By Melanie Petrucci, Senior Community Reporter
Shrewsbury – Looking for some Halloween fun for the whole family? Look no further than the Haunted Hillando Halloween Maze located at the home of Sean and Meg McNamara, 48 Hillando Drive, in Shrewsbury. It’s spooky, it’s spectacular – it’s Spooktacular!
Although they have been decoration for six years, this is only the second year that the maze has been open to the community. It has many new elements this year, but no blood, no guts, no gore.
“We have double or triple the number of ghosts than we had last year and those are scattered throughout the maze and we have double the number of skeletons as last year so that means there’s maybe 20 ghosts and something like 25 skeletons,” Sean McNamara said.
Visitors will be treated to a giant, movable spider, named “Araña Grande,” which is Spanish for “big spider.” There are animated witches, singing jack-o-lanterns and dancing skeletons in a mausoleum. Much of it has been hand built or retro-fitted with motors by McNamara.
“We aim for family friendly and there’s no blood and guts or anything that is super scary or anything that jumps out at you and we don’t have scare actors to startle kids. It’s geared for all ages,” he noted.
There is no entrance fee, but the McNamara family is collecting donations for Shrewsbury Youth and Family Services, Inc. In their first three days, they collected $200.
“We saw almost a thousand people last year when all was said and done and a lot of those people asked if we were taking donations either to compensate for money spent on the maze or for a charity,” Sean McNamara said. “At the time I was like ‘no, we aren’t taking any donations for the maze, but [collecting for charity] is a really good idea.’ We decided last year that this year we would open the maze with the intent of picking a charity or nonprofit to donate to.”
Operating hours are Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., through Halloween. Find the maze on Facebook by visiting: www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=haunted%20hillando%20halloween%20maze.
Photos/Melanie Petrucci
