Chichester's free lantern parade leaves the Council House at 4pm on 31 October; the Spooky Disco is sold out. Dell Quay pumpkins 9.30am to 4.30pm.

Chichester’s big free Halloween event this year is the city council’s lantern parade on Saturday 31 October, leaving the Council House on North Street at 4pm, followed by a free Spooky Disco in the Guildhall in Priory Park that is now fully booked. Around it: two pick-your-own pumpkin farms on the edge of the city, a costumed day at the Weald and Downland Living Museum and a children’s party in Fishbourne. Every detail below is from the organiser’s own page, checked on 24 October.

The quick answer

  • Free and in the city centre: face painting from 2pm and the lantern parade at 4pm, no booking, on Saturday 31 October. The Spooky Disco that follows is sold out. All run by Chichester City Council for its 800th anniversary.
  • Pumpkin picking: Dell Quay PYO is open for pumpkins on 17 and 18 October and 23 to 31 October, 9.30am to 4.30pm, free entry; Northlands Farm runs a ticketed Halloween event, with five days still on sale.
  • Halloween falls on a Saturday this year, the day after West Sussex half term ends. Fontwell Park’s fireworks are the same night.

Updated 17 October: the city council now lists the Spooky Disco and the lantern workshops as sold out (walk-ins may be possible at the workshops); Dell Quay has published its pumpkin days and hours; Northlands Farm’s booking page now offers only 25, 27, 28, 29 and 31 October, and its Gold adult ticket is £17.55.

Updated 24 October: the Weald and Downland Living Museum has published its full half-term programme (27 to 31 October), and its admission prices on the booking page are now £18.75 an adult and £9.75 a child.

The free lantern parade and Spooky Disco

All from the city council’s half term announcement of 30 September. The parade draws on an old Chichester custom: the Mayor once walked the streets behind a round lantern, now known as the Municipal Moon.

  • Lantern workshops, Thursday 29 October: sessions at 10.30am, 12.30pm and 2pm in the Assembly Room at the Council House. Free. Now listed as sold out; the council says a limited number of walk-in places may be available, first come first served, so you may have to wait. Children make a lantern to carry on Saturday.
  • Face painting, Saturday 31 October, 2pm to 4pm: free, under the Council House portico, first come first served.
  • Lantern parade, 4pm: gather outside the Council House from 3.50pm. Children’s wristbands are handed out at the portico from 3.30pm. The parade goes to the Market Cross, where the Mayor reads a proclamation for the council’s 800th anniversary and the Reverend Canon David Nason blesses the city, then along East Street to the Guildhall in Priory Park, arriving about 4.30pm. You do not need to have gone to a workshop: the council will have ready-made lanterns on the day.
  • Spooky Disco, 4.30pm to 6.30pm, the Guildhall: free, booking essential, and sold out on the council’s page by 17 October. Only families with pre-booked tickets get in. A DJ, light refreshments, and costume prizes judged by the Mayor in four groups: under 7s, 7 to 13, over 13s, and groups and families.
  • Food: Fenwicks Café in Priory Park serves pizza and hot drinks until 5.30pm, with an offer for families at the event.

The workshops and disco were booked through the council’s Ticket Tailor page, linked from the announcement. The parade and face painting need no ticket. The council has not published any road closure for the parade.

Pick your own pumpkins at Dell Quay

Dell Quay PYO, at Crouchers Farm on Birdham Road, Apuldram (PO20 7EQ), is open for pick-your-own pumpkins on Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 October, then every day from Friday 23 to Saturday 31 October, 9.30am to 4.30pm. It is closed for pumpkins from Monday 19 to Thursday 22 October. The farm’s own page says entry is free, parking is free with no need to book, and you pay only for what you pick, by card or cash. There is a café, a play area and accessible toilets; no dogs except guide dogs.

It is about a mile south of the city on the road to the Witterings, with a pavement all the way from the centre and Stagecoach routes 52 and 53 stopping close by. It has not published pumpkin prices.

Northlands Farm Halloween

Northlands Farm (PO19 3PY) runs “Family Frights and Pumpkin Delights” from Saturday 24 October to Sunday 1 November, with two entry sessions a day, from 10am and 11am. On 17 October its booking page offered tickets only for Sunday 25, Tuesday 27, Wednesday 28, Thursday 29 and Saturday 31 October; 24, 26 and 30 October and 1 November were no longer listed.

  • Gold child ticket (ages 2 to 14), £19.55: includes the pumpkin patch with one pumpkin each, and the trick or treat trail with sweets.
  • Gold adult ticket (14 and over), £17.55: parking, the trick or treat trail and access to the pumpkin patch. Adult carer with parking £11.55. Under-twos free.
  • What’s on: the spooky woodland walk, a candy treasure trail, a “pumpkin cemetery”, pumpkin carving and children’s Halloween art, marshmallow toasting, the farm animals in the “spooky stables”, and the farm’s 50 metre zipline.

Prices are as listed on the ticket page on 17 October. Tickets are online only and non-refundable, and the farm says the event goes ahead in rain or shine: it asks visitors to bring wellies, warm clothes and their own bags or trolleys for pumpkins. Numbers are capped by car parking space.

All Hallow’s Eve, Weald and Downland

The Weald and Downland Living Museum at Singleton has turned its Halloween into a half-term programme, with the most on Saturday 31 October. Costumes are encouraged. The museum’s page lists:

  • Plagues and Potions trail: every day of half term, a hunt round the historic buildings for a village healer’s scattered potion ingredients.
  • Haunted Hambrook, 27 to 31 October, 10am to 3.30pm: Hambrook Barn turned over to broomstick racing, ghostly beanbag toss, eyeball races and pin the spider on the web.
  • Creepy Crafts, 27 to 29 October, 11am to 3.30pm, and Plague Potions, 27 to 31 October, 10am to 3.30pm.
  • Ghost stories with The Bard Dawn, 27 and 28 October, 10.30am to 12.30pm and 1.30pm to 3.30pm, and autumn adventure walks, 27 and 29 October, at 11.30am, 12.30pm, 1.30pm and 2.30pm.
  • Spooky Victorian School, 28, 29 and 31 October, 10am to 12.30pm and 1.30pm to 3.30pm.
  • Halloween day only, 31 October, 10am to 3.30pm: Mystics in the Woods, making a spell jar sealed with wax, and the Wise Woman’s Cottage with its cures and ointments.

The activities come with ordinary admission, booked as a timed daily ticket. On 24 October the museum’s booking page listed £18.75 an adult, £9.75 a child aged 5 to 17, under-5s free (they still need a ticket), and £51 for two adults and up to three children, all marked as Gift Aid eligible. From 26 October the museum opens 10am to 4pm. Parking is free.

Children’s Halloween Party, Fishbourne

The Fishbourne Centre, 46 Blackboy Lane, holds a children’s Halloween party on Saturday 31 October, 3.30pm to 5.30pm: a disco, party games and a prize for the best costume. £7.50 for ages 2 to 11, £2.50 for under-2s, tickets only. On 4 October the booking page showed 41 places left at £7.50.

After dark: the Cathedral and fireworks

  • Chichester Light Experience, Chichester Cathedral, 23 to 31 October: Luxmuralis’s Illuminating Art projections and sound, with timed evening entry. Adult £13, child £8, students £11, family (two adults, two children) £36, from the Cathedral’s event page. Halloween night is its last.
  • Fontwell Park fireworks, Saturday 31 October: ticketed, display at 7.30pm. Details, and West Dean’s and Petworth’s displays the following week, on our Bonfire Night page.

Getting there and parking

There are no trains west of Chichester from 26 to 30 October while Network Rail resignals Havant, so Fishbourne station has no trains that week. National Rail lists no Southern changes for Saturday 31 October itself. Details in our story on the closure. For the parade, the nearest council car parks are covered in our parking in Chichester page, and current roadworks, including the Stockbridge Road closure from 10 October, are on the roadworks page.

For everything else that week, see October half term in Chichester and what’s on in Chichester this month.