All Your Fear Is Here: Dorney Park Haunt 2010

With so much Halloween oriented hoopla currently going on across the nation it's not fair that I ignore 50% of this Blog's home park!  With that let's take a peek at the horrors taking place at Dorney Park's 2010 Halloween Haunt.

The event has continued to grow each year since being renamed Halloween Haunt from Halloweekends in 2008, but dates back to 1998.  The experience now includes 13 different haunted attractions including indoor mazes, outdoor mazes, haunted midways, lots of fog and live entertainment.

A Mansion House display greets guests at the main entrance

The 2010 Haunt features a new indoor maze called the Mansion House Hotel.  The park really went all out on this one, creating one massive haunt by combining two picnic groves.  In fact, the 10,000 sq. ft. attraction is not only the largest at Dorney Park but at any Cedar Fair park in the nation.  The park has decided to play on the park founder's original Mansion House Hotel which opened in the 1880s.

The creepy exterior, well, one side anyway

As guests enter the Hotel they are greeted by a front desk clerk that informs them that their room isn't quite ready - but urges them to explore the hotel grounds.  That's when the fun starts.  The tour includes plenty of encounters with dead maids, crazed bellhops, and other long-dead employees.

The entrance gates to the property

The haunt really is noticeably longer than most, even including a mid-course trip through a dilapidated green house, and a trip in a special-effect filled ramshackle elevator.  We won't even talk about what happens when you have to pass through the laundry area!  The theming is a definite step above many other attractions at the park, and seems to have been extremely well received by the public.  (judging from the long lines!)

Clowns are scary... no way around it

Since the Mansion House Hotel replaces the former Boo Hill/Kill Hill space, Psycho Circus now does double duty as a kid-friendly daytime attraction, and a scary haunt at night.  During the day it is known as the Clown Factory, where kids can enter and be processed into a clown - red ball nose and everything.  At night the psycho circus clowns take over and things are decidedly more intense.
 

You can hear the base pumping from outside... the screams too

The park's two other indoor haunts have also returned this year - Club Blood and The Asylum.  The Vampires and Crazy Folks are equal opportunity - both will welcome you into their attractions with open arms (fangs). 

Yo ho, yo ho, you know the rest

All 7 of the Haunt's outdoor mazes are back for another year of screams as well.  Pirate Passage again takes over a portion of Camp Spooky, and there be plenty of wenches and scallywags along the way.  The Gauntlet, which runs on the path under Thunderhawk, and its medieval themed monsters continues to be a fog-filled screamfest.  Terror Square, a western themed haunt, has moved onto part of the go-cart tracks near Steel Force's helix, after Demon Drop took out much of its previous home.

Calling all crazies... the Asylum is open

A darkened trip through a graveyard is what you find yourself on in Headstone Hollow, and an equally dark journey through cornstalk-lined paths filled with ghouls awaits in CornStalkers.  Death Trap, which is really a traditional indoor haunt with no roof, is also back.  The gory trip through the destruction left by a Saw-like killer is enough to freak anyone out!

This is the view before you even get in line for Backwoods!

Finally, Backwoods, with its Camp Cudie theme, has again taken residence in the woods behind Steel Force's station.  There's nothing better than walking up to the attraction to hear the sounds of a chainsaw and screaming girls!

Live entertainment this year includes Fangs'n'freaks, a mix of vampires, music, and dance, and Panic Attack, which includes dancing ghouls to spooky music.

The Haunt runs for two more weekends - check out the official website for full details.