Haunt Review: The Haunted Forest

45250 North Delbert Road, Parker, CO
http://hauntedforestparker.com/

Somewhere out in the wilderness near Parker, marked by a barely-illuminated sign, lies the Haunted Forest. It’s a bit difficult to find, and a bit pricy compared to other haunts ($20), but it’s absolutely worth the trouble and the cash. Unlike most haunts, the Haunted Forest doesn’t take place in a warehouse, or in a densely packed cornfield. It’s a long, meandering path through the woods, marked only by yellow police tape. The experience is kind of like taking a nice 20 minute hike, except that sometimes people chase you with chainsaws. They get a surprising amount of mileage out of the parts of the trail where nothing happens – to be honest, it would still be pretty spooky even if there were no actors.

Once you factor the actors in, though, it gets a little bit terrifying. They are generally few and far between – but they take advantage of the space to make sure that every person counts. My favorite encounter involved an actor in a Michael Myers mask who came at us from behind. Because of the sparse layout, he was able to wait until we were well down the path before moving, and was therefore able to reach a full charge before announcing his presence (with a really creepy grunting/snorting sound). In a situation like that, it’s pretty hard not to just run away as fast as you can – and, in fact, during one of the later chainsaw chases, I kind of managed to twist my ankle while doing just that. This is not a complaint – it’s a testament to the effectiveness of the haunt.

Like the Haunted Mines, there were a couple of early season kinks to work out. The actors in the big schoolbus setpiece that ends the trail weren’t ready for us, so we wound up standing outside it for a bit. The graveyard toward the beginning of the trail also didn’t seem to be completely up and running – there were some exposed electronics and patches where it seems they probably meant to stick another strobe light. All in all, though, these were pretty minor concerns. We were told that they expect to get much better as we approach Halloween, but they’re already in pretty good shape. I loved this one.

9/10