You follow a cloaked figure, lantern swaying, along dark, a winding path into the corners of the night. A raven appears like magic, an owl hoots over your shoulder, and you can hear raptors in the distance, waiting, eyes gleaming with hunger.
Have you woken to find yourself in Sleepy Hollow where the Headless Horseman rides? Or has Edgar Allen Poe visited you with a nightmare?
No. You are at the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon, for “Tales of Hallows Eve.” In association with BEAT, the Bend Experimental Art Theater, the museum has created a wonderful celebration to engage your imagination and thrill you to the bone.
The High Desert Museum is located three miles south of Bend on Highway 97. Visitors encounter wildlife (from wildcats and raptors to otters and reptiles), as well as living history (historical characters) and permanent exhibits (By Hand Through Memory and Spirit of the West).
“Tales of Hallows Eve” takes place from 4 – 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, October 30. Entry fee is $5 per person. 
High Desert Museum members: free.
The Highlights of Hallows Eve:
Illuminated by jack-o’-lanterns, the museum’s raven and raptors will appear at dramatic readings of Edgar Allan Poe (The Raven and The Telltale Heart) and Edward Gorey (Gashlycrumb Tinies). A puppet show of 1880s “Cautionary Tales” – stories with morals that teach about avoiding peril – are told through the eyes of local animals. Also, live characters emerge from the past to join the revelries and help you churn pumpkins into butter, make puppets, and bob for apples.
This year, Hallows Eve will be a night you won’t soon forget. And if you do, or if you neglect the teachings of the cautionary tales, one night you might see, in the dark corners of your memory, the cloaked and menacing figure of Poe or the Headless Horseman…