impressive and looked absolutely huge, so I had to take a picture of it. If you have sharp eyes, you might see that there is a bait and aabove its head, hanging from a big fishing stick. It does bring a bit of fun to the sight, but the shark is no less terrifying. I think it's a great white, or at least it looks like one. Anyway, I thought I'd share this picture today.

Ours mal léché

J'ai pris cette photo à Sundown Adventureland. Ils avaient des statues comme ça partout, de personnages fériques ou d'animaux. Il y a aussi des sections du parc qui forment une ville du Far West américain, un bateau pirate, etc. Je ne sais pas pourquoi, mais pas loin de l'entrée, dans la section Far West si je me rappelle bien, il y avait notamment cet ours mal léché, sur ses pattes de derrière, prêt à attaquer. Je crois que c'est un grizzly, quoiqu'il soit un peu "blond" pour pour un grizzly. Je ne sais pas trop ce qu'il faisait à cet endroit précis. Il y avait de créatures plus terrifiantes, je crois que l'ours est plus colérique que malveillant, mais dans tous les cas, j'aime bien et j'ai pensé le partager ici aujourd'hui. J'ai vraiment hâte de retourner à Sundown un de ces quatre.

Le sourire sinistre de la citrouille

J'ai pris cette photo à Sundown Adventureland. Je la publie aujourd'hui pour deux raisons. La première, c'est que le parc d'attractions est l'un des rares endroits en Angleterre à souligner l'Halloween aussi tôt qu'en septembre, le mois où j'ai pris la photo. Il y avait tout une boutique dont cette fenêtre était la vitrine qui avait une exhibition de l'Halloween. ensuite, parce que j'adore le sourire sinistre de Jack O'Lantern. Je disais récemment que je n'aimais pas trop les sourire trop doux ou chaleureux de certaines citrouilles. Celui-ci est délicieusement maléfique et sinistre à souhait. Je vais essayer d'en sculpter un semblable cette année.

Jack and the Beanstalk (and Wolfie)

I took this picture at Sundown Adventureland and as usual I am sharing it here because it goes perfectly well with today's topic. Anyway, yesterday and the day before yesterday I cut the rosemary by the entrance of our house because it got way too big. Wolfie wanted to assist me in this exercise and was adamant that I cut a lot of the rosemary and the weed that had grown as well. Apparently, he does not want it to "turn into a beanstalk" and for "the Englishman" to come down. I never thought that he remembered Jack and the Beanstalk so well and that it gave him such a strong impression. I bought him a book with the fairy tale a few months ago. We read it a couple of times, but that was it. I'm glad he has such a strong imagination, although I hope he does not become scare of giants living in the clouds.

Dragons, imagination and RPGs

I took this picture at Sundown Adventureland, a theme park for children and maybe some adults too. It had a lot of displays, including a dragon guarding a treasure that you could wake up. I took a few snapshots, including this one. Watching it so lifelike, I wished we had something like this where I was when we grew up. But my brothers and I had our imagination and this was enough for us. I was thinking about this recently, and before we played Dungeons & Dragons when we reached teenage, a lot of our childhood make belief games were basically medieval fantasy games: we played knights, wizards, rogues and we fought all sorts of critters like this one, hoarded treasures and visited many places. Of course, dangerous forests or sinister swamps were our home's back garden (or or friend's) and the taverns and castles were our front porch. We needed little else to create fantastic worlds, except the odd piece of fiction (this movie and these books). Our D&Dr campaign is a direct product of these games and a lot of the elements we had in these old pseudo medieval games were transformed in our campaign setting.

Cute Creepy Critter

In Sundown Adventureland, where we went last September, there was a "Singing Pet Shop" that had many animals that were either magical or extremely rare to the point of being the stuff of legends. It is difficult to explain, you have to be there. There was also this creepy little critter. I saw creepy, even though with the shaggy fur, dog-like muzzle and the big round eyes, he looks quite cute. But if you look closely, there is a label saying that  that the animal, whatever he may, loves children "especially roasted". I think the critter is up to no good and potentially dangerous and hides a sinister nature beneath his cuddly appearance. What do you think?

Hooded Outlaw

During our last English holidays in September, when we visited the family of the childhood friend of my wife and especially her son Uber who is Wolfie's best friend ever, we spent a day at Sundown Adventureland, a theme park for young kids. The kind of place that can also appeal to daddies who never quite grew up. There were many fun rides. We did not try them all, but we enjoyed a few, including the Rocky Mountain Railroad, which was basically a western setting. It was a goldmine full of gold diggers and also bandits attacking the convoy we were one. I took a few snapshots, including this one which I think is pretty neat. A menacing hooded outlaw (and what a hood!) gunning down on us. With the light, it almost looks like a desperado in a real ambush.

La peur du grand méchant loup

J'ai pris cette photo lors de ntore visite wn septembre dernier au parc pour enfants Sundown Adventureland et je la reproduis ici car elle sert mon propos. demain on nous annonce des vents violents et on nous recommande de rester chez nous. Ce que nous ferons. C'est peut-être une coïncidence, mais hier ma femme a essayé hier de faire découvrir à notre petit loup l'histoire des trois petits cochons, via un vidéo sur YouTube. Mal lui en prit: il en a eu une peur bleue. Pas tant le grand méchant loup que ce qu'il fait dans le conte. Enfin je crois. Il a fallu lui expliquer que ce ne sont que des histoires, mais ça ne l'a rassuré qu'à moitié. C'est assez étrange, car il n'a pas peur d'autres contes mettant en scène le Loup. Mais ça, c'est une autre histoire...