Haunted Attraction Reviewed: Fear Hollow - Mayhem on the Mountain Top
Website: www.fearhollow.com
Location of Attraction: Mountain Top Pennsylvania
Date of Review: Saturday September 30th 2017
Total Number of Attractions Available: ONE!
Overall Haunted Attraction Rating (scale of 1-10): 6
Entertainment and Food Rating (scale of 1-10): 5
Overall Makeup and Costume Rating (scale of 1-10): 6
Overall Actor Rating (scale of 1-10): 8
Overall Props/Animatronics Rating (scale of 1-10): 5
Overall Scare Factor Rating (scale of 1-10): 5
Overall Feedback: Fear Hollow is a small town and old school style haunt located in the dark and eerie woods of Mountain Top Pennsylvania. We were in the area to conduct a review on a nearby haunt and decided to add this small town haunt to our review list. It’s safe to say we are glad we did! It was night two of opening weekend so we’re sure the haunt still had some kinks and changes to work out but as far as we could tell there weren’t any glaring downfalls in this haunt! We by no means expected the top notch sets, movie ready makeup/costume and all the other elements of your larger scale haunts in the area. What we did expect was an old school style haunt that provides a very personal experience and this is exactly what we got! It was actually really really nice to take a step back to how haunts used to be before all the animatronics and pyrotechnics. Not to mention the lack of a large crowd really made for a darn near perfect eerie atmosphere! As we waited in line the small town haunt “feel” really rubbed off on us as all the staff were thoroughly pleasant and all the customers engaged with one another about various haunted attraction experiences. It was clear they were really working to ensure that you NEVER got stuck behind another group as they let groups of up to 6 individuals in every 3+ minutes. It’s safe to say their system worked as we NEVER heard footsteps or voices of another group in front or behind us. Throughout the haunt we really liked the use of hidden doorways. At one point in time we all laughed hysterically as we stood in a dark hallway trying to find our way out to then later find out the door was a moveable wall that everyone walked right past. A very similar tactic was used as we walked into a chained in area with a crazed actor harassing our group as we stood there like statues hoping he’d show us the way. A good minute passed by before we finally figured out that we ourselves had to find the way out… boy did we look like a bunch of ding dongs! Probably our favorite scene was the outdoor maze. Only lit by a small sliver of the moon was a rather dark maze filled with a chainsaw maniac and a few other actors. We roamed around aimlessly in this area for a good 3+ minutes before we finally found our way out. The actors seemed to know exactly where we’d end up as their timing was perfect on their pop scares in this area! Of course a small town haunt is going to have their version of a clown scene and they definitely nailed it! The one clown scene had an ending that we never would have expected… it truly caught all of our members off guard (obviously we can’t tell you what it is…)! Across the board we really loved the personal experience we received. All the actors were in your face and did an amazing job at using the customer's personal fears and phobias to really nail a good scare! We didn’t encounter a single actor that was out of character which seems to be very hard to find nowadays! The outside of the haunt truly does a phenomenal job of not disclosing the fun and scares that are to be had once inside. We spent a good 20 minutes inside the haunt at Fear Hollow so it’s really a decent sized walk through attraction! At the end of our experience we had some time to chat with the owners of the haunt and they are truly great people with much love for the halloween season! During our talk we discovered that they begin set up for the haunt in mid August and then have to tear down the haunt completely by Thanksgiving. Hearing that statement really made us that much more impressed with this haunt! When comparing this haunt to bigger and larger scale haunts in the area like Field of Screams, Reaper’s Revenge, Bates Motel, Pennhurst Asylum, etc. of course it’s going to score much lower on ratings ... but when you compare it to your average small town haunt it definitely competes with it’s own category of “competition”. If you’re in the Mountain Top PA area or plan to attend a haunt nearby we definitely encourage you to pay this attraction a visit! We have been to dozens of different haunts over the past few years and we had just as much fun at Fear Hollow as we did at all the other haunts! Kuddos to the Fear Hollow team for providing that awesome old school small town haunt experience that we’ve been looking for! It’s safe to say that Fear Hollow is sure to provide that old school, intense, interactive and horrifying experience all haunt goers know and love!