We were lucky enough to attend the "Halloween Extreme" here in Orlando last year and because they didn't return this year I made a last minute decision to make the drive to the 2014 Midwest Haunter's Convention in Columbus Ohio.
Belinda couldn't get away from work so I had to go it alone, although I did meet up with a couple friends I know from here in Florida that let me hang with them through the haunted house tours. Would have been a real bummer to go it alone.
Overall I was disappointed with MHC in comparison to what I experienced at Halloween Extreme, possibly because I had built it up in my mind as something much older and thereby more organized and larger than Halloween Extreme. So many people have proclaimed it their dream haunter weekend though, so who am I to rain on their parade...
I did get to meet a bunch of people that until now I had only known through social media, especially "Haunter's Hangout" on Facebook. There were just so many people to meet, hopefully I didn't accidentally ignore someone I shouldn't have. I know there were people I never did find and meet. I tried my best.
The highlight of the weekend for me was probably getting to tour "The Scare Factory" on Friday night. "The Scare Factory" is an extremely large design and fabrication studio for the haunt industry whose products I'm sorry to say are way out of our price range... although there was some temptation, rationalizing to myself "you only live once", but I didn't buy any. I did walk away with some "I could make that myself" thoughts that will most likely never come to fruition but it's okay to dream I suppose.
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| I wanted to take this guy home so bad, He'd dominate our yard! |
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| Even this guy would make a nice addition to Shingle Creek Manor! |
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| There was a little bit of everything in this huge warehouse. |
One of the things underway was a restoration project for unnamed private collector that dominated the office section. The gentleman I talked to was rather tight lipped about the collection or who it belonged to, other than to say it was being restored for future display.
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| These are only a few of the characters. There were probably 30 or 40 total. |
After " The Scare Factory" we were taken to "The Scaretorium". There were two haunted attractions inside this 40,000 square foot building, "Northland Asylum" and "RIP's 3D Funhouse". The inmates at the asylum tried their best to be scary but they had a tough audience of haunters to contend with. I'm not much for clowns being scary but the 3D house of clowns was pretty decent. Again, not too scary to a bunch of critical haunters bu the 3D set designs were really good.
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| Photos courtesy of Jim McCrary |
Without being too critical of the classes and showroom, it was a fun weekend but doubtful I would spend the money to travel that far again. It wasn't any better than the first year for Halloween Extreme we attended and as few vendors in the showroom which I expected would be much larger. Next year, hopefully it's TRANSWORLD!
