For some, Halloween is an excuse to scare people witless.
That’s what it means to Bob Wright, part owner of the Thunderbird Trail of Fear Haunted Scream Park, 14501 E. Etowah Road, in Noble. It is strongly recommended by the website Travel Oklahoma.
“We hold contests some evenings to see how many people we can get to pee their pants,” Wright said. “Sometimes we have people curl into the fetal position on the ground.”Wright said the haunt he built with co-owner Matt Achemire takes the extra step to get into the visitors’ heads psychologically. He uses a team of actors that break up the tension up with humor just to keep visitors on their toes.
“We try to suspend your belief so you won’t think you’re in the real world anymore,” he said.
The backstory is set in the countryside near Lawton, there was this family nobody liked to talk about: The Hackensaws. Rumor was the Hackensaw family was unnatural. A family of inbreds, they hunted down trespassers on their land. Since the Hackensaws moved outside of Noble a year ago, the number of missing persons reports filed is quite troubling.
“Every once in a while, folks wander on down here,” said Purdy Hackensaw. “But they ain’t exactly missing ’cause we know where they’re at. I ain’t saying they’re all in Momma’s stew, but we know where they’re at.”
Garrett Irvin is a marine stationed at Fort Sill who lives in Norman. He transforms into the menacing cannibal Purdy Hackensaw for a few weekends each year.
To learn more, visit trailoffear.com.
Worldly wraiths
This year, hauntedhouserankings.com awarded the 26th best haunted attraction in the United States to Nightmare in the Country in Woodward. Unearthed plants visitors knee-deep in an encampment of doomed archeologists. Foul creatures eternally lay underneath the ancient sands. And Puzzledust’s Curse leads visitors through a haunted mansion.Kenton Baird is its creator.
“Our tours last 30 to 35 minutes, depending on how fast you can run,” said Baird.
Bothersome bats
Few experiences sound as Halloween as exploring a blackened cave full of bats at Alabaster Caverns State Park, 217036 State Highway 50A, in Freedom, Oklahoma.Park Manager Mike Caywood says they have over six thousand bats in the caverns.
The caves aren’t haunted. There is no special show, haunted tour or attraction.
There is a cave that was designated as a fallout shelter by the Civil Defense in 1967. This was meant to house 3080 people through the initial bombardment and radiation of a nuclear apocalypse. The cave is filled with fallout survival rations, echoes of footsteps, cries of bats and the skittering of insects.
“Our cave is scary enough without anyone jumping out at you,” Caywood said.
Print headline: Scary jaunts, There are a few horror shows outside the metro that are worth the drive for horror-seekers.
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