What to expect from this year’s Enchanted Forest Stop the Clock: The 25th hour
Alan Cumming is the star of the light and sound show in Faskally Wood.
As Scotland’s trees and woodlands slowly don their autumn colours, and the nights draw in, it’s once again time for the annual Enchanted Forest sound and light show. Taking place in Faskally Wood just outside the popular town of Pitlochry, the event is celebrating 25 years this year with a show themed around time.
Titled the Stop the Clock: The 25th hour, visitors are encouraged to solve a riddle as they wait for the buses that ferry thousands of people every year from the town to the woods. The answer to which is a sign of things to come.
This year’s show is all about the precious nature of time, and making the most of each moment. It starts with a huge installation of a talking clock, voiced by Alan Cumming, who explains time has stood still in the forest, a feat which happens every 25 years, and encourages visitors to stay, play and enjoy.
The team at the Enchanted Forest have worked with Napier University students on some of the other, more interactive installations, such as Orbis, inspired by kinetic structures that explore the idea of time as a continuous circular loop that passes and repeats.
The path follows different areas linked to time, and it standing still, with suspended rain drops, illuminated clouds, and fluorescent flamingos.
The focal point of this year’s Enchanted Forest, as with previous years, is the moving light show shown through cascading water in the loch. This year the images start with a look back at previous years before showing a series of images linked to what visitors have seen already - cogs, clocks, flamingos and the 25th hour and celebrations.
The well known Faskally Wood landmark, The Boathouse, has been reimagined as a fibre optic trail that leads to a clock illumination, seen from the other side of the loch.
There are the well known stops on the route for food - this year there’s fried chicken, pizzas and smash burgers as well as Dutch doughnuts, churros and marshmallows to toast - and to get warm by the fires.
An area dedicated to messages in the mirror will make for much-photographed moments while neon deer, fluorescent cogs and moving forest floor lights add to the fun, if not the coherence of the trail.
There’s a final installation at the end, also voiced by Alan Cumming which explains more about this mythical 25th hour, and is quite touching.
We’ve all had moments where we wish we had more time; with loved ones, on holiday or just over a weekend, and I can only imagine the parents who’ve walked these woodland paths over the last two decades with children who are now adults or for thoughts of those who are no longer here to enjoy this annual event. It’s a thought-provoking theme for the show, which could easily have chosen to showcase the greatest hits of the past 25 years.
It’s a lovely reminder not to take time, and time with loved ones, for granted and although quite random in approach in bits, it’s a fun, immersive and colourful experience ideal for all the family.
This year’s show will run until 8 November and tickets, while selling quickly, are still available. To find out more information, or to book, please visit the Enchanted Forest website.
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