My Top 5 Halloween events

Returning to Movie Park Germany's halloween event this year got me thinking; what are my favourite ever halloween events? I've stuck to events with scaremazes and come up with my top 5 favourites, in order, starting with my top event! 

Liseberg 

Halloween 

(2019)

I visited Liseberg for the first time last Halloween and wow what a treat that was! Liseberg is a beautiful park, especially in the autumn and this event did not disappoint at all! The mazes are intricately detailed, both the temporary ones and the year-round attraction, Hotel Gasten and the immersion is next level! Some of the mazes felt like movie sets filled with loads of great little details as well as big scares. It was a totally different style of maze compared to what I'd experienced before and I was really impressed. Vinden, Zombie and Experiment were all fab! The park is beautifully lit up at night and there are pumpkins all around! Zooming past blurs of orange and yellow on both Lisebergbanan and Helix is really something else! The combination of great mazes and a fabulous park atmosphere created an all-round amazing experience! We missed out on the outdoor maze, Skogen, due to the queueline closing before we got to it but from what I've heard from others who have visited we did the best mazes and this didn't detract from the overall experience at all because everything was so high quality! Every now and then I randomly think about how good this event was because it was just that memorable!

Dreamland 

Screamland 

(2019)

As a Dreamland fan (I mean, it's a retro paradise!) and having heard lots of good things about the Screamland event I decided to take a trip to their halloween event last year. Dreamland's mazes, like Liseberg's, were also very detailed, with theatrical sets that really immersed you into a story in a different time and place. Many of Dreamland's mazes had historical themes, which felt very much in keeping with the park's vintage aesthetic and was an enjoyable concept. After doing quite a few scare mazes you get used to a lot of the common scares that are used and you can become a bit immune to these but Dreamland made me jump in a big way multiple times with clever uses of innovative set design, acting and technical effects. You really couldn't expect anything! Submerged, had a really cool theme based on boarding a sunken ship, The Brotherhood, based on plague doctors, was super spooky, The Sleep Experiment 2 had some intense scares and the Condemned Carnival was a fresh vintage take on the classic carnival maze. I was really impressed by this event as it was such a refreshing take on a scare event. Regrettably I didn't manage to do the Hammer House of Horror Maze due to time constraints but I had a great time experiencing the other attractions on offer!

Tulley's 

Shocktober 

Fest  

(Many years)

Ah Tulley's Farm. I feel like you can't do a halloween event list without it! There's the classic hayride which is not to be missed, plus a huge range of other mazes covering a wide variety of themes and scares. Notable past mazes worth mentioning include the spooky Cellar, crazy Chop Shop, atmospheric Colony, up-close and personal Creepy Cottage, unhinged Wastelands Penitentiary and the moody Coven of 13. There has been plenty of other great mazes and attractions too over the years! You could probably write a book about them all! The event boasted a staggering 9 scare attractions last year, so a night at Tulley's is always packed with scares from start to finish! To top off the range of intense scare attractions there's also fab interactive street entertainment, including classics characters that come back every year, great street performers, such as firebreathers and multiple live music acts that all come together to create an all-encompassing, world-renowned festival of all things spooky!

Movie Park 

Halloween 

Horror Festival

(2017, 2020)

Movie park's Halloween Horror festival is billed as "Europe's greatest halloween event" and it's an event any halloween lover should add to their bucket list if they haven't visited already! Movie Park really comes to life after dark! I've attended this event twice now and the park's dedication to spooks is not hard to miss! Some notable mazes include Project Ningyo, an unusual twist on a classic, The Curse of the Chupacabra with an innovative theme and maze setting and The Secrets of St Elmo which uses some really cool technology! A ride on Van Helsing's factory is also a halloween must! This is another event that really delivers on the street acting, with loads of unique characters out to get you as you wander the park. The park's lighting, music and effects out on the walkways and plazas really take it up a notch and tie everything in together to create a fab spooky event!

Alton Towers 

Scarefest

(2016)

Alton, like Liseberg, is another park that is beautiful and atmospheric in the autumn. The towers are a unique park centrepiece all year round but at Halloween there's nothing quite like walking in the shadow and stepping inside of a the ruins of a grand stately home! Terror of the towers and sub species really benefited from the Towers' eeery abandoned interior and I remember thinking both Sub Species - The end games and Altonville Mine Tours - legend of the skin snatchers were both quite intense. House of Monsters was a nice change of pace and had some innovative characters and set design. There are some great night rides to be had and the whole park has a fantastic atmosphere at Halloween, it really comes alive!

So that's my top 5 favourite halloween events that I've done so far! Notable mentions also go to Hellendoorn for their crazy halloween rethemed kiddie boat ride, Toverland for their insane wall of fog, imaginative scare zones and fireworks and Thorpe Park for their old big top maze and of course stealth in the dark! 

Thanks for reading!