17th Eberle Winery Haunted Caves

I had the high honor of working security at the 17th Eberle Winery Haunted Caves benefit event the past two evenings (Saturday and Sunday evenings) as a security guard. This was my first stint working this fundraising event in support of Camp Ocean Pines in Cambria. I can honestly say without qualification that this is my favorite event to date working as a security guard.

My task was to stand in the shadows at the bottom of the ramp down into the maze of subterranean wine cask caves below the winery and maintain situational awareness and in the event of any infraction of house rules (example: DO NOT touch any staff) in which case transgressing individuals or parties were to be removed. This happened tonight only once and not once the night before. Mostly the past two evenings I had front row seats to people coming into the subterranean lair of this event and getting scared... in some cases terrified, by the amply qualified team of mostly teen volunteers with a few adults thrown into the mix.

Most notably of these was local man Ryan Henninger who volunteered his time, skills, and equipment to provide the terrifying climax of the dungeon tour with his 8-foot tall monster goblin which freaked out a great many visitors over the course of the weekend. I had met Ryan before somewhere but couldn't initially peg it until he reminded me we had met earlier in the year at a social event hosted by our mutual friend and master magician Rich Ferguson whom used to donate his time and skills working the crowd at this event as they waited for their turn in the terror tour. The public can see Ryan in the same get-up this Thursday at the SLO Farmers market which will be Halloween evening.

Special thanks goes to Jan whose last name eludes me at this late hour for masterfully managing this wonderful event and whose company I enjoyed as I was stationed across the cave opening from her throughout both evenings.

Note: to date Eberle Winery has raised over $80,000 for Camp Ocean Pines. 

All photos by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).