Haunted Happenings Grand Parade 2018 (Salem, MA)

Date Of Event: October 4, 2018 (held annually the first Wed of October)

Location: Downtown Salem (Congress St, Derby St, Essex St)

Highlights: marching bands, costumed marchers, floats, exhibits

It’s that time of the year again in Salem, MA.  Ghosts, goblins and traffic have begun inundating the streets and walkways of Salem for the Halloween season.

The Salem Chamber of Commerce kicked off the Halloween season with their 23rd annual Haunted Happenings Grand Parade.

Decorated vehicles and costumed marchers lined the streets of downtown Salem.

The Salem Marines JROTC and Irish American Association of Police Officers and other men and women also marched.  Some of them even gave candy to the spectators.

The theme of this year’s parade was Hocus Pocus, the film starring Sarah Jessica Parker and Bette Midler.  This year marks the 25th anniversary of the film which features several Salem landmarks in the film such as the Old Town House which I have photographed in the past.

Or, from the more prominent side in the film, the front side of the building.  The building doesn’t usually have words written in chalk on it usually.  There are poems in chalk written on this building in this particular photo because I took the photo during a poetry festival in which visitors could either write their own poems or other famous poem in chalk on the building or on the street.

Keeping with this theme, there were lots of people dressed up as the Sanderson sisters.  It is a very common costume theme in Salem each year, likely because of the connection to the filming sights from Salem in the movie.  In the second photo, Mary Sanderson couldn’t make it to Salem, so they had a stand in for her.

Even the spectators were dressed up for the event.

Not to be outdone by the humans, there were also dogs dressed up at the parade.

This king is Buster, a 7 year old Yorkie.

Ginger is an 11 month old butterfly, I mean Goldendoodle.  Or is she a Goldenfly or butterdoodle?

I saw Roy, a 7 year old German Shepherd, while I was walking to the parade.  He is posing in front of a cool classic car in front of the Peabody Essex Museum.

I’m not sure why this sweet ride was parked there since Essex St is usually closed to vehicles during the Halloween festivities.  But, a good bet is that the mistress of the dark, Elvira, drove to the museum in that car as she was the special guest at the museum that day.  If only I could be in two places at once.

Due to the low light environment (the parade began shortly after 6 p.m. EST) and the various characters to show, it was a little easier to video parts of the parade.  Unfortunately, YouTube failed to upload the last part of the parade that I had videotaped.  Below are the three videos I took from the parade.