What’s in season at Connors Farm? Scares! And lots of them! But what sets this Danvers locale apart from many of New England’s Halloween-related happenings is that there’s actually an opportunity to not only confront your fears, but to shoot at them and watch them crumble in front of you.
For the first year, Connors Farm is offering Zombie Safari Paintball. It’s exactly what it sounds like, but since these three words aren’t often strung together in the English language, we’ll explain.
You sit in the back of a tractor cart, stationed in front of a paintball gun, alongside 14 other zombie hunters. The tractor then takes you around the hallowed grounds of Connors Farm as actors dressed as zombies try to attack. That’s when you strike back, firing rounds of fluorescent paintballs at them.
“We have a very high turnover rate for zombies,” laughs Bob Connors, who is the fifth-generation owner of the farm. “People have no mercy. You get 15 people on a trailer and they just plaster the zombies, and the zombies just go to their knees, it’s beautiful!”
The Zombie Safari Paintball is a new addition to the farm’s scary arsenal. For the past six years Connors has also offered a truly scary Haunted Cornfield and Woods of Horror. Ticketholders walk through a maze with shifting themes — this reporter found the circus theme to be the scariest: with its sped up and slowed down carnival music and evil clowns it’s like step right up … to be murdered! — and Connors says the 53 actors he has stationed throughout the course aren’t just about unexpectedly jumping out in front of you.
“We’re trying to do psychological scares more than ‘boo’ scares,” he says. “We like to set the scenes with the right music, the right fog, the right lighting, the right strobes and the right smells.”
Connors Farm also offers less sinister seasonal enjoyments, including a flashlight corn maze that doesn’t include actors paid to scare you, but it may be even scarier if your phone/flashlight runs out of batteries. There’s also a mechanical bull, a pumpkin patch and hot cider doughnuts. For more info on the non-haunted haps, click here, but for info on the haunted haps, click HERE! IF YOU DARE!
