Guide to Canada’s Wonderland Halloween Haunt

When it comes down to my favourite time of year, Halloween comes close second to Christmas. Not because I can wear whatever I want without being judged, but because I’m in love with this horror theme. I’m the type of person that has pretty much seen every scary movie since the mid 1970’s. Scary movie came out in theaters? I’ll be there opening night. I love feeling scared, having my adrenaline go through the roof because a dead corpse popped out from under the bed or there are glowing white eyes in a closet.

Since I prefer more of the jump-scare scary movies and the psychological thrillers, I am OBSESSED with haunted mansions, corn mazes, asylums, etc. I am addicted to walking around with friends through a booby-trapped place just to get that fight/flight response. Call me an adrenaline or horror junkie I don’t care – I accept all labels.

I live in a decently sized city that is surrounded by farm fields where many farmers use their property to create haunted corn mazes and houses. Since I’ve already been to the ones surrounding my city, I thought why not spend a little more money to visit Halloween Haunt at Canada’s Wonderland since I hadn’t been there in 6 years – and from what I remembered I got the sh*t scared out of me!

Overall the trip cost me $150.00 not including gas and hotel since I thought 5 hours was not sufficient to ride on all the rides and go through all the corn mazes. This included $35.00 Halloween Haunt ticket, $35.00 fright lane which was a fast pass for the scary mazes, $50.00 for fast pass plus, and $20.00 (split between friends) for parking. The rest of the money contributed to online fees, etc.

Now I know you may say it’s my choice for spending so much money, but again, Halloween Haunt is only open for 5 hours, and you get access to all mazes and most rides within these 5 hours. Let’s see – the average wait line for Leviathan (the largest rollercoaster at Canada’s Wonderland) was 1.5 hours mid peak, Behemoth was 1 hour, Skyhawk, 20 minutes, and so on and so forth. Within just wanting to go on three rides already half of your available time is up to even enjoy the scary mazes and other rides. And so I begged my partner to spend $150.00 each to not rush ourselves and enjoy everything the park had to offer.

Starting off with our evening, the park opened it’s doors at 6:30 pm which allowed entrance to the restaurants, walking around the fountains and waterfall, and the clothing stores. All the walkways to the rides and attractions were closed off by rope and security until 7 pm. By 6:55 pm more than 100 people were huddled around the castle door entrance (first walkway to attractions on the right) since it was the closest to Leviathan. Since I had the fast pass I didn’t care about all the people ahead of us since I knew not everyone one. Around 7:10 pm my partner and I decided to go on the Leviathan as our first rollercoaster and we barely waited a minute, whereas the line-up for the non-fast pass riders was longer (probably a 30 minute wait if we had gotten in their line).

Was the fast pass worth it? Overall it was worth it for Leviathan and Behemoth – the attractions that had the longest lines. And keep in mind there is a regular fast pass along with fast pass plus, where the latter gives you additional access to Leviathan and Behemoth (and a few more) on top of what fast pass gets you, which is why it costs more. The rest of the rollercoasters either had a one ride ahead of us wait, or the moment we got in line the doors opened for us to get on a ride. Some rides didn't even have a person to check our fast passes.

It’s important to note that as time progresses the park will get busier and the line-ups get longer. By 9:00 pm I had finished the right side of the park (Leviathan side) and made my way over to the Behemoth side. Yes the lines were longer for non-fast pass riders but not long as those warm sunny days on the weekend in the summer. Psyclone and Stunt Coaster would be a 20-30 minute wait max each whereas I waited 10-15 minutes in total.

I would also like to insert somewhere that I am a huge roller coaster fan, but waiting so little between rides sort of made me sick – not the stomach kind. My head just hurt from all the banging and shaking around. I truly felt like an adult for the first time in my life thinking rollercoasters made me feel sick.

If I were to redo my night – I would not buy the fast pass plus. I would get in line early for the park at 6 pm, get in front of the huge crowd at the Castle Gate side of the park and got on Leviathan immediately. Then I would run over to the other side of the park and go on Behemoth, Psyclone, and Sledgehammer. After that I would go to the haunted mazes. The rest I couldn't care less if I waited or the park closed on me.

Haunt pass + Fright Lane

The haunt pass and the fright lane gave you access to 10 haunted mazes (one is a 4D ride that I will talk about later), Skeleton Key mini haunted mazes, and of course no line waiting. Should you buy the fright lane? Absolutely not – not once did I wait in line for any of the mazes. It was very disappointing to go to an amusement park filled with variety of haunted mazes, and not get jumpscared and feel that fight/flight moment.

That is because instead of making people wait in a line, and let a group of 2-6 people go through the maze at a time (or at least halfway before they let another group), we all walked in without waiting. This means that while you’re walking with endless people in front of you and behind you, you see all the jumpscares. I’m not the type of person to get scared by looking at a mask, or a fake dead body hanging from the ceiling – I prefer the jump in front of you and scare you so bad you turn into a Karate Black Belt. While walking through their mazes I more observed the decorations instead of being scared senselesly (Fear Factor 4 my a$$).

There was literally no wait for any of the mazes – not even for the non-fright lane holders. The park seriously couldn’t let only 2-6 people in at a time to get a better experience of the “haunted” whatever? I mean, if the fright lane pass was supposed to get you to the front of a line, why did I spend $35.00 extra for a metal key I will throw away?

The haunted part was quite a let down – really wasn’t as I remembered from 6 years ago. The Skeleton Key mini mazes were the only thing that gave you that one-on-one experience with the horror aspect of the park. But they were so short and the actual haunted mazes sucked so much I lost all excitement (sorry to be such a Debbie downer/negative Nancy).

All in all, here is the breakdown if you are to visit Halloween Haunt this year (1 more day) or in the next years.

To buy:

Halloween Haunt Admission
Parking pass
Expensive amusement park food/merchandise

Forget about it:

Fast pass/plus
Fright lane/Skeleton Key
4D Zombie ride

That last point was THE BIGGEST WASTE OF MY TIME. If you’ve been to roller-coaster in Disneyland/world there were some interactive 4D rides. This means you sit in a ride with a gun and you get to shoot things, experience 3D, feel like everything is real since your chair moves with the actions on the screen (4D); the “That was an awesome ride” feeling you get after getting off. As a fright lane and fast pass holder I had no fast access to this ride, so I waited about an hour to get on. First of all, there were 3 cars in total each holding 8 people. One car, 2 seats on another, and four seats on the third were out of order – their guns didn’t work or some silly thing. That means 14 seats out of 24 were not being used every time those cars went around. The ride itself was more enjoyable as a rollercoaster (no spoilers). You get about 200 m of the ride where you are facing a screen and shooting zombies. My gun didn’t work so I just rode in a very slow roller coaster. The 3D did not make the zombies scary, neither were the graphics of the animated show any better. This ride was overall poorly designed, poorly run, and overall was a huge waste of my time.

It is safe to say Halloween Haunt wasn’t as fun as it’s made out to be – I had more fun hanging out with people and going on the Leviathan twice than the rest of it. But to spend $150.00 to do that? Not again my friend, never again.