The City of Arroyo Grande has hosted its Halloween Carnival Chaos and Maze on October 25-26, 2025. This event has become an annual celebration of Halloween for Arroyo Grande.
A lot of setup is required prior to the event. Many people from the Arroyo Grande community volunteer to help. Physical setup starts the day before the event showcase.
The event features a Halloween Bounce Town, there are several bounce houses with different themes. So that children can “hop around” to all the various bounce houses with friends and family.
There is also a haunted maze, where children and families can walk through and get spooked. The haunted maze consists of a dark inflatable clown head, and to enter, you have to walk straight into the mouth of the clown. While the maze is scary, children are still able to take on the challenge of not getting spooked.
“My friends had to convince me to go, but once we went through the maze, I wanted to go again,” 7th grade student, Ashlyn Schmidt said.
The bounce houses cost $15-$25, and the haunted maze costs $3-$5, though this event has free games as well.
Costume contests, carnival games, trick-or-treating, and photo ops are all free activities. Along with a pool of water where people can roll around in an inflatable balloon.
The Halloween Carnival Chose and Maze also consist of only local food vendors to support the Arroyo Grande community. Some of the food options include Crave Donuts, Tacos, and Hubbalicious, where they serve hot fudge sundaes.
“The food was amazing, my favorite was the hot fudge sundaes,” 7th grade student, Colbie McCall said.
Many students from Arroyo Grande High School came out to help put this event together. Students volunteered to run games, set up, and clean up for a few hours of community service.
“Helping out with this event was a fun and easy way to complete my community service. Would definitely do it again and recommend [to others],” Santi Rojas (’26) said.
With the help of some Arroyo Grande students and other community volunteers, the event ran smoothly and was fun for many families and children. Yet again, another successful Halloween Carnival Chaos on Elm Street.
