Make this Halloween in Montreal the scariest and spookiest ever with haunted amusement parks, corn mazes, escape rooms, and more.
Haunted amusement parks, scary movies, dog costume parades and petrifying parties? Break out your costumes and light your jack-o-lanterns because Halloween in Montreal is here! With the arrival of fall in Montreal comes all kinds of activities like nightclub parties galore, going apple picking or pumpkin picking near Montreal, but this is the one day of the year where we can enjoy spooktacular events like haunted corn mazes or terrifyingly beautiful cemeteries.
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On November 2, swing by the Market between 5 p.m. and 10 p.m. to celebrate the Day Of the Dead (Día de Los Muertos) ! Expect beats by DJ Truwayz , specialty cocktails, mesmerizing mariachi performances, and an exclusive show by Mamselle Ruiz and her talented band and dancers.
There’s a club party for everyone at Halloween. Zombie lovers die for Snowbird Tiki Bar’s ALOHAWEEN party. Celebrate Halloween in the dome at the SAT. Jet Night Club and Muzique host megaparties with costume prizes and fearful fun all around. The Dark Eighties call at Cabaret Berlin, while Blvd44 celebrates Halloween the Persian way. Afro-Caribbean have haunted the night at Rialto Theatre, and the Diving Bell Social Club presents two Halloween drag cabarets, one called Mythos and one called Coven. La Voûte promises the city’s biggest Halloween party inspired by Carrie in its always-haunting space, a 1920s bank vault.
Get ready for a dip in the Black Lagoon, an award-winning, international Halloween pop-up bar experience taking root in Montreal at Le 132 Bar Vintage throughout October. This creepy-as-hell, immersive event pays homage to the macabre and throws in a splash of goth and metal for good measure. The spooky cocktails have names like the Screaming Banshee and Hellraiser and are served in out-there custom glassware. Expect a dark, dungeon-like environment bedecked with skulls, life-size coffins and other elements that pay homage to the occult and bizarre.
It's a cabaret night of devilish dances, pervy performances, fiery fetish, and more evil delights than you can imagine in your darkest dreams!". Cirque de Boudoir's Halloween 2023 edition—The Gates of Hell—will premiere on Saturday night, October 27, at the Théâtre Paradoxe.
Come enjoy an hour of haunted music by candlelight on October 31 from 7 to 8 pm in Verdun's Église Notre-Dame-des-Sept-Douleurs: It's a 60-minute "soundtrack of fear" played by the Listeso Quartet on strings in the light of hundreds of candles, playing timeless classics like Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' and Danny Elfman's 'This Is Halloween' from The Nightmare Before Christmas alongside some thematically appropriate classical pieces as well. Tickets are getting gobbled up, though; grab them while you can! (Not open to kids under 8 years old.)
This festival hosted by New City Gas is inspired by both Halloween and the Day of the Dead. There is $5000 in prizes to give away, so wear your best costume!
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For three nights, Montreal's Rocky Horror Picture Show Halloween Ball will light up both stage and screen for fans of the cult film (and the experience of throwing around objects and singing along as loudly as possible) at the Imperial Cinema. The event is deemed the largest of its kind in North America, so get ready to mourn Meatloaf en masse.
You've got your pumpkin... right?
If you haven't already gone beyond the city limits to take in the autumn scenery and eat fresh menus from farms' kitchens at pumpkin patches for picking near Montreal, now is the perfect time to do so. We found a whopping 23 different places for you to travel to both near and far, and it's a great time to make it part of a Halloween-themed weekend by going for a quick road trip.
While the date hasn't been announced, we've been checking the official website daily for updates about this famous zombie parade. The walk draws about 10,000 zombies and dozens of floats, including mariachi zombies, dismembered human marionettes, and a zombie marching band.
Don't miss this Halloween celebration in Verdun! Local vendors will have the opportunity to set up their stalls, offering unique art and delicious treats. Don't forget to bring your own pumpkins for the pumpkin decorating activity! And, of course, feel free to dress up in the Halloween spirit.
Running until October 29, there's haunted houses, 'scare zones', shows, and rides to check out at La Ronde every weekend that's great for both brave adults and curious kids looking for a scare. Fridays are 18+, with exclusive horror evenings in the park where everything becomes a scary playground to ride in the dark and visit all the haunted houses. From 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., you'll have unlimited access to the thrill rides and all the haunted houses.
Pointe-à-Callière history museum in the Old Port will be hosting some terrifying storytelling at the end of October for 12+. For the older set, get a taste of haunting history on October 28 with a lecture by Cemeteries of Montreal on the city’s buried secrets (literally).
Get your dose of Halloween Shivers throughout October at the Montreal Botanical Garden with a family-friendly event full of play areas, illuminated sights and horror stories—plus a wand handling and potion-making classes.
Get a chill down your spine at the Spasm Film Montreal Halloween Festival, a short film festival dedicated to the eeky creepy and weird side of cinema. The films can be horror, drama, or even comedies, but they’re all guaranteed to eek you out. You can enjoy the cool programming over Halloween weekend in person at Théâtre Plaza or within the comfort of your own home online.
In the Old Port, SOS Labyrinthe will leave you lost and frightened with its Halloween programming including the pumpkin treasure hunt. Get a real adrenaline rush next door with a go on the MTL Zipline.
Go beyond skeletons and ghosts to celebrate the full cycle of life and death at the Mexican Festival Día de Muertos. The 2023 edition runs from mid-October to mid-November and is packed with activities for the whole family, including workshops, film screenings, live music and a bake sale (tres leches cake, here we come).
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Up by Gibeau Orange Julep (score!), Arena LeRinque is hosting a Halloween Roller Disco on October 28. There's going to be disco lights, decorations, and lots of music. Tickets get you access to the arena for 3 hours, but the price of the ticket doesn't include your skates. Must be 16+.
In the neighbouring municipality of Laval, you’ll find the largest light-and-sounds multimedia event in the world. Illumi pulls out all the stops for their Halloween themed show titled Dazzling World of Lights, which immerses viewers in a seasonal atmosphere that stays kid friendly. See monsters, ghosts, witches and thousands of pumpkins come to life.
Every year, the Village Québécois d'Antan in Drummondville looks to outdo the previous year's spooky activities, upping the ante. This year promises to be no different, with more than 130 actors bringing your worst nightmares to life in more than 20 displays of horror spread throughout the houses of the historic Village and 3 kilometres of streets and paths to get lost on. The family area opens at 6:00 pm to entertain the littlest ones. For the bravest, the area for mature visitors opens at 6:30 pm. It's even got a spooky restaurant and candy run to check out.
Did you hear about a digital block party that's happening in Mile End from MAPP_MTL? Well, they're throwing a special series of projections up on the chalet du Parc Laurier and it won't cost you a dime. With the organization's ability to pull together top artists in the field of projection mapping from Quebec and abroad, you know it's going to be amazing.
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Embrace the seductive allure of Vampyros Lesbos wiht a special screening at Cinema L'Amour. A night of vampiric darkness and queer passion awaits!
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For this highly anticipated 7th edition called V7CE, expect a unique immersive event that challenges taboos through the seven deadly sins. Take a journey through a variety of interactive installations that highlight pride, envy, greed, gluttony, sloth, lust, and wrath. (Expect Squid Game horror—with a little less actual murder.) With between 700 and 1,000 animators whose sole aim it is to produce cold sweats, you might get a little PTSD from this one.
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Montreal's own Find the Key escape rooms have 45 minutes to an hour of pure terror to experience, and if you don't believe us, consider why one of their puzzls is 16+: Anywhere from two to six people can experience one of four trials the company has made available at their Village-based business, ranging from the gore of the The Unknown (age restricted) and another based on the upside-down of Stranger Things to a Cabin in the Woods and a haunted pirate ship. You've been warned.
Every weekend in October, the La Belle de Coteau-du-Lac farm an hour outside of Montreal is hosting an event called Festiv’Halloween which features a haunted corn maze and haunted 250 meter-long indoor and outdoor gallery course, in addition to pumpkin picking and picking your own corn for popcorn. The real attraction is that corn maze, however: Separated into a family-friendly version and one that's scarier and not for the feint of heart, October 15, 16, 22, 23, 29, 30 and 31 from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.is set up to scare you good.
If you're into getting some top-notch Halloween treats this year, don't look any further than the chocolates that the Plateau chocolatier Ernestine is making—skeletons in coffins, jam-filled eyeballs and adorable and edible cyclopses—as well as a Spooky Banana Smoothie from The Alley bubble tea store in Chinatown West in downtown Montreal, inspired by diabolic forests and crafted especially for daring grave hunters, that comes with “rest in pieces,” a crunchy caramel tombstone with Oreo crumble.
Looking for a Halloween day trip? Running from October 13 to October 31, Wesley Clover Parks Campgrounds is hosting their Deadwood Haunted Drive, a haunted drive-through with a total of seven "spine-chilling, hair-rising horror sets. With live actors, dazzling special effects, coordinated lighting and sound and unforgettable scares all from the comfort or discomfort of your vehicle." The Deadwood experience is estimated to take around 20 minutes. Note that you can't stay at the campground too; reservations ended on October 11.
With 50,000 pumpkins at its disposal, the Laval-based Ferme Marineau has created its first-ever pumpkin picking season that will last until the end of October. They've put together games, a giant fiberglass pumpkin sculpture you can step inside of, a park with a real silo, swings, a chicken coop, and all kinds of other agricultural delights you and the kids can get into. Because it's outside, no vaccination passport is required, and there are tons of snacks that make the trip worth it.
ARG Évasion escape rooms have been touring Quebec with their haunted house inside a 53-foot trailer for a few years now, but now they've set up shop with a new 14+ horror-themed escape room that's entirely handcrafted by the team. Located an hour and a half outside Montreal, the first show that's available is the Burger Palace, where one to five people need to solve the gory mystery of a restaurant's mystery meat in less than 60 minutes; soon enough, on Ocotber 31, the same company will launch an escape from the St-Charle Hospital and asylum.
Want some SLeepy Hollow feels this year? Located an hour and a half from Montreal, Upper Canada Village's Pumpkinferno show is back: It's an outdoor art exhibit made up of over 7,000 handcrafted pumpkins that are all lit at night along a kilometre-long path with the historic village's 19th-century backdrop. New and returning designer/carvers create new designs each season, so no two visits to this place's exhibits are ever the same.
Located an hour outside Montreal in Rawdon, Ferme Guy Rivest has cut more than 8 kilometres of trails in their six-hectare cornfield for all kinds of family-friendly Halloween fun. The maze will be decorated for the occasion throughout October with additional activities and entertainment on Saturdays.
Montreal's had a lot of trouble dealing with its red zone restrictions, but among all the closures that have been happening, retail remains open. That means that the best candy stores in Montreal will be happy to have you come by and pick up some sweets in bulk, or just to pick up some nostalgia-satisying American imports or just gorging on some homemade chocolates, fudge, ice cream or candy. Candy stores need some love too, you know!
While it is located out in Saint-Amable, the level of detail in Maxime Duval's haunted houses are legendary and worth the trip out of Montreal. The artist's designs have regularly made headlines on the South Shore and during 2020. This year's theme will be the jungle, and he's going a spookier route than usual with some trippy illusions and sculptures to bring thick canopies of plant life to, er, life.
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