Haunted Overload: More Than a Haunt

October 16, 2023 — Haunted Overload is one of the best haunts in the entire Halloween-celebrating world. And I say that without having been to the haunt in over a decade. Sort of.

I haven’t been to it at night in over a decade. But I’ve been to it during the day many times. When there are no scare actors. And no creepy lighting. And no ominous music and screams thickening the air. And it’s still one of the best out there. And even that phrase, “one of the best,” is inadequate. It’s unique. The haunt is arguably even better as an art project than a Halloween roller coaster.

 

The first thing you should know about the Overload is that it’s an outdoor haunt. It’s located in a forest at DeMeritt Hill Farm in Lee, New Hampshire, but it’s no mere haunted corn maze full of off-the-shelf monsters. It’s a necropolis of large, custom-made buildings shaped like monsters. Some of them are dozens of feet tall. Giant skulls and pumpkins and lizards and less categorizable creatures. You walk into so many dark mouths in this haunt. It also has some of the more conventional bits of haunts—rooms full of sideshow characters and dolls and cultists. And they do those supremely well. But again. Very few haunts have a haunted trainwreck in the middle of them.

Basically, any haunt that is just as good (and from some perspectives, even better) during the day than at night is operating in a league of haunt that few could aspire to. And, strangely, the best thing about it might be how inclusive it is. I’ve met a lot of people over the years who love Halloween but can’t experience the stress and fear response of a haunt. During the day, they can do this haunt. Children too young to go haunts can also easily do this haunt during the day. And that’s because it’s not just a haunt. It’s in a category of its own.

I don’t know why I wrote so many words about the place. All you need is photos and a location.

And if you want more, here’s an OTIS post from when I visited it in 2017. Just be careful. There are more monsters in that one than just Haunted Overload ones.