My kids love Halloween. So do I. So since it is now October, we headed over to Smalley’s Inn at 57 Gleneida Ave in downtown Carmel. Smalley’s has been around, in one form or another, since the 1850’s. It is a fun place, and my kids love the pizza on the kids menu. The tabletops are coated in pennies, the room is dark and the walls are full of old pictures and interesting decorations.
Stories about the location include that it was used as a morgue – and that it is haunted by the ghost of Elizabeth Smalley, an unidentified woman, and a Revolutionary War soldier. Regardless of your belief in ghosts, it is a lot of fun to get in the spirit of Halloween, and Smalley’s goes all-out decorating their establishment for our annual holiday for the dead. The people that work there seem to really enjoy sharing their little shop of horrors with dinner guests. And I enjoyed the fact that my youngest could not sit close enough to me during dinner, what with all these spooky sites around.
After dinner, we were treated to a tour of the ghoulish decorations, and my kids were mesmerized by the owner’s stories of strange experiences, how Elizabeth Smalley’s headstone made its way to the restaurant, and the pictures that hint at the presences of ghostly residents.
We spent about $100 for the five of us, but we had enough in our doggie bags for the next night’s dinner, and I view a good portion of our bill as paying for our ‘experience’ so I was happy to pay it.
