Cedar Scares: Halloweekends

While we’ve already provided some in depth coverage on Knott’s Scary Farm (KSF), it wouldn’t be “fair” if we didn’t also provide info on its scary relatives across the country. Since 1997, Knott’s has been a part of the Cedar Fair theme park chain, which includes California’s Great America, Valleyfair, Kings Island, Kings Dominion, Dorney Park, Carowinds, and Cedar Point. Since joining the Cedar Fair family, the curse of Knott’s Halloween Haunt has spread across to the other parks. In this special Scare Zone report “Cedar Scares,” we’ll review the Cedar Fair family of horrifying haunts across the country.

Tonight we’ll start our report with a look at Cedar Point’s Halloweekends.  This year’s event will start the weekend of Sept. 17th and run through Halloween. The first Halloweekends took place at the end of the 1997 season (after Knott’s joined the family) with just a few haunted houses and minimal Halloween decorations. Over the years, the seasonal celebration has grown to much greater proportions with terrors found throughout the park with different fear factors. The event has become so popular, in fact, that attendance during Halloweekends often rivals the busiest summer days, and the number of weekends has been expanded to accommodate the demand. However, unlike Knott’s massive line up of mazes, Halloweekends features a modest four mazes. Nonethless, they have a few interesting mazes and scare zones in their line up (along with a few familar names).

First up, there’s Club Blood, which is a duplication of the “vampire-saturated nightclub” maze at KSF. Next, there’s Dr. D. Mented’s Asylum For the Criminally Insane, which sounds similar to the Asylum: Lockdown maze at KSF. This one is fairly self-explanatory. Then there’s Happy Jack’s Toy Factory, which is described as, “When is a doll not a doll? When it’s a fiendish, evil creature seeking revenge on humankind. You’ll never turn your back on a stuffed bunny again!” This maze seems like an interesting hybrid of Knott’s The Doll Factory and Uncle Bobo’s Big Top of the Bizarre. Finally, there’s Eerie Estate, which is a completely unique concept for Halloweekends. In this maze, victims enter a “stately limestone mansion that harbors deep, dark secrets, guarded by ancient inhabitants seeking revenge and looking for more permanent residents”.

Halloweekend ups the scares with an impressive five Scare Zones, compared to Knott’s three. The line up includes: Terror Island (undead pirates pillage and plunder), The Fright Zone (a fog-filled street full of sneaky sliders), Fear Faire (mid’evil monsters), Carnevil (crazy clowns and sideshow freaks—also a zone at KSF), and Cornstalkers (this is a full maze as KSF and features corn trail filled with scarecrows who are bored with just frightening the birds).

Cedar Point is actually a significantly bigger park than Knott’s, which raises the question as to why their haunt line up is rather small. Perhaps as the years go by and Knott’s has more “retired” haunts to share with the rest of the Cedar Fair family, we’ll see the Halloweekends maze line-up increase. With the addition of at least three more mazes, we’d be enticed to make the trip out to Ohio to check out Halloweekends. Until then, we’ll keep our fears near with Knott’s.

Halloweekends Info:

Hours

Sunday: 12:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Friday: 6:00 PM – 12:00 AM
Saturday: 12:00 PM – 12:00 AM

Special Hours: 10/10: 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Admission

Junior: 19.99
Ages 3-61, under 48″ tall in shoes
Senior: 19.99
Age 62 and over
Funday (Regular One-Day): 45.99
For guests ages 3-61 who are 48″ tall or taller
Starlight: 29.99
Valid after 6 p.m. Fri., 5 p.m. Sat. & 4 p.m. Sun.

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