Please note: this review is for the 2010 season rather than the current season.

Hartford Jaycees Haunted House

by CC2 after attending on Saturday, October 9, 2010 at about 4 p.m.

Fun Factor: High Fear Factor: Medium

Review

I routinely attend this attraction as the producers of the house and trail do a nice production year after year.

There is ample space in their waiting area that is an old barn. One area allows visitors to watch movies while they wait. Last year the movies were projected on a wall. This year the movie while we visited was shown on a fairly small television.

The Haunted House and Trail has one of the better equipped snack bars I've visited with a huge selection of Halloween candy.

Waits at this attraction tend to be long. My party waited appx an hour between arrival and entrance and the attraction was not as busy as I've seen in previous years.

The trip through the attraction begins with a stroll through a torch lit woods. More props and scenes have been added to the woods this year. There are always well placed crew waiting for you in the dark.

One then enters the house after passing through a silo/tunnel that features some effects inside.

The trip through the attraction features three separate episodes where the visitor will need to crawl and that is excessive. In particular, there is a need to crawl through part of the tunnel outside the main entrance to the house and that can become muddy during wet weather.

This year's house is prop heavy and the sets are elaborate, which is always appreciated.

Scenes tend to feature a lot of dialogue from the actors, which can be difficult to hear and don't add much to the effect of the scares.

Also, some sets were dark and it was difficult to appreciate the make up and costumes of the actors.

My party agreed that the best actor's performance was in an area where the "procurer" with a shovel speaks to you in his Southern accent about his purpose before the scares begin. His role was very well portrayed.

It takes about 25-30 minutes to negotiate the attraction.

It can be a bit tricky to find as it is located off of Hwy 60 in the fireman's park in Slinger and the signage is rather subtle at night unless you know where to look for it.

Summary

As has been mentioned in a previous review, I felt this haunt relied too heavily on pop up/pop out props vs live actors and that diminishes the intensity of the scares. With overuse of that kind of a scare, the house takes on the features of a carnival midway trailer.

This year's house features a very nice animatronic effect of a girl with a morphing face that is worth the price of admission and probably the best feature of the visit. If feasible, pay attention to it for a while as it has many evolutions. Routing of visitors may necessitate you having to rush through this area, however.

All of the performers in the house gave good efforts, however, there was one scene featuring a hard rock music scenario that went excessively long and featured a loud horn that was overused.

The walk through the woods is always a highlight of this stop as very few other attractions have such a resource available and the producers of this house do a good job of utilizing it.

The creators of this house always do a solid job of decorating and it pays to look around to appreciate their efforts as there is lots to see.

Desite some of the criticisms of this attraction, it is certainly worth a look due to its elaborate sets, the previously mentioned animatronic effct and the presence of the torch lit woods.

View all Hartford Jaycees Haunted House reviews

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April 26th, 2024 5:03 p.m. CDT 24.07