Clayton Fear Farm — Attraction in Clayton

Visited October 30th, at 830pm. The attractions seemed nice, but the effort by the actors was abysmal.

-At the "farm house", the actors were talking at the front door, and we had to wait for them to go get into place (after already seeing them). After this, the attraction was actually one of the best ones, but a very poor first impression.

-At "a walk in the dark", we only saw one actor. He lost track of us and entered too early, so we walked up behind him and greeted him. Other than him, it was literally just a pitch black hallway to navigate. No jumps, no scares, no motion sensors, just a dark hallway with a few turns.

-At "fear farm academy", the attraction was literally completely unmanned. It was just an empty walk-through of a building with a lot of blacklights. The employee at the front door that checked our bracelets didn't know why it was empty.

-At the "haunted maze" (which is not a maze at all, and just one long path through a field), we only encountered 3 employees. One actually did his job and jumped out with good timing (despite his station being completely obvious from the cut away that he was hiding in), the other two we walked up on while they were sitting down and talking, rather loudly. Once we were noticed, they both stood. One of them walked towards us while "growling", the other one ducked at the edge of the path. I stated that we saw them sitting there and heard them talking from up the path, and which point the second one stood up and gave a halfhearted "Rah" to try to elicit a jump.

-The hayride was passable, despite being a bit cookie cutter. However, the actors gave their all at this attraction, actually making it quite the nice change of pace. They never broke character, moved with energy, had proper timing, etc.

-The "Slaughterhouse" was the best attraction of the night. Loaded with actors, stayed in character, good energy. It was regrettably shorter than some of the others, but made up for it.

Overall, this was HIGHLY disappointing compared to previous years, especially having visited on Devil's Night. Will likely be making the trip to Greensboro in the future, as opposed to...

My son's special education class had a field trip to this farm, and let me start by saying, the staff is just plain cruel. I was instructed to drive there myself and walk and find the class if my daughter's appointment ran late. My daughter's appointment was longer than expected, so she came with me in order to make the trip on time. When we first arrived, there was a building that was empty, and a field that appeared empty. We were yelling out and trying to find someone, so we walked on the trail, expecting to find my son's class. We walked about half a mile without seeing anyone, and when we finally found 3 staff members, they made it seem as if we were trespassing. First, I entered, harmlessly asking where the class was, and here's how the conversation went: "I'm here for a Riverwood field trip, I'm looking for my son's class, and there was no one by the parking lot." "You weren't supposed to walk there," was all this grouchy old man had to say. "I'm sorry, but my daughter's appointment ran late, and I was told to find my son's class." "Unfortunately, you weren't supposed to be walking at all," a woman yelled. She literally YELLED at me. "I was calling out for someone, and no one came, and I'm just trying to find my son." "This isn't your land to be walking on, it's mine," the old man said. "Okay, but, which way is my son's class?" The woman responded, "Over there, but, unfortunately, the trip was only for students and parents. I'm going to have to charge for her," she said, pointing to my daughter. "10 dollars is our regular fee." I was stunned that these people were being so rude. But, I handed her ten dollars for my daughter who was just going to stand around. I had to leave early to go to work, so I wasn't sure how I was going to get out if I couldn't walk. I asked her if I could walk out, and her response was "Unfortunately, you're going to have to stay until the trip is over." The old man cut in, saying he'd allow me to walk, but on a different trail. This was a terrible farm with flat-out mean staff, and I'd never put my kids through going there again. I recommend you...

SoOOooOo.... I really hate leaving a 2☆ review for this place bc coming here has been a tradition for 7 years in a row.

When I went on the website, there was no description of the attractions (which was kind of a red flag in the back of my mind) but it said "new attractions", so I was hoping some things had changed around a bit. Well, they did, but not in the best of ways.

There are only 3x attractions. 2 haunted houses & the iconic haunted hay ride (and the dizzy spinny tunnel thing)

I remember when we 1st went 7 years ago. They had at least 5-6 attractions, and it took you 2+ hours to go through the entire farm. This year we went in at 7:30 pm & were back in our car by 8:20.

I am not the type of person to complain, but I ended up speaking with the owner (who was absolutely lovely) and she explained that, since Covid, it was almost impossible to find any help/actors and that it was a true struggle to open the doors at all this year.

What she said made sense bc there are "Help wanted" signs in every store window, and people just don't want to work anymore, so I totally get it.

She appreciated the feedback, and I truly hope that things with the economy change and that they are able to get things back to the way they used to be bc it was amazing.

We plan on going back for their Christmas "Lights on the Neuse" event in December. That's a 30+ minute lighted hayride, and it's supposed to be beautiful, so we haven't given up on them yet.

The owners and staff are so nice, and they truly love what they do, so continue to show them support and keep them in your prayers so that their buisness will once...