UPDATE 10:00am Monday | Halloween has passed and so has the Queen Mary’s annual haunted ship and maze event, Dark Harbor. But that doesn’t mean we can’t relive the terror, the horror, and the fun with this updated photo gallery from the biggest frightfest in Long Beach. Photographer Dale Brown descended upon Dark Harbor over the busy weekend to bring us these frightening shots on the event’s final nights. Whether you spent last night trick-or-treating or watching the series premier of The Walking Dead on AMC (it is really good), these shots will make you feel like you attended Dark Harbor and put the final punctuation on a spooky season.
3:30pm October 13 | The annual Halloween horror at the Queen Mary took on a different name this year when it changed from Shipwrecked to Dark Harbor, but the shrieks and scares have become even more frightening than they were before.
More than just the name of the event has changed. Dark Harbor boasts about the same number of mazes inside the ship, but the scares have spread to the courtyard below, the Spruce Goose dome and the nearby shops. Stepping inside the massive walls of the dome only to be thrust into a tiny, dark corridor is enough to spook anyone, but the real genius of Dark Harbor is the games it plays with your mind.
One of the mazes falls almost completely dark as you’re expected to find your way through drapes that appear to have no openings. That means you’re feeling around in the dark, searching for a gap that may not even be there, and you have no idea what is waiting for you on the other side. Mazes tend to lose their scary aspect when you’re just following a path, but the idea of creating putting you in control is more than an entertaining scare – it’s unsettling.
The terror – or fun, depending on how you feel about these kinds of things – starts right away. And I mean right away. As soon as the security guards are finished with their – thorough – patdown, you’re thrust into a narrow corridor with strobe lights limiting your vision and a number of directions to choose from. Making a decision is not something that even horror night veterans like myself are used to, and it adds a new level of fear to the event. Outside, in the natural ocean fog, ghouls dash through the shadows and make you check your peripherals at all times.
The mazes inside the actual ship are perhaps not as downright terrifying as the Mental Ward that was set up last year, but the darkness and odd sounds and natural creepiness of the Queen Mary are enough to keep the thrill-seeker on his or her toes. The elaborate decorations and creepy lighting were enough to make me think twice about my standing policy to get through the mazes as quickly as possible (though not enough to change it).
Last year’s Shipwreck event was a blast, but with the expanded grounds and the feeling of your fate being in your own hands, Dark Harbor is even better.
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A friend of yours waits patiently for your arrival.