The third annual Cochrane Pumpkin Lantern Festival will light up Historic Ranche Park this Friday (October 27) evening.

Over two hundred carved pumpkins are expected to illuminate the pathways in a collaboration made possible by five schools.

Cochrane High School Council reached out to all the school's in the Cochrane area to create a free evening in which the students, businesses, and families come together to celebrate fall and the creativity of carving.

Ecole Notre-Dame des Vallees, Cochrane High, Fireside, RancheView, and Glenbow Schools are all working together this year to showcase how working together can create a strong, united community. Carrie Cline, Cochrane High School, Parent School Council Chair, is excited to see this event grow bigger each and every year. "It is one of these events that you really scramble in the fall because there is not a lot of time from when school starts to when the event is so you always go in with fingers crossed, and it always seems to turn out really well."

two pumpkin

Cline shares it is a beautiful, whimsical evening where event goers can come and marvel at the artistic talent through both pumpkin carving and musical entertainment. "When the evening opens at 6 o' clock they can come and just wander through the trails and it is really very magical to see all these beautifully lit pumpkins and hear the high school band playing on the stage in the background and they just meander through."

The festival provides an opportunity to be creative and all entries are welcome and encouraged.

Interepipeline is hosting a tea, coffee, and hot-chocolate table and event goers are welcome to warm up at the firepits while they enjoy smores or food from the food trucks.

If you would like to drop off a carved pumpkin you can do so all the way up until 4 pm on the 27th. For more information on where to drop off your creation go here.

Going forward Cline would love to see every school in Cochrane be involved, more pumpkins, musical acts, and buskers. "If the sponsorship is there and the volunteers are there we'll keep plugging along."