Mikes Horror Hotel

[crazyaboutwildwood]

Hey Everyone. Check out my website www.mikeshorrorhotel.com This will be my 4th year, and every year it seems to get a little bigger! We have 19 nights total this year. This is set up behind my pizza shop in pottstown. This year we are adding Terror Visions In 3D a complete blacklight-3D attraction. Some of the artwork is coming from Halloween Productions In St Louis Mo, Other stuff is being airbrushed by some locals. We work on this all year around so its really a special time of year for me! Take a look And let me know what you think. Thanks, Mike

[robert]

Hi Mike, is this attraction any good as Castle Dracula was? Is it better than Dorney Park's haunted houses? Since you've probably been in Castle Drac and Dorney's haunted houses you probably have lots of ideas for your haunted house, er, hotel. It's too bad that no one would be willing to take the risk to set up a year round or summer haunted attraction in the Allentown area, I know of a few tourist towns that have them open in the summer or year round.

[crazyaboutwildwood]

I cant say that its better then dorneys haunted attractions. We do our own thing and it seems to be very popular around our area. We are on a much smaller scale then cedar fair but our haunt is very good for it being the only haunt in our area. We did like 4,000 people last year over 5 weekends. It rained just about every weekend so Im hoping for even a bigger turn out for 2006. The borough of pottstown would never allow us to leave it up all year around so it gets costly. As long as it is a temporary structure we can get away with the codes dept but have to deal with the fire marshall and it can be very hard to deal with him. I hope I awnsered all of your questions robert.

[crazyaboutwildwood]

I forgot that we are doing a section like castle dracula. It will be the entrance. The hotel owner Will come out of a painting of himself about 15 feet up in the air. This will be the center of the hotel . Our facade this year could be as high as 25 feet. We our really going to scare the hell out of people this year!

[robert]

Yeah, it seemed like the number of haunts in our area have declined, probably due to insurance/fire issues, and high costs. Other than Dorney Park there's a blacklight 3D attraction at Terry Hill waterpark on 222 a couple miles west of Dorney Park. There was a great one near Bath on 512 in greenhouses, but it is no more, they just do the pumpkin patch I think. It sucked that it rained almost every October weekend when Halloweekends at DP was going. I went two of the Saturdays. I hope that they will add on to it further, such as yet another haunted house. Too bad the Gold Mine is gone, they could have used that as a Halloweekend attraction, but it was probably too old and it was closed since about 1985. I suppose Niagara Falls, Canada doesn't have a problem with fire marshalls because their haunted houses are open year round. The article about them is on this site.

[crazyaboutwildwood]

Insurance and the fire issue is the number 1 thing with my haunt or any haunt. With out both we are screwed. If the fire marshall says no haunt then there is no haunt! Whatever he says to do you better do it! They have alot of power and they let you know it! As far as I know all of the stuff from the goldmine at dorney park has been saved and put into use with there halloweekends. IM sure what they dont use will be saved and maybe displayed in the future!

[robert]

And NJ is probably the strictest state due to all the haunted house/castle fires. Not very many have opened since Long Branch and Brigantine burned down, the only one might be the Haunted Manor at Seaside. The Six Flags Great Adv. Haunted Castle fire in 1984 is the reason many haunts in the state closed.

[crazyaboutwildwood]

Well, Great Adventure is just a bunch of idiots! You cant put togeather 6 trailers, Not have fire exits and not have proper lighting and expect to keep people safe. How they got away with that is just amazing. At that time the state or whoever handles this stuff should have burned in that fire!!!! My little haunt had a total of 7 fire exits, 4 fire extinguishers, and back up lighting if the power failed. Im sure this year I will use the same if not more!

[clnancy50]

Wasn't that one fire at Dorney Park in the haunted house started by someone lighting a cigarette lighter? Anyway, that's what I heard. Alot of times because of kids' stupidity, the owner must pay the price with high insurance.

[robert]

No, the fire that started with a cigarette lighter was at Six Flags Great Adventure in May, 1984. There was a fire at Dorney Park in Sept. 1983 that burned the Bucket O' Blood dark ride, it started by the PTC carousel which was built 1916 and came to DP in 1932 and consumed it first. It was accidential, I think someone left a fryer on in a food stand. There were some big fires in WW that destroyed the Castle Frankenstein, then Lost World, Crazy House on Fun Pier in 1984, and the entire front of Nickels including the wax museum/carousel building in late 1992. Almost every walk through haunted attraction built in the 70's in NJ burned down except for Gates of Hell on Casino Pier Seaside and Morey's Haunted House which were taken down after the Great Adv. Haunted Castle fire because they were all built by the same company which was run by the Mahana brothers. Related to Fred Mahana who built dark rides and other attractions. His website claims he built Castle Dracula and Morey's Haunted House. Maybe he helped his brothers build Morey's Haunted House. I'm wondering what happened to it? Did they simply tear it down and put the remains in a landfill? I know some of the props were saved and reused in Dante's until recently. Yes, a couple of haunts at the falls closed recently, no big deal they were just Alien Encounter and Screamers parts II and III original Screamers is still open. But, none burned down there as far as I know.

[clnancy50]

I'm going to ask this again, for about the 10th time, HOW DO YOU GET ALL THIS INFORMATION? No matter what anyone says, I have to give you credit for knowing so much. Still, what caused all these fires; accidents, carelessness, arson?