Alton Towers, Halloween and Scarefest, October 2025

We hadn’t been back to Alton Towers for a month or so, the kids had kind’ve been burned out on it with frequent visits up to the start of the school holidays, but we thought we’d go and take a look now as it was set up for Halloween and it’s Scarefest event. Plus it was open until 9pm, so night rides were back. Try as I might at Alton After Dark back in March, I didn’t manage to get the elusive night ride on Toxicator. Would I be successful today? No. No I wasn’t.

I’ve never seen Towers that busy. I’ve never seen a car in the overflow car parks before. It was mega busy. A Saturday at Scarefest isn’t the time to go to Alton Towers if you want to go on rides. It was chocka all day. Queues for the coasters were at 90mins for most of the day and evening. Luckily our plan wasn’t to go on all the rides, it was just a check out the Halloween decorations, explore Scarefest a little and get on a few things kinda trip.

We’ve been to Towers at this time of year before but I’ve never seen it decorated for Halloween before. We’ve seen the Scarefest car towards the end of it’s run, but never the level of decoration we saw on towers street on this day. As soon as you walk in the main entrance, the view down Towers Street was amazing. The Scarefest signs and pumpkin photo op at the top of the ramp looked down on a sea of hay bales, bunting, pumpkins and Jack-o’-Lanterns.

At the top of the ramp was a giant pumpkin face looking down admiring his work. The Frogs we’re decked out in witches hats and capes, the Scarefest car was in situ surrounded by tombstones, with all the Towers Halloween characters on board, there as a giant Scarefest logo, with different character-inspired lettering and some really fun Towers ride inspired Jack-O’-lantern models on columns. The Smiler and Nemesis eye ones were good, but the Big Bob / Wicker Man one was the winner.

Around the park were giant models of the Halloween characters too. There was Frankenstein’s monster, a skeleton named Skelvin, a pumpkin named Patch, a zombie, a witch and some kind of mummified blue goblin. The all had names, but I don’t know what they all are. They made for great photo points around the park. The witch was near Smiler and her eyes showed she’d been marmalized. There were also a few giant pumpkins you could get into for a photo. We did spot some of the character actors near Mutiny Bay posing for photos too.

We’re not big scare maze people. Never done one, and not sure I’d be into it, though I would love to try a night at Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights to see if it lives up to the hype. Alton Towers has it’s version, Scarefest, which offers a few upcharged scare mazes along with a few free to enter scare zones. So, when in Rome and all that…

Next to Wicker Man is the scare zone Burial Grounds. I think I went in this one too early in the day to get the full spooky effect, but I did go in when it was quieter, so I could get more ‘action’ from the actors as it were. The walkthough had wooden walls and banners with symbols and “Feed The Flames” written on them and wicker pentagrams decorating the walkways. This zone felt more like intimidation than fright.

The actors were in fake pig face masks with weapons, standing and staring menacingly and threatening you, occasionally getting in your face or reaching out to grab you. One path had 2 masked girls with fake machetes then more pig heads with bats, another trapped in a cage. This was my first taste of scare attractions and I’m not sure it was for me, but it definitely would have been better later on in the dark. I wasn’t sure how to act/react if that makes sense. I wasn’t scared but I felt daft walking though like I was smiling when I shouldn’t be?

The other freebie zone was Dark Hollow, located along the walls towards The Dark Forest area of the park. It was a walk through the forest with teddies hung from the trees, tables along the sides, actors dressed as bears, the creepy girl from Th13teen, old school ventriloquist puppets, Roman soldiers, cymbal-banging monkeys, jesters and more, menacing you as you walked by.

This zone I did go in when it was dark, but this time it was too busy to get any sense of scare from it. You could see everything coming and whilst there were a few actors getting in your face, you could tell that they knew who they needed to target for the best reactions. I was pretty stone faced all the way though.

Evan tried it with me for his first scare attraction, and we were worried he might be bothered by it, but he just thought it was daft. Not his favourite thing but glad he did it. There were some young girls in front who were terrified of the Bears and the Jester, so naturally they made a beeline for the scared kids.

Generally, its not for me. Whilst the first felt a little hollow and disappointing, the second was too busy to enjoy, especially when you’re being bumped into by kids scared of the Bear so you can’t enjoy it. It’s brilliant that they have these two areas for free to give you a taster of what the real mazes might be like. Maybe next year we’ll try one of them, but I’m not sure I’ll enjoy it. Each to their own though. If you do like being scared by people jumping out at you and chasing you down a path, go forth and enjoy. I could probably get this for free in Wrexham after dark.

For access to all of the scare mazes you can either pay per maze or buy a ticket that covers all of them. The family friendly mazes ‘Amigos in the Afterlife’ and ‘Trick O’ Treat Town with Haribo’ started at £10 per person, whilst the thrill mazes ‘Edge of the Forest’, ‘COMPOUND’ and ‘Altonville Mine Tours’ were between £14-16. You could also get bundles for thrill/family mazes from £16-£38 or the whole shebang from £55. Discounts were available for passholders too.

We only really went to see Towers done up for Halloween so any rides were a bonus. But it was so busy we didn’t really try. Instead, we wandered around taking in the scenery. We love walking around Alton Towers at night, and they do a great job of lighting the park for Scarefest and Alton After Dark events. On this day, the towers themselves were beautifully illuminated and all of the Halloween décor along Towers Street looked fantastic. Curse also looks great bathed in purple light with the haunting soundtrack playing in the background.

We also tried some more of the loaded fries from the shop on Towers Street. They’re nice, but took forever and were not exactly hot. The queue was bigger than most rides too!! I grabbed another Wicker Man inspired ‘Beornen Beer’ from the courtyard bar in Mutiny Bay, a really nice IPA type flavour to it – recommended. They also had blood bag cocktails (fruit juice/grenadine/vodka – didn’t try one though). There were several pop up food vans and such around so there’s plenty to choose from if you’re there for a Scarefest event.

As for rides we did manage to get on Runaway Mine Train while it was reasonably quiet and me and Evan had the customary last ride of the day on Nemesis, and you cant go wrong with a night ride on Nemesis Reborn. The lighting package in Forbidden Valley is great. Everything really stands out. Once again though, there was no night ride on Toxicator. It had broken down and I wasn’t for waiting around to see if it would reopen before 9pm, so we headed out.

All in all, not the best day we’ve had at Towers, but nice to see the decorations and lights. Great to experience the free Scare Zones too! We’ll be back again soon for our first ever visit for Alton Towers Fireworks – an event I’ve wanted to go to since I can remember! Excited for that. Will I get a night ride on Toxicator though? Probably not.

Check out the Scarefest page over on the official Alton Towers website for future info on the event.