Salisbury Haunted Barn & Trail

Salisbury, NH

Website: https://www.facebook.com/thesalisburywoods

Pricing: $20

Type: Haunt

Setting: Indoor/Outdoor

Full Contact Option: No

Overview

The Haunted Barn and Trail in Salisbury, NH, is a community project designed to raise money for local educational organizations while still creating a full-fledged haunted experience. Set behind a classic New England church, it has all the features one would expect from a local attraction of its kind.

The entrance is decorated with an oversized pirate ship, complete with a crew of skeletons painted in neon lights. The line continues the ambience with a cemetery of sorts in addition to a little pumpkin extravaganza and a few freak show oddities to spice up the decor. Actors roam around during the wait to provide a few extra scares before the main event. There are plenty of photo ops at this point, which help pass the time.

The line does move at a consistent pace, even if it may take some time before you get through it, especially on one of the busier nights. Being out in the middle of nowhere, though, does lend itself to avoiding such crowds that places like Spooky World would garner.

Once through the clown's mouth, you enter the barn from its namesake, which forms the only formal indoor portion. Once beyond that, the trail weaves throughout the back and is sufficiently condensed as to maximize the length of the walk. You can expect the usual clowns and haunted dolls, although the section with an array of thrift store plushies is particularly notable. Since scares are on the backburner for me at this point, I tend to enjoy picking apart the finer details.

Overall, it's a solid experience for roughly what you would pay for many of the neighboring haunts outside the much larger ones, and it supports charitable causes while it does it.

Notable Moment

Nearing the end, my son turned the corner into the final pseudo-indoor portion and let out a bloodcurdling scream. I entered the building only to see a blank window. I tried to get some info out of him as to what he saw, but I didn't get too far. It took a repeat visit the following year to anticipate the turn and see for myself. It turned out to be a video of a woman decaying into spiders. It was quite the shock for the younger crowd.

Photos

Ratings

Ambience:

From the haunt proper to the line to the street view, lighting and props are consistent throughout and ensure that the haunted experience continues from the moment you walk in until you walk out. There are plenty of places for photos where allowed, and some light refreshments are available as well for reasonable prices.

Value:

While the Haunted Barn operates as a nonprofit for local educational organizations, the price is still in the median range. That said, the trail is on par with many of the professional outfits and certainly warrants the asking price.

Scares:

Scares are on par with most other haunts. It mainly relies on jump-scare actors and ambience/decorations for the majority of the trail. Some animatronics and audio/visual elements flesh out the rest. Nothing is too gory, so a wider range of ages would be appropriate.