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Howl-O-Scream Schedule and Attractions Announced

Busch Gardens Tampa made a veritable passel of information available this evening, as the park launched the website for the 2003 Howl-O-Scream event. Featuring scare zones, haunted houses, and night riding on certain coasters and other attractions, the event will take place on October 3rd, 4th, 10th, 11th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 23rd, 24th, 25th, 30th,and 31st, as well as November 1st. ARN&R is pleased to give the exclusive scoop on what the six haunted houses will unleash upon horrified guests.

Returning from last season will be the popular Ripper’s Row and Mortuary houses. However, there will be four all-new haunted attractions that will, in the words of one confidential spy from high up in park management, "scare the living s%$# out of everyone."

First off will be Lorikeets of Utter Damnation. Guests will enter the Lorikeet Landing area to view the brilliantly colorful birds, after which the small, Satan-possessed avians will violently pluck out guests’ eyeballs for use in merry games that our source assures us “the children will just love.” There will be the usual extra charge for the little cups of nectar the guests can use to feed the Lorikeets.

Next will be Serengeti Hunt, where guests will be rubbed down with ripe meat drippings and then locked in the lion paddock in Edge of Africa. “Many of our guests have mentioned that the Universal parks have had a haunted house that featured a lot of running around in the dark past scary rooms,” said our source. “This is our version, and we assume that the incentive of not being ripped limb from limb and devoured by a hungry pride of big cats will keep mood-spoiling troublemakers from having a negative effect on those parkgoers who are really trying to have fun.”

The third new haunted attraction will be the Swamp of Unholy Terror, where visitors negotiate a complex obstacle course through mud, gurgling water, and fog. The ultimate peril of the swamp lies in a climactic encounter with a deadly river otter. “We’re still working on this one,” admits the source. “Although our marketing indicated the river otter would be an excellent choice for loosening the vocal chords, and bowels, of our scared-stiff clientele, it appears that many people find the river otter to be ‘amazingly cute’ rather than ‘the most horrifying nightmare beast they could ever imagine.’ We’ve had to fire some of our design team over this one, but we’re tinkering with the thing and it’ll be really good by October. Just out of curiosity, lots of people are really freaked out by soft, fluffy little bunny rabbits, right? No? Oh well.”

And finally, the source indicates a fourth haunted house will be King Tut’s Tomb. When confronted by the information that this is a standard BGT attraction that has been operating at the park for a number of years, the source claimed that “it might not be the least bit scary, but King Tut’s Tomb is definitely the most horrifying thing we could think of to subject people to. We think that pile of crap’ll be the hit of the Howl-O-Scream!”

--JCK