On the final weekend of this year's Halloween season we tried another new haunt. And by new, I mean only that it was new to us - because this is the 19th year that the Haunted Mill has been running in Clinton. Downtown Clinton is pretty adorable and seems to really get into the Halloween season, which makes that town ok in my book. Between the pumpkin carving contest displayed through the city's Main Street and the Haunted Mill operating for its final night of the season, Clinton was packed and it was a challenge just to find a place to park. We soon realized that there was a line, hundreds of people long, extending from the Haunted Mill's entrance, across its front lawn, and all the way across a bridge into the center of town. The line was easily a couple hours long, and this wasn't something we had quite prepared for. Fortunately, we discovered that the Mill, in addition to offering standard admission for $20, was offering an express pass for $40 per person. That may seem like a lot, but then you may not realize how much I hate waiting in lines. So we shelled out eighty bucks and hopped straight in front of those hundreds of other suckers. Hell yeah! The official title for the attraction was the Haunted Village, and this village was broken up into about five different sections. The first area was inside the old musty mill which was set up like an abandoned mental institution. The place was packed with good actors, trap doors in walls, uneven floor contraptions, and an excellent wall of spikes that closes in on you as you walk towards a stairwell. Very cool stuff. This area took at least 10 or 15 minutes, and then we had a short outdoor graveyard to navigate before boarding a hayride. After being chased by clown cars, demonic priests, and werewolves, we unloaded from the hay cart towards the entrance of the next area, which had some kind of sweet Hell-theme. Actors and props were again bountiful and effective. At the end of this area, a member of our group was abducted by some demon lady (it happened to be Maggie in our group) and she then became part of the act, giving a possessed speech, as dictated by the demonlady in her ear. Very fun. After some more stuff (who can remember things that happened 4 days ago, right?) we reached an indoor maze. The doors were intentionally disguised and the few actors inside it were doing their best to send you the wrong way. The occasional tricks of strobe lights, mirrors, and fog didn't help either. There was also an excellent hallway filled with mattresses on the floor. Not scary, just fun. Eventually we found the exit door and made our way outside, back past the still-infinitely-long line, and towards our car. If you want to check this place out, I totally recommend going on the last night of the season, like we did, and seeing the town's pumpkin carving contest as well. Clinton definitely knows how to do my favorite holiday! Each section was pretty long and they were all fairly different from each other, which is awesome.
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