Think you've been through a haunted house before? You haven't. Not like this.
Most people think "haunted house attraction," and their thoughts steer toward the typical five-minute walkthrough maze with stuff jumping out at you. This ain't that.
More extreme haunted houses have popped up in recent years, like Blackout in New York and L.A., or Gates of Hell in Las Vegas. These events have been described as disturbing, traumatizing, the stuff of nightmares. Places like these have been picked up by news outlets and gotten outraged complaints and even threats of legal action.
McKamey Manor in San Diego (do not visit that website if you're the least bit squeamish) makes those "extreme" haunted houses look like Disneyland. It's been described by many as the most terrifying experience on Earth. Conceived of and created by Russ McKamey, a hardcore terror fanatic, it employs movie-quality props and effects, and it gets inside your head in ways too horrible to describe. It's sadistic, twisted, torturous and sick.
You'd have to be a sadist to willingly sign up for it, and yet people keep doing exactly that.
What makes it so extreme? For one thing, it lasts up to seven hours long. It's not just a test of bravery, it's a test of stamina — both physical and mental. McKamey Manor is open on the weekends, all year round, and get this: only four people are allowed to take part per weekend, or two per day. You can't just buy a ticket, you have to apply for admittance. McKamey uses a careful process to select participants, and needless to say, you have to be a healthy adult in excellent physical condition. And there is a very long, comprehensive legal waiver you have to sign before you enter.
What takes place inside McKamey Manor is mostly kept secret, but videos McKamey has posted online show participants (who are genuinely terrified out of their minds) being tied up and gagged, covered in (hopefully fake) blood, being sprayed by an unknown substance that shoots out of a filthy toilet, heads locked in cages with snakes, stuffed into freezers and caskets, dowsed in freezing water, forced to eat disgusting-looking substances and more.
Despite this, people travel from hundreds of miles away to take part in McKamey Manor. Can you believe it? Hundreds of miles!
(Seriously, don't watch this video unless you want to be disturbed.)
Participants are asked to go to a public place, from which they're presumably taken to the Manor's location. Is it a secret location? Are the participants blindfolded? We don't know. But we do know that the owner has had hardened Marines and adrenaline junkies come through and left shivering, crying blobs of humanity.
This might be the most incredible part of all: experiencing McKamey Manor is free of charge. The only catch is that once you're in, there's no quitting. There is no safe word, there is no leaving early. Aside from a medical emergency, there's nothing you can do to be let out until it's over.
A standard haunted house could be called "fun," but that word does not apply to McKamey Manor. People sign up to challenge themselves, to see if they can survive this marathon of terror. No one who leaves claims to have had a good time. Other extreme haunted houses are to McKamey Manor what standard horror movies are to "torture porn."
Would you do it?
