We Survived Our First Visit to Pennhurst Asylum!
Long before we became the tried-and-true haunt enthusiasts that we are today, we had heard more than once about the haunt experience at Pennhurst Asylum in Spring City, PA. Roughly two hours northeast of Baltimore and a mere 45 minutes northwest of Philadelphia, this former state hospital in rural Chester County has become one of the most renowned and legendary haunted attractions in the Northeast - and has even come to be revered by many as one of the best haunts in the country. After almost five years of interacting with Pennhurst staffers at conventions and neighboring haunts, hearing about Pennhurst from fellow haunt reviewers and spooky enthusiasts, and being fed seasonal Instagram ads for Pennhurst’s haunt experience, we could take the anticipation no longer. And so, in October of 2024, we piled into the car and set our course for the winding gravel roads on Pennhurst’s 1,400-acre property.
Ticketing
Like any haunt, the earlier you make a plan to attend Pennhurst, the better your pricing is likely to be. We swept up our tickets during a promotional sale early on in the season (circa early September 2024) and were able to get two (2) V.I.P. Express Lane Bundles for $85/person before taxes and transactional fees. Pennhurst utilizes a soft but dynamic pricing structure which increases the cost of the experience on days when the foot traffic is expected to be heavier and the lines longer. As a general rule, September is carved out for the hardcore ‘haunters’ whilst most of the civilian traffic doesn’t begin to think about haunted attractions until mid-October; resulting in large crowds as the calendar creeps towards Halloween. The price point for this purchase would gradually rise as the season continued, and by the time of our visit in late October, a same-day purchase of the same ticket tier (assuming availability) was north of $100/person. Base tickets are obviously much cheaper than the V.I.P. jump-the-line bundles, but we’re usually willing to shell out some extra cash to be sure that we get the most out of our visit - so, if you’re of the same disposition, keep an eye on Pennhurst’s socials for those rare ticket sales that might save you a good chunk of change!
Arrival
Having never visited Pennhurst before, we weren’t sure quite what to expect regarding parking or entrance protocols. After winding our way down woodsy back roads for a spell, we spotted our first sign for Pennhurst when we were roughly five miles out. The next sign was accompanied by a staffer waving a marshalling wand to direct us towards the main entrance and the flow of traffic. Pennhurst is a one-way-in, one-way-out property, so by definition, all roads lead to the parking lot. Once in the parking lot, which is an expansive area that remains unpaved, additional staffers will wave you to your designated spot. Most tickets will have an associated arrival or entry time, but the V.I.P. Anytime Tickets that we purchased earlier in the season came with some flexibility on that front. Pulling in at roughly 7:30pm resulted in our being guided to a spot close to the front of the property, which is an area that tends to fill up first. Note this location for later, as we will have some additional recommendations for you about how to plan ahead for the flow of traffic later in the evening!
Above: Pennhurst Asylum’s titular attraction, all lit up and ready for unsuspecting visitors to meet its terrifying patients!
Entry
The first thing we noticed about Pennhurst was the unbelievable size of the campus. The hospital shut its doors quite a bit more recently than we had originally thought, with the last patient being discharged in 1987. Before that time, the campus was alive and bustling with doctors, nurses, patients and visitors roaming between the various buildings and through the underground passageways. The land was purchased and the hospital constructed with this level of foot traffic in mind, so it’s no wonder that we had to walk quite a ways from the parking lot to reach the main entrance of the haunted experience. There were a number of porta john’s (portable toilets) lining the lot on either side, and a lit pathway guiding us towards the security entrance. Though we greeted the back of a long line when we reached the security station, the staff was efficient and the line moved quickly. Large backpacks are not permitted to the event and small bags or clutches are subject to search, but the key thing to note if you want to keep the line moving is that everything in your pockets must be out of your pockets when walking through the metal detectors. Before we knew it, we were through security and gradually making our way into a second line for the experience itself.
The Haunt
Since we had pre-purchased tickets, we simply had to scan the QR codes that were emailed to us when we reached the ticket booth, at which time we were given a paper V.I.P. badge and told to head on into the main queue. Don’t count on this paper badge being a proper souvenir, though, because the staffers will have to neatly tear off each corner as you enter each leg of the experience. The haunt experience itself consists of four separate chapters (or attractions, if you prefer) which are experienced in successive order, with smaller queues forming at the entrance to each individual stage. It’s at each of these stages that the V.I.P. becomes invaluable - dare we say, essential - as we were easily lopping twenty-five to thirty minutes off of some lines and possibly as much as an hour off of others. Pennhurst is a full contact haunt which means that the actors may touch you, though you are not allowed to touch them. Photos and videos are not permitted inside the attraction, which was a non-issue since we hadn’t planned to vlog our evening anyway…however, you can take as many photos and videos as you want before entering the attractions themselves! After receiving the first of four separate safety briefings we’d be receiving that evening, we were directed underground to begin our terrifying journey.
The first attraction was the Catacombs, which was a long, winding, underground cave system where cultists and heretics were gathered together to prepare (terrify) the sacrifices (you). The catacombs themselves, which at one time were an underground passageway for doctors and staff and have since been covered from end to end in impressive and fairly convincing rock work, were filled with an unsettling mix of scare actors and static figures/animatronics. The name of the game for this first chapter seemed to be disorientation. After walking for so long without seeing any major change in interior design, it became difficult to gage how far we had or hadn’t come through the attraction - and people and animatronics became harder and harder to tell apart. Though this leg did feel more like a prologue or a drumroll than an attraction unto itself, the finale did offer some larger-than-life creatures and animatronics that set the bar very high for the other attractions we’d be experiencing later that night. There were too many of us walking through at one time for us to ever truly get ‘got’, but a good haunt is more than just jump scares!
The second attraction, Asylum, saw us rise above ground and enter one of the old hospital buildings itself. Pennhurst is widely known as being actually haunted, and after entering this attraction, it’s easy to see why paranormal entities might gravitate towards such a place. The Asylum has some of the largest and most detailed rooms we’ve seen in the industry thus far, some of them leveraging actual medical equipment from the hospital’s early days and others barely accommodating the massive animatronics and “actor-matronics” standing at no less than ten feet tall. Actors were more plentiful in this attraction, and smaller groups being deployed led to more and better scares for those of us in those groups. The atmosphere was also just heavier on the whole, knowing that these hospital walls weren’t just drywall and plaster built to recreate a hospital setting - real patients and real doctors had real issues to contend with in these halls, and we thought Pennhurst did a great job leaning into its history for this particular stage. Of note, we had to ascend and descend two sets of stairs in order to follow the route to the higher and lower floors of the building - so guests will need to be ambulatory in order to fully appreciate the experience.
The third attraction, the Morgue, took us back underground again to explore the cold, dark rooms which may well have been used to treat patients back in the hospital’s early days - but now serves as a home for the dead and the dying. Sets in this leg were some of the best across all of the Pennhurst attractions, with an emphasis on unholy experimentation and creatures running amok after escaping the labs in which they were bred. Actors in this area were able to use dark corners to their advantage seemed more inclined to reach out and touch the customers, which was a component that Katie and I were excited to see introduced. Every time you thought you might be safe, someone would walk two fingers across the back of your neck or whispering something disturbing into your ear. We lost count of the number of times we jumped, yelped, or straightup screamed! As a result of the highly-immersive sets and effects, the significant number of actors and the heavier emphasis on the tactile component of the haunt, this attraction jumped to #1 of the three we had done so far.
Briefly resurfacing again before diving back underground one more, our last attraction was the Tunnels - a long, dark series of winding passageways that put you face-to-face with alien species as they are studied, antagonized and enraged by the lab geeks poking and prodding them. It should be a surprise to no one that these alien creatures would ultimately escape, wreaking havoc and bringing a graphic end to many a scientist. Although the Asylum attraction definitely took the gold for massive animatronics and the Morgue had some truly amazing actors, we felt that the Tunnels actually presented the strongest and most well-rounded attraction overall, striking a perfect balance between a good spread of hands-on actors, immersive and believable environments, sizable animatronics and narrative substance….with a few fog machines, water jets and strobes thrown in for good measure. We were even fed some bugs on our way out the door, as a sort of “parting gift”.
Above: Pumpkin sculptures and animatronics line the pathway to Pennhurst’s midway, perfect for commemorative photos!
The Midway
Upon exiting the final attraction, we found ourselves in a sort of garden walk as we were led back towards the property’s midway. We took to calling it a ‘garden walk’ because it literally feels as though you’ve walking through a spooky garden, with creepy sculptures and large, hydraulic animatronics tactically placed on either side of a lit pathway. Since we were now outside of the formal attractions, photos and videos were allowed and encouraged - so customers were eagerly gathering around each of the displays to snap photos and claim memories of surviving the haunt. Arriving to the midway, we found a few more stray photo ops lining the outer perimeter, along with additional porta johns and one county-fair-style “Hoops” game with prizes. The center of the midway was mostly picnic tables and barrel fires, each and every one of them filled with happy customers who were warming themselves after a chilly night inside the halls of the attractions. The primary offering of the midway, however, was the food. All along the back wall were food trucks with varying cuisines including Burgers, Pizza, Grilled Cheese, Cheesesteak, Ice Cream, Funnel Cakes, Kabobs, Turkey Legs and Roasted Corn. We got ourselves some grilled chicken kabobs at a pretty decent price point and they definitely hit the spot, but it was the ‘flurries’ (house-made, off-brand McFlurries) with peanut butter cups that really hit the spot…despite the cold, ice cream from a small shop is always worth the money!
Above: Freshly grilled chicken kabobs were one among the many different concession offerings on the Pennhurst Midway.
The Gift Shop
As with any attraction, haunted or otherwise, you can’t make it back to your car without first passing through the gift shop. Pennhurst’s gift shop is one of the largest and most expansive that we’ve seen so far in the industry, which is in keeping with the massive scale of everything on property. Not only is there a healthy selection of T-Shirts, hoodies, sweats, hats, bands and anything else you might wear or think of wearing to show your haunt pride, but the gift shop also seems to be the home for retired and/or replaced props which have been moved out of the haunt itself. The grandest and most eye-catching of these is undoubtedly the massive dragon against the back wall, which is impressive enough as a static prop to merit a photo or two - but keep your video cameras ready, too, because every few minutes the dragon actually awakes and moves its head around! More than a few customers managed to get one last scare by standing a bit too close to the monster’s massive jaw only to be nudged and jump out of their skin when it came alive to greet them. We did our duty for the haunt by taking home a T-Shirt, Hoodie and two enamel pins.
Above: Katie makes friends with the massive dragon animatronic in the Pennhurst Asylum gift shop.
Departure
After spending roughly two and a half hours on the property and having some great exchanges with plain-dress team members, we started schlepping our way back across the many acres between ourselves and our vehicle. If you recall, when we mentioned arriving on the property, we talked about following the flow of traffic until we were safely parked in a small lot towards the front entrance. This made it nice and easy to get in at around 7:30, and we were grateful that the staff were there to place us and take all the thinking out of the parking process. Getting out of that spot, however, was a different matter. Timeslots for the attraction continued on for several hours past our arrival, and cars were - in fact - still arriving and being guided to the various lots as we were trying to leave. With only one way in and one way out of the property and no staffers still posted to the front lots, we had to rely on the mercy of strangers to provide us with a lull large enough that we could safely reverse out of our spot and re-enter the flow of traffic to the exit. For this reason, if for no other, we highly recommend either arriving later (8-9pm) or planning to stay later (past 10pm) so that you can avoid the smaller lots and/or leave the property with exit traffic instead of having to disrupt incoming traffic. We did eventually make it out, though, and once we were able to re-enter the flow of traffic, it became very simple to escape the Asylum.
Other Experiences
If you know us, you know that we are haunters before we are historians or ghost hunters - but that’s not to say that everyone leans the same way when it comes to the seasonal offerings of spooky attractions like Pennhurst. As it happens, Pennhurst is renowned for being a top destination for paranormal investigators, and hosts an annual event called ‘Paracon & Oddities Expo’ where true believers gather to seek out the paranormal together at one of the most haunted properties in the United States. Overnight stays and Paranormal investigations are also available at Pennhurst year-round, though they must be booked in advance, and daylight tours of the historic buildings are also available to be booked during the off-season. For those like ourselves who love scare actor interaction, fear not, because Pennhurst also hosts the occasional off-season scare event! Dates may vary, but the haunt usually puts on at least a Valentine’s Day event and a Christmas event, the latter of which will be coming up quickly now that the formal scare season has ended. Be sure to check https://pennhurstasylum.com/ for hours and availability!
Final Thoughts
When all was said and done, Pennhurst definitely lived up to all of the hype. Any haunt can render sets and pieces to mimic a historic asylum or a failing medical building, but not every haunt can actually do so in a historic former asylum or shuttered medical building. Though some vignettes had a better distribution of scare actors than others - which may have simply been a result of our timing - it’s tough to meet this legendary haunt at its level with regard to atmosphere, theming or scale. The actors that we did see were flawless, with makeup, costuming and VFX being above and beyond as well as their performances in-scene which were fantastic. We love that Pennhurst is a full-contact haunt that allows direct physical engagement with the customers and it really goes a long way towards making you feel like you’re part of the scene. At one point during the long, dark stretch of tunnel at the end of the last attraction, we were even separated as one of us was grabbed and made to wave goodbye to the other. These kind of things may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but in general, the more involved you are in the experience, the more we feel you get out of the experience. The availability of food was great, the management of crowd flow was superb and the team really went above and beyond to make this a haunt that you’d be talking about for years to come. So, if you’re a Philadelphian, Baltimorean or even a Northeastern haunter with reliable transportation who is looking for something to celebrate spooky season next September or October, we highly recommend that you add Pennhurst Asylum to your list of considerations. We loved this historic haunt experience and we look forward to visiting them again at some point in the not-too-distant future!
