Haunt of Halloween Review | Mission Viejo
On September 30, I got to attend the opening night of Haunt of Halloween! This event marked the beginning of my spooky season festivities!
As I’ve shared in a previous blog post, Haunt of Halloween is one of many Halloween events happening this year in Southern California, particularly around the Los Angeles region. Although, this particular event is actually located in Mission Viejo, which is a city within Orange County. So, as you read through this review, please do keep it in mind that this event is further out than the typical Los Angeles Halloween event!
Let’s move on to the review, shall we?
Haunt of Halloween in Mission Viejo is a hodgepodge of spooky activities! There is a spooky maze, macabre performances, and exhibits where you can face your fears. For kids, there is a designated time where they can enjoy a scare-free event, and even participate in a little pumpkin patch! Then, as soon as the sun goes down, Haunt of Halloween transforms into a scary event!
I, naturally, went for the latter portion, and didn’t really know what to expect! I have to say, I didn’t think I was going to be scared too bad, but, of course, I was proved wrong.
As soon as I walked into the venue, I was put in a line to enter the haunted maze! I haven’t done a haunted maze since college, mostly due to the fact that I hate being scared! I am not a person who actively seeks out haunted houses or haunted anything really, so I don’t know how I ended up in this position, but somehow I did.
Alright, so I go in front and Arjuna is right behind me, holding onto my sweater because I refused to hold his hand so that I could cover my ears. I am not a fan of sudden noises or loud sounds, so during any horror movie or experience, my ears are covered! And that’s exactly how I was throughout this maze. I was strolling through this dark, foggy, creepy maze, barely hearing what was going on, but I saw everything!
There were fake body parts hanging from the rafters, creepy scare actors popping out from around the corner and so much fog! Also, to make the scene even more disorienting, there was an abundance of strobe lights utilized, so if you are not a fan of strobe lights, DO NOT do this maze!
I finally made it out of the maze after being scared a bunch of times and made it into the main event area. As described, there were different booths throughout the grounds, of what it's about the size of a boutique store in a mall. Also, I find now a good time to mention that this is an indoor event, located inside a retail space at the Kaleidoscope Mall in Mission Viejo! Hopefully, that will give you a better picture of the space, but then again, for an actual visual of the event, just click the video above or click here to watch my video recount of the event here!
Okay, but back to the event!
So, we survived the maze and then proceeded to visit each of the exhibits. We started out getting our picture taken at the event’s photo op, then headed over to look at horror movie memorabilia! We took some more pictures with recreated scenes from scary movies and paid $3 extra for each of us to go inside their mini-museum! Because there was no one in line for this attraction, the museum attendee gave us a personal tour of the artifacts and even told us their origin stories, which were really fascinating!
I also took some time to visit two other exhibits; the “Face Your Fears” station and the Reptile Exhibit. I had a lot of fun at the Face Your Fears exhibit as I had to stick my hand into fully covered boxes and try to guess what was inside. Let’s just say that many of them were sticky and slimy!! (No spoilers here)!
After thoroughly sanitizing my hands, I moved onto the reptile exhibit where I got to pet a snake! This is where I was a bit disappointed with the event, unfortunately. When I read the description of this exhibit on the Haunt of Halloween website, I got the impression that there would be multiple reptiles in attendance, most of which you could interact with, if not all. However, this was not the case. At the time I attended, there was only a single snake, and while he was a cute snake named Snickers, I wasn’t wowed. I was expecting at least 3-5 different reptiles, but what I got was far from it. I don’t know if there was only one reptile present because I went on a Thursday at 9 pm, but regardless of time and day of attendance, the event should have been as advertised! So, that was a major disappointment for me.
The event picked up after that with the Monte Revolta show! This dark, comedic live performance was laugh-out-loud funny, and entertaining! I had such a good time watching this interactive show, that I was able to shake off my disappointment from the reptile exhibit.
When the show ended, I had at that point, done everything there was to do at this event, so we decided to head home.
All in all, I’d give this event a 3 out of 5 on my spooky rating scale. I took an obvious point off for the reptile exhibit, but then I took an additional point off because I felt that there was a lot of negative space throughout the space, as well as the space not being well-utilized. I’ve been to a lot of events in my day and had the pleasure of attending some incredibly well thought out events at that, and I don’t know if I can say that this event was on par with those stellar Halloween events. I wanted more Devore for each of the exhibits, and I felt that fog machines were used as a bit of a cop-out decor item.
I think because it is only $20-$25 dollars per person, you do have a good value for your dollar, which is always a plus! So, would I recommend you travel from the Westside of Los Angeles to Mission Viejo for this event? Probably not. However, if you’re local, or even in the eastern side of Los Angeles, then yeah! I think Haunt of Halloween could be a fun spooky event to attend towards the beginning of your spooky season!
If you liked this review, stay tuned for more Los Angeles Halloween event reviews all October long!