Nightmare on 13th in Salt Lake City
I drive past this place several times a month (my chiropractor is around the corner) and have never stopped in. In fact, you might say that I avoided the place. You see, I don’t really like haunted houses. OK, OK, I fess up – I really hate haunted houses. Well a friend of mine (you know who you are) coerced me into going to Nightmare on 13th (on my birthday no less…).
Other than the haunted house in Planet Hollywood, I haven’t been to a haunted house since I was 13 and my parents took me to the Haunted Old Mill (is that even still around??). Haunted houses are the rage these days. They are only open about 30-35 days out of the year, and then for only 3-5 hours a night (Dates/Times). And they must be making some moolah or we wouldn’t have them popping up all over the place. So I decided to step out of the box and see what all the fuss is about.
If you buy tickets online you can upgrade to a VIP pass for free and avoid the lines (tickets were $20.00 and a $3.95 fee. Not sure what the “fee” was for…). If you purchase on site, tickets are $20 and the VIP upgrade is an additional $15. There is no age limit, and while I wouldn’t take your littlest ones unless you want a lot of tears, this attraction would be fine for most tweens. We got there around 8:00 (they open at 7:30) and were done by 8:40. Before you enter the main part of the attraction they take your picture with a ghoulie monster (see below). They took 2 shots (one serious and one funny) and let you know that you can download the photos for free online. You can purchase them at the end if you don’t have a way to print them out yourselves. Pricing on the photos, concessions and merchandise was actually pretty reasonable. I thought the free pictures were pretty cool. Nice birthday momento!
Nightmare on 13th is rated number one in Utah (haunted house ratings). It got 10 ghouls out of 10. Their website said that they have been listed in the top 10 haunted houses in the US on the travel channel twice! Nightmare on 13th has three distinct “nightmares” this year – Mutant, 13 Levels of Fear, and Dark Harvest. They are consecutive, but you could tell when one nightmare ended and the next one began. Considering the fact that I really don’t like to be startled (I mean, I really don’t like it), this ended up being a lot of fun. I guess, stepping outside the box once in awhile can be a good thing!
