Fear on the Farm at McCray’s Farm has Amazing Animatronics and Actor Energy with 3 Attractions (5 stars)
Fear on the Farm, in Western Massachusetts just north of Springfield, is a delightful family farm that has pumpkin picking, daytime hayrides, mini-golf, a petting zoo, and a creamery selling ice cream and more. In warm weather, they have live outdoor music, and in the December they have a 30-minute holiday lights stroll around the farm. In, between, it’s Halloween!
Fear on the Farm is a 20-minute hay ride, plus a walk through a haunted house. It’s remarkable how many large mannequins they have, many of them animatronics! One Viking demon warns you not to enter with a whole speech. Another giant ghoul seems like it’s static until the it slowly rises up to attack. Wow!
Even better was the energy of the actors. Bless those lovable knuckleheads who came out in the cold and high winds of late October to entertain us. They jumped up onto the hay ride and walked back and forth with their fake chainsaw and other effects, scaring people right up close. At one point the hay ride goes into a barn, whose front and rear doors close completely for a minute, trapping you with the creatures. Bless also those of us who came out to be entertained. These are my people. How wonderful to be taken around the grounds in a hay ride with the moon shining among clouds and the crisp night air.
Although the hay ride didn’t have very many special effects, I loved the video projection in the clown town, and I assume they still have the laser lake inside the haunted house that I noted in my last review from 2018. It’s a place filled with fog with a green laser that sweeps out a horizontal plane. The plane of the laser light hides anything that lurks underneath, just like the surface of a lake. (I was absolutely shattered after an exhausting day in the cold and wind. I wanted to but could not make myself go through the 2 other attractions.)
My only concern, and I see that I also wrote about this in 2018, is that the clowns had a noise popper device, across from the fire pit, that made such a loud sound that it set my ears ringing. That’s a no-no. You don’t want to damage people’s hearing, right?
Fear on the Farm is a very impressive destination well worth the long drive out to Springfield and you can make it a whole day trip by also visting the nearby attractions from Springfield to Northampton. One time I came to McCray’s for a late afternoon pumpkin hay ride, left to get dinner, and then returned for the spooky Halloween hay ride!
I almost gave 4.5 stars, but I see on the website that I actually missed two attractions, DON and Massacre Manor, not just one. Ah, what the heck. I’ll give Fear on the Farm a full 5 stars, the same as I did last time. You folks are doing an incredible job and it’s only because earlier that evening I exhausted myself climbing around Jiminy Peak that I lacked the energy to see it all.
See fearonthefarm.com.