Returning in 2025 for its 15th gruesome year, we were so happy to be able to return to Yorkshire Scare Grounds Scream Park this season. Set along a winding and terrifying trail that snakes itself through thick woods, each moment is punctuated by scares that flow one into the other. The themes had been refreshed this year and ran the gamut of phobias: Nazi hellborn, the rising dead, possessed hotel guests, devilish doctors, killer clowns, deranged agricultural cultists, and chemical disaster scientists are all to be encountered and overcome. It’s not your average walk in the woods…
Yorkshire Scare Grounds is special, for whilst most haunts trot out generic characters, they have unique creations that appear year on year that we can’t wait to see. Whilst waiting to enter the trail, characters worked the queue for scares, including some great one on one interactions with those most scared amongst us. Each zone which you travel through is introduced by a different actor, giving you some background on what you’re about to see. These moments were some of the strongest of the night, with up close and personal treatment from an undertaker-priest to give us the rules of the road at the beginning (and yes, he did get close!) and excellent performances from the staff at “Mercy Hospital”. We thought these latter two, one getting us ready for check-in and the other presenting the story behind this macabre clinic, were really excellent in delivering both a feeling of trepidation and some good physical humour, which is quite a balancing act! And we can’t help but mention the thankfully dead Nazi at the beginning of the “Die Glocke! 2” area, who made some hilarious jokes about the superiority of German engineering and raved madly in Hitlerian on “winning the war”.
Some spaces had less actors in them than we would have expected, such as the master bedroom of the hotel and a couple of corridors, but overall this is a full world populated by the undead.
Each cast member stayed strongly in character, but we did notice some who tended to repeat lines, including some we’d just heard. However, we were some of the first people to experience Yorkshire Scare Grounds this year and we’re sure the cast is still getting to know the new bodies they’re inhabiting!
Costume and makeup throughout every zone was full and hideously well-suited to the story being told. We especially love the queue actors, whose full-head wrapping masks don’t look like masks at all, but flesh (or lack thereof!) itself. These masks include movable elements, which means you might get a tongue lashing too. Another very strongly costumed character was the four-armed clown in the “Freak Show” scare zone, whose dangling appendages were most life-like – in fact, he was more than happy to show off his unique talents with them!
Other well-realised costuming efforts included Nazis in full uniform, ominous pig-faced gentlemen with glistening eyes stalking us through a true farm of death, and completely blood-stained doctors and nurses dashing around, eager to get us onto their horrific operating tables.
Easy to find with a well-lit entrance, Yorkshire Scare Grounds Scream Park is difficult to miss: for what other place could be literally located on Hell Lane. There was plenty of parking and a good number of attendants to direct us. All aspects of the trail are safe, including CCTV in every room to make sure nothing goes awry.
We received nothing but courtesy from the entire team, who made it easy to check in and line up. All interactions prior to our visit were also just lovely. You can really tell that everyone involved is rightly proud of what they are creating and eager to share their scares with the world.
Yorkshire Scare Grounds has an excellent website, with all the current and correct details easily accessible. A large FAQ section answers most questions you might have, but if you’re ever stuck, the team is but an email away.
The haunting trail that is Yorkshire Scare Grounds winds through thick woods, revealing zone after zone where you never truly feel out of the moment. Indeed, there is a rule here: once you’re on the trail, you must complete it. Because of this, immersion levels are very high here, each moment making you believe just a little more that you might not make it out alive.
Groups are batched with who you arrive with, so if it’s just the two of you – as we were – then you’ll be encountering all the beasts ahead of you alone. There is always a cast member on hand to introduce a new space in a theatrical way, which means you never lose the thread of the storyline. Each of these spaces feels unique with its own narrative that really draws you into the creation fully. Moreover, they use a specific set of roaming actors that you see year on year, making that world feel more cohesive and well-imagined. Indeed, you can buy goodies from the gift shop tailored to each of them!
Yorkshire Scare Grounds ups the ante with their set design and special effects each year. We were very impressed with their “Mercy Hospital” area, from detailed infirmary designs to one of the most believable dilapidated bathroom sets we’ve seen this season – complete with the smell of cleaning materials and antiseptic
There were some great larger-scale set designs, from a detailed scene of people feasting on giant platters of innards to a hotel lobby with a beautiful chandelier and their hellish pneumatic lift, which gets us every time! Smoke and light effects were used to great effect in all areas, with water a fun feature in the “Cult of the Farm” zone, which left us soaked and disoriented!
We also can’t forget to mention the upgrade “Die Glock! 2” achieved this year, with a German soundtrack playing throughout and giant swastika flags adorning the front of the facility, not to mention the attention to detail at every twist and turn in what seems like the longest maze on the trail.
21. How scary was it? (35% of score): 7.75
22. How well did they provide scares to everyone in the group? (15% of score): 10
23. How predictable were the scares? (25% of score): 7
24. How well did they provide a wide variety (types) of scares? (10% of score): 7.5
25. How strong was the ending / finale? (15% of score): 9
Yorkshire Scare Grounds incorporates a really fun mix of scares into their trail, with pop up scares dominating the field but with a healthy dose of menacing stalking and misdirection alongside. We highly recommend coming during their later timeslots when the woods outside are at their darkest – it’s our usual strategy and we did clock a bit of a difference not being able to do so this time around. The dark and eerie interconnecting trails in between the areas really heightens the fear factor at this haunt, not allowing your adrenaline to dissipate just because you may have survived, as there’s always another horror lurking around the next corner.
A unique strategy we did notice this year was that some of the scare actors seemed to purposefully be timed just as we were about to exit a room, which is usually the opposite of what scare attractions do and really kept us on our toes and reevaluating our level of safety.
One of our favourite aspects about Yorkshire Scare Grounds is that they always let you travel in only the group you arrived with, which for smaller groups also really heightens the fear factor. When you don’t have a crowd of people surrounding you for protection you always feel watched and stalked on this trail, and this fear is never unfounded!
Yorkshire Scare Grounds continues to bring an exciting mixture of fear and fun, constantly reskinning their trail each year, even just slightly, to keep it fresh and interesting. Being able to experience the trail in just your small group instead of a huge one of strangers makes this experience completely worthwhile, and the batching system and strategies they enlist ensure that you’re never experiencing queueing within any of the areas themselves.
At approximately £32 for essentially a non-stop 40-minute maze, this trail is amazing value, with beautiful set designs and tons of different theming throughout, and with a talented cast who clearly care about being there and who absolutely want to scare each and every person that comes through their doors. We’ve never had time to stay for their stage shows, but with a fun food and entertainment area complete with fairground games like archery, there’s plenty to experience after you escape their trail. Best yet, the roaming actors keep the night going with their crazy shenanigans – they’re certainly a cast not to miss!
Hell Lane, Wakefield, Yorkshire WF1 5SH