Halloween means, candy, costumes, trick or treating and haunted houses. Scorched Earth Haunted Farm is where to go in Falcon if one wants to be ìscared to the bone.îStacy Packer, executive director of Scorched Earth Haunted Farm, said they are in their third year of hosting the frightening scenes at Smith Farms.The owners of Smith Farms wanted to have a haunted theme and organization on their property, Packer said. ìI have a huge following of people that I have been haunting with for a long time, so we all came on board; itís been a great partnership with them,î she said.Preparations for the haunted house started in May to be ready to open on Sept. 30, she said. She worked closely with her production manager, Stephanie Mittelstadt, to plan the new potential haunt path and make sure it would work. Packer said, ìThe challenge is to keep things fresh, because people who come year after year expect something new and different.î This year, they added a big corn maze as one of the new features.She said on an average night, 25 to 30 actors (out of 40 total) are on set, plus a costuming and makeup team, along with the staff that runs things behind the scenes. They also provide security and parking.Parker said it takes about 25 minutes to go through the haunted house. Besides the new corn maze, customers can also participate in such activities as the jumping pads, a zombie paint ball area, a fire pit to sit and relax and a snow cone food truck, she said.Scorched Earth Haunted House is a nonprofit organization, and almost all the staff are volunteers, Packer said. ìThey volunteer because they not only like to scare and be part of the haunt, but also because they can give back to the community,î she said. ìWeíre like a small family helping other people.îAdam Smith and Sasha Ortiz, owners of Smith Farms, have been selling produce to the community for more than a decade. He said they always wanted to get into the haunted house line of entertainment, and met Packer through mutual connections.ìI love watching customers reactions; thatís why we do all the fun stuff we do at the end of the season,î Smith said. ìWe love watching kids laugh and smile all day long and then at night, we love watching them scream. Itís just a joy for us to be able to provide the level of entertainment that weíre able to each season.îThe farmerís market is open from about July 1 to Oct. 31, including evenings when the haunted house is open.Liz Madrid, lead haunter, said sheís been ìhauntingî for about seven years. Her love of performing started in high school while she was involved in theater, she said. Presently a middle school language arts teacher, she wanted to find volunteer work that would accommodate her limited time, Madrid said. She decided to combine her love of acting, Halloween and haunted houses; she met Packer several years ago and has been working for her ever since.Haunted house actors are called many things, but Madrid refers to herself as a ìhaunter.î ìPacker calls us her monsters,î she said.As one of the lead actors, Madrid has to stay in character and manage her crew. She constantly walks through the haunted house and plays off the other actors. ìThere is no script, itís all improvisation with the other actors and the customers; we are constantly playing off things the other actors or customers are saying or doing while they are going through the haunt,î she said.Madrid said the ultimate goal is to get a good scare or scream out of the customer, but they also want the customersí scary experiences to be varied; to make them feel unnerved, uncomfortable and get them into a spooky mood.ìI would encourage people to have an open mind when walking through a haunt, allow yourself to be immersed in the experience and have fun,î she said. We want to provide a fun, Halloween experience for everyone.îPacker said as of Oct. 22, 3,000 people have gone through the haunted house. They plan to make donations to the Susan G. Komen Foundation, the Elbert Town Foundation, Mattersville, the Falcon Fire Protection District, a school in El Paso County School District 49, to name a few. They also donated tickets to people, schools and organizations in the community throughout the event.
