As you may know, Field of Screams is an annual haunted house extravaganza located in Lancaster, Pa. It has been rated the “Best Extreme Haunted Attraction” by USA Today, and its website boasts many testimonials that make it perfectly clear that Field of Screams is a terrifying place.
As a disclaimer, I do not like frightening things. I am the kind of person who pauses a horror movie every 20 seconds so that I can catch my breath. Every year, my high school offered a trip to Field of Screams, and I never went because I knew it would be a miserable evening. I do not like being scared, and I certainly don’t like paying people to scare me.
Thus, it would follow that when one of my high school friends called me on Tuesday and asked if I would go with her to Field of Screams, I was pretty reluctant. Unfortunately for me, I try to be a good friend, and before long, I was convinced to join her.
It was only afterward that I realized what I had just gotten myself into, but at that point it was too late. My fate was sealed. At long last, I was Field of Screams bound.
The park was divided into four sections, each with its own theme. Meanwhile, the Haunted Hayride was a thematic grab bag.
My friend and I rode along on the tractor full of hay as we were taken through a variety of set pieces. At each stop, we were harassed by flashing lights, ominous music and an impressive group of incredibly dedicated actors.
One locale was designed to resemble a spider’s den, with web-bound forms throwing plastic arachnids at the guests. Another highlight involved a group of bloodied, pig-mask-wearing actors waving strikingly realistic cleavers in the air.
Needless to say, I spent the entire ride with my hand firmly wrapped around my friend’s arm, refusing to make eye contact with any of the performers. The only time I looked up was when one of the cast members complimented my hair.
Just when I thought I’d found a moment of refuge from the terror, he abruptly threatened to rip it out of my scalp and wear it himself. Good times.
The first of the traditional haunted houses was the Frightmare Asylum. It was in an overwhelmingly claustrophobic building — all of the doors are only about five feet tall — full of insane doctors and patients.
The strobe lighting in one room was so strong that it had the effect of disorienting me to the point that I could just barely make out where the path was leading. Later we had to push our way through a pitch-black tunnel as hands grabbed at us from behind the walls.
I was fortunate enough to go through the asylum immediately after a man who was far more frightened than I was. His screams of terror drew the attention of all of the monstrous patients and doctors, so I was able to get through relatively unscathed.
Nevertheless I still spent most of the walk with my hands wrapped around the straps of my friend’s bag.
The other haunted house, the Den of Darkness, served as a much more terrifying version of the Haunted Mansion. The house boasted several set pieces, such as a room filled entirely with sheet-covered mannequins and a playroom filled with discarded dolls with porcelain masks stapled to their faces.
In my opinion, the worst portion of the tour was the attic, where we had to crawl through a passageway on our hands and knees. Unexpectedly, there were ‘corpses’ scattered throughout the path, and I was never quite sure whether or not they were going to spring to life and grab me.
The final attraction was the Nocturnal Wasteland, the only one to take us outdoors. At this stage we were forced to walk through pools of “radioactive waste,” dodge mutant raiders and even revisit one of the stops from the Haunted Hayride.
An especially tense mood filled the air as we walked through a derelict school bus full of shadowy figures taunting us more with each step we took.
The Nocturnal Wasteland was probably my favorite of the four attractions, mostly because it relied on the natural atmosphere for most of its scares.
Walking through the woods in the middle of the night is inherently terrifying, and the actors were able to effectively play off of that energy.
In the end Field of Screams lived up to all of the hype. Each attraction was a non-stop barrage of frights and horror, and it was obvious that the owners had perfected their craft over the last 25 years.
If you’re ever in the mood for a horrifying haunted house experience, I’d highly recommend checking them out.
After all, if I was able to make it through the night and enjoy myself, then it should be a cakewalk for a true horror fan.
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