WITH the cancellation of an event designed to promote Okehampton's eateries and shops, a community group has stepped in to ensure Okehampton celebrates Hallowe'en in style.

The Good Evening Okehampton events, organised in conjunction with the Okehampton and District Chamber of Trade, have been taking place on the last Friday of each month from May.

The event aimed to unite the town's pubs and eateries, shops and residents once a month with an evening of entertainment, good food, shopping and socialising.

The idea was that shops would remain open until 8pm, and on the streets there would be vendors selling food and goods and there would be entertainment and competitions to enter.

Organisers had planned for the October event —which would have fallen on Hallowe'en — as the biggest one yet, with dancers and spooky themed activities.

A flash mob of dancers from the Okehampton Community Recreation?Association (OCRA) ?Dance Project had been scheduled to appear.

Yet a lack of enthusiasm from traders and time for organisers led to the event being cancelled.

Donna Tombs, chair of the chamber of trade, said she felt 'awful' to cancel and disappoint those planning to be involved, especially those from the dance project.

She said: 'There have been a number of problems that led us to decide to cancel the event. We had problems getting stallholders and we had also not been able to give it the time to make it a real success.

'We have also not had huge enthusiasm from shops in town.

'Rather than drag it out, on a night when many will be doing things with their families, we decided to cancel.

'We will try to run the events again next year and go into it with lessons learned.

'We need to find out what our shops here want. If there is no enthusiasm for a late night shopping event, we will try and do something else.

'But we are very disappointed because it has been well received by the customers who have become involved and we are very sad to have to cancel.'

Despite Good Evening Okehampton being cancelled, community spirit has managed to ensure the town does celebrate the spookiest day of the year.

OCRA has decided to step in and plan an event to celebrate Hallowe'en at the Pavilion in the Park.

Stuart Lord, manager of OCRA said: 'It was with great disappointment that OCRA found out about the chamber of trade's late night shopping event being cancelled on Hallowe'en.

'OCRA Dance Project had been asked to perform and had been practising, had their costumes ready and was looking forward to showing off some ghoulish moves.

'To avoid disappointment OCRA has set up a family Halloween party that will transform the Pavilion in the Park.

The event is open to all and has free admission.'

The event, running in the pavilion on October 31 from 6.30pm to 9.30pm, will have Hallowe'en games, music and dancing, toasted marshmallows, prizes for the best costume and carved pumpkin, and a bar.

For more details call Dave from OCRA on 01837 318010.