Stepping onto the property is like the first glimpse of an amusement park. There’s lights, sounds and special effects bursting around the next corner, enticing guests along as they take in the spectacle that is Rottingwood Haunt.
As a dragon billows hearty plumes of smoke from its nostrils, skeletons dance along the windowpanes, and many more creatures lurk about the grounds of 20 chemin Stewart in Litchfield.
But this is just what’s seen from the outside – all the real scares begin when guests are ushered into the tents. In there, a step in the wrong spot could lead to a witch’s shriek, an animatronic hand grabbing at legs, or spiders dropping from the ceiling onto the unsuspecting guest’s head.
Since the 90s, Darell and Lise McCorriston have been building their original haunted walk from inflatables on their front lawn in Portage du Fort into the spectacle that it is today, drawing a few thousand visitors each year.

For them, all their fun actually started with Christmas and Darell’s knack for tinkering with machines.
“Back in the early 90’s when we actually started, Darell built an animatronic, our very first animatronic,” said Lise. “It was at Christmas and we built these things out of stuffed animals, like a chicken or a bunny, whatever we could find to put motors in them, and he built this big house, and it had all these farm animals in there with motors. Golf balls for a chicken laying eggs, that’s how it started, and then we just went from there.”
The most amazing part may be that Darell has only pursued this kind of building as a hobby, having never studied robotics professionally.
“I always had a fascination with what Storyland did near Renfrew and what they had going there,” explained Darell. “I would have really loved to work there and maintain their animatronics. I always tinkered with robotics and stuff like that.”
Their creations were so popular and eye-grabbing, they regularly stopped traffic along the main street through Portage du Fort.
Attempting to continue with those kind of Christmas decorations at their chemin Stewart home quickly proved too difficult. The bigger property was more susceptible to strong winter winds, and freezing rain would bring down the inflatable characters, too.
However, the biggest issue for the McCorristons was working in the cold. Neither are fans of when the mercury drops below zero.
“We did Christmas when we first moved out here, like we had 10,000 lights out in the yard,” said Darell. “But it was just too cold out here with the wind, blistering cold.”
“If Christmas had been in the summer, hey we’d have lots,” said Lise, to which Darell quickly agreed.
But the Halloween decorations, which also began in Portage, took off. Nowadays, their efforts take weeks to put up, with the McCorristons often starting Labour Day weekend to be ready for the beginning of October.
That’s because there is much more than meets the eye when it comes to preparing their haunt. Everything from the displays through to lighting must be tinkered with meticulously, sure, but there’s also the element of telling a story and creating a flow to each portion.
Guests to Rottingwood Haunt begin their adventure by visiting the boneyard, a collection of skeletons bringing a variety of creatures back to life. They’ll also meet a skeleton riding atop a homemade horse-drawn carriage, (which was built last summer, proof that the haunt is not just a two-month ordeal, but a year-round endeavour); a ghost, floating apparently all on its own; more than a few Star Wars characters; and many more inflatable ghouls, goblins and monsters.
It’s the tents where the actual scares begin, and that’s where the pair’s handiwork really shines.
Lise explained that she always takes her time to envision what monsters need to go together, or follow each other, for the best effect. While it’s easy enough to toss all the moving parts in, it’s much more enjoyable for everyone that she takes the time to plan it all out, adjust little details, and build upon the items they have by combining them in new fashions.
“You have to build a theme when you [organize the tents], you can’t just throw the animatronics in there,” she said. “Your mind has to, like go crazy, and think what goes with that? So, when you’re in there and you’re building your theme, your mind is going 100 miles per minute because you have to figure out what details do I need in here that’s going to make this good.”
While putting this together, Lise can be found rooting through many bins to find the perfect addition to a display. Darell added that it’s her relentless energy that pays off though, as certain details make all the difference for their visitors.
“She’s the creative mind that does all the details in the tents and that’s what a lot of people see,” he said. “You go in and see a zombie baby or something like that, with the baby boots? You think, okay that’s just a little detail but [guests] pick up on that.”
Just as much as Lise provides these details as the storyteller, Darell is there to bring it to life as the magician, they joked.
“The technology out today is just mind-boggling,” said Darell. “What you can do and what you can get on the market next to being… Well you know, I’m not Steven Spielberg.”
The only obstacle, Darell said, limiting their talents nowadays is a lack of new items for their displays. While spending all year keeping an eye out for new additions, the couple often turns to their imagination for what they’d like to add next.
“We’d like to make the boneyard bigger, but we pretty much have it all right now,” he said. “I even sent letters to companies telling them, ‘Why don’t you create like a woolly mammoth or create a big alligator skeleton, for us haunters to buy and display?’ I never did get any replies back, but I’m kind of hoping they do [make them].”
That’s not to say they don’t have a hugely impressive collection already. For everything that’s on display, there’s much more packed away in storage.
“We could take all that away and fill it up again with new stuff, right now as we speak,” said Darell, pointing to the sheds and tents portion.
For inflatables, they display about half of their total collection, numbering somewhere around 150 in total. They own 13 more animatronics than what’s currently on display – which is upwards of 20 – and five or six are still unopened, with another coming in the mail.
The McCorristons have enough decorations to produce a fresh display each year, and still Darell plans on making the walk longer, as he looks to add a fifth shed to it.
Shopping for new pieces begins towards the end of Halloween, as the sales begin, but there are still many items they’ll pay full price for, as they know it won’t last the season.
Though they’ve never kept a running total, Lise said they’ve easily poured thousands of dollars into their collection. Often, the most impressive pieces will cost a few hundred dollars for just that item, and a quick glance around the property puts the total cost into perspective.
However, they’re not alone in their pursuit of everything Halloween for Rottingwood. Darell and Lise are part of a larger community creating spooky experiences for the public who refer to themselves as ‘haunters.’
“There are so many people around that have never seen stuff like this before and we’ve got a lot of different connections to Halloween paraphernalia … through the internet and other haunters that we talk to,” said Darell. “We’re always sharing ideas. We’re members of the Ottawa Valley Haunters, the Canadian Haunters’ Association, and the Ottawa Haunters’ Association.”
Working within these social circles, members alert the group to new themes, trends and even sales going on, helping everyone succeed.
Darell and Lise, however, have many unique advantages, as their haunt is located so close to the highways, and far from many other similar attractions. As much as it’s a treat for everyone in the Pontiac to enjoy right in their backyard, it proves very popular amongst tourists to the area, as well.
Lise said their busiest time of the month has always been Thanksgiving weekend, when families are driving by and see Rottingwood Haunt all lit up. They’d easily see anywhere upwards of 600 people then, which is generally twice the size of a regular weekend crowd.
Curious to where the visitors came from, there used to be a guestbook for fans to fill out, of which people would write pages of praise on.
“They were writing the Bible in there,” said Lise, with a laugh.
Not only did this let them know what was really popular, it also led them to discover they had played host to guests the world over. From all corners of Europe to China, Australia and Mexico, folks loved their work.
The rest of the month, and especially Halloween night, the haunt is filled with Pontiac folk. Once the kids have their pillowcases full of candy, the whole family comes for their scares.
That’s because Oct. 31 is the one night of the month the animatronics are joined by some special guests, as Darell, Lise, and friends become a part of the exhibit.
“We don’t want to keep it to ourselves,” said Darell. “We put way too much work into it to want to keep it to ourselves, we want to share it.”
“[To] not have to drive 400 miles to go and see something like this … Where do you get that? Nowhere here,” said Lise.