SCREAMFEST RETURNS TO ADVENTURE FARM IN RUN-UP TO HALLOWEEN

AS a major Halloween attraction has opens to the public this weekend, we sent a reporter along to try out the series of spooky mazes staffed by live actors that fans can’t get enough of.

It has been two years since The Screamfest attraction was held at the National Forest Adventure Farm, in Tatenhill due the Covid pandemic meaning last year’s had to be called off.

The spooky Halloween event normally attracts thousands of visitors who come to enjoy being frightened out of their wits by the dozens of live actors dressed as everything from zombies to blood curdling ghosts. They populate a series of large Halloween-themed mazes, which have been created in gruesome and painstaking detail at the venue. Some are outside and others inside.

This year’s attraction is aptly called Screamfest Resurrected, as it returns after the enforced postponement and will take place on 13 dates throughout October in the countdown to Halloween on October 31.

Screamfest is not for the fainthearted and anyone aged under 16 has to be accompanied by an adult as the actors revel in making sure visitors go away feeling they have been frightened and certainly made to jump throughout the night.

The event features more 100 live actors spread across the five Halloween-themed attractions, including two brand new indoor mazes set to frighten thrill seekers. The actors have spent hours in make-up being turned in to zombies, ghouls and creatures of the night.

They man the five mazes, each with a different theme and storyline. The mazes this year are Creed Farm, Le Theatre Noir, Hillbilly Joe’s Zombee Zoo, Love Hurts and Freakout on Tour, all of which visitors dare to walk around.

The first maze I tried was Love Hurts. The setting for this one is based on a rock bar, where visitors would go to find love, but there’s a fiendish twist to this unorthodox dating service that gets jumping out of their skin as the actors rush to scare them. I loved hearing tracks by Queen and Guns N’ Roses as I queued to get in.

The most entertaining part of Love Hurts was the opening scene where visitors are led through foul- smelling toilets. Visitors are then stuffed into the cubicle with at least eight other strangers. Having been to Glastonbury and Leeds festivals for the past six years, I was at least used to the smell.

We were then forced out of the cubicle and made to delve deeper and deeper into this subterranean lair often having to crawl while possessed demons clawed at our bodies. It’s tense and makes your heart race, but is brilliant frightening fun if this is your thing. One of the new attractions at this year’s event is La Theatre Noir, which was a real treat. Visitors are sat down on wooden pews in a huge indoor theatre and from the

lffIt is so immersive and filled with some amazing special effects. It is all very gothic and is so different.