L.A. Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: New, Different & Overlooked
This year’s post devoted to Halloween yard haunt recommendations represents a bit of a break with our tradition of driving around to visit as many haunted homes as possible in Los Angeles and beyond. This annual Halloween Yard Haunt Odyssey has been a feature of Hollywood Gothique since our very early days, when it served as a grab bag of attractions we visited in the final days of Halloween. Since then, we have become more methodical, visiting yard haunts as soon as they opened (which is earlier every year, it seems), and documenting them by neighborhood. This has resulted in quite a bit of repetition, as we revisit old favorites every year. That repetition was doubly redundant because not only did the best long-running yard haunts show up in the annual Halloween Odyssey post – they also appear on our Halloween Home Haunts page, where you can find links to entire archives of reviews, photographs and videos, which tell you everything you need to know before deciding whether you want to check them out.
In order to avoid this repetition, we are offering a different sort of Halloween Odyssey for Halloween 2024. As indicated in the title, we will recommend new, different, and overlooked home haunts. “New” does not necessarily mean brand-new; it can also mean a new theme or location – anything that makes a haunt substantially different from before. “Overlooked” can mean haunts we have never covered or that we have merely mentioned; we are stretching the definition a bit to include haunts so good that they deserve – but have not yet received – their own dedicated page on our website, which would make it easier for you to find them. At the same time, we are not overlooking old favorites, which we will mention below, linking their names to pages where you can get more detailed information about them.
Los Angeles covers a vast area, and you can only get so far in a single night. So for those of you planning your own odyssey this Halloween Night, we are grouping them into geographic districts. Happy Haunting!
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Pasadena, South Pasadena, Altadena
Ghostwood Manor: Wreck of the Crimson Dagger
2001 N Raymond Avenue, Pasadena
https://www.facebook.com
Open Halloween Night 7-10pm
Ghostwood Manor has been around several years, graduating from a yard display to a walkthrough. Last year’s theme was Egyptian mummies; this year’s is “The Wreck of the Crimson Dagger” – a haunted pirate ship. The front yard display has also been enhanced with props bought from the Haunted Storage Yard, which closed up shop this year. So basically, it feels like almost a whole new experience.
The walkthrough is short but loaded with sights worth seeing, including a couple of mechanical scares and an oversized ghost captain waving a scroll that probably leads to Davey Jone’s Locker. There were no live actors on the mid-October night we attended, but even so, it was a wonderful experience.
Wreck of the Crimson Dagger Photographs
Blood Hill: The Circus
1727 N Hill Avenue, Pasadena
Open Halloween Night 8-10:30pm
Blood Hill is not new, but it has added a walkthrough this year. We wish we could tell you more, but they closed up early on the night we tried to visit. It’s only a few minutes from Ghost Manor, so if you’re in the neighborhood for that, you might as well swing by and see for yourself.
Diamond Avenue Haunts
1100 Diamond Avenue, South Pasadena
Open for Halloween Night Trick or Treating
Put this one in the “Overlooked” category. We visited this block-long series of yard displays once before (for the 2022 Halloween Odyssey), but it was the day after Halloween, when much of the lighting had been turned out. What a difference a day makes! The fully lit version is quite charming. There is no single standout; rather, the effect is cumulative. With trees lighted up and down the block, and a high percentage of decorated houses, Diamond Avenue feels like a haunted neighborhood.
Most of the yards feature store-bought decorations enhanced with spooky lighting, but a few add original touches. At the north end of the block is a house with multiple television monitors screening clips of horror films in the yard. Another one features home-made, oversized figures of a vampire and a hooded monster poised above a skeletal marriage. The most elaborate is a “killer corn field” filled with stalks of corn and a couple of talking animatronic figures. With its pointed roof, the house itself can pass for a barn, and its upper window displays a digital projection of a pumpkin-headed figure appearing and disappearing.
Diamond Avenue Haunts Photographs
More 2024 Halloween Yard Haunts Recommendations for Pasadena, South Pasadena & Altadena
Many yard haunts in this region are decorated yards, but a few stand out.
Forgotten Hallows at 1602 N. Roosevelt Avenue Altadena is always fun. It includes a few mechanical scares, a short walkthrough leading up the driveway, and one or two haunters handing out candy. Open Halloween Night 6:30-9:30pm.
Garden Path of Doom on Pepper Drive in Altadena is, like Diamond Avenue, a block lock series of decorated houses, catering mostly to local trick-or-treaters, but it is worth a drive-by for Halloween fans in the area. It doesn’t do much to promote itself (like announcing its hours online), but you can expect the houses to be handing out candy this evening.
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Glendale
Nightmare in Whiting Woods
413 Whiting Woods, Glendale, 91028
Halloween Night sunset to 11pm
This scarifying home haunt is celebrating its 20th anniversary with a new theme; the name alone makes it a must-see: Zombie Biker Bar! The walkthrough (which was great both years we attended) does little to promote itself, but over the decades it has earned a reputation that attracts swarms of people, creating lines that can last for hours. Go early if you can.
Forever Present Cemetery
700 Arden Ave, Glendale
Open 7-10pm Halloween Night
Forever Present Cemetery is first of a trio of yard displays we visited for the first time last year. It features some talking animatronics and digital projection in the front window, and the corner yard has room for lots of decorations. The two other worthwhile yard haunts are listed below…
The Spooky Strip is literally around the corner from Forever Present Cemetery, at 939 Concord Street, Glendale. It lives up to its name (set up on a strip between a wall and the sidewalk), but it makes good use of the space, making it worth the short walk from its neighboring yard haunt. Open through November 1, 7-11pm.
Vintage Window Display (518 n Howard Street, Glendale) is a rather generic title for a haunt that features home-made decorations, including video of a medium pronouncing unfortunate fortunes for those watching from the sidewalk. It was known as Madame Mysterium last Halloween – a better title we think. Whatever it is called, it is only a few minutes from the two previously mentioned Glendale haunts. Open tongith 6:30-10pm.
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: West Valley
Enfield’s Lost World
6455 Enfield Avenue, Reseda
Open through November 2, 7-10pm, runing at 20-minute intervals.
This home haunt is pretty simple but very memorable: the yard is set up to suggest the T-Rex pen at Jurassic Park has been breached, and if you wait long enough, you will see the dinosaur (a digital projection) approach and roar angrily in your direction. Great fun!
House of Horrors
6938 Whitaker Ave in Lake Balboa
Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm
House of Horrors is a very enjoyable walkthrough home haunt of the black tarp variety. This Halloween they are charging for admission, but based on our experience last year you probably won’t mind donating the $5 admission fee to keep them running.
Maynard Manor
8381 Maynard Avenue, West Hills
Open Halloween Night 6:30-9:30pm
Maynard Manor offers a light and sound show. Decorations are viewable before and after show time, and they look great, but you don’t want to miss the full effect.
El Canon Light Show
6034 El Canon Avenue in Woodland Hills
Open through November 2, 6:30-10:30 pm.
The DIY Light Guy Show puts on a spectacular display that literally lights up the night sky. The decorations are so plentiful you will want to see them up close, but the best way to take the whole presentation in is by viewing it from across the street so that you can see everything happening at once. We saw this one last year when it was called Halloween Rocks, and it was fabulous.
Ravenswood Manor
10929 Ruffner Avenue, Granada Hills
Open through October 31, 6:30-10pm
We were quite impressed upon visiting Ravenswood Manor for the first time last year. The haunt presents a great little show in the front yard, using digital projection enhanced with billowing smoke to create a reasonably spectacular viewing experience.
Other 2024 Halloween Yard Haunts Recommendations for the West Valley
Haunted Groundz at 13243 Mission Tierra Way, Granada Hills is back with its entertaining shooting gallery. Open Halloween Night, 6-10pm
Haunt at Hellizondo at 21024 Arminta Street in Canoga Park presents its annual walkthrough. They always do a great job. Open Halloween Night, 6:30-10pm
Hillhurst Haunted Circus at 24218 Hillhurst Drive in West Hills offers even more animatronic clowns than last. There are so many you’d think it would be overcrowded but they are cleverly arranged into sections like a Pennywise sewer tunnel. Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm.
The Haunt With No Name…Yet at 19351 Hatteras Street in Tarzana is a super-moody display that changes only incrementally from year to year, but it is always worth immersive yourself in its lowkey atmosphere. Open through October 31, 6:30-10pm
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Burbank
Burbank Clown House
715 N Ontario Street, Burbank
Open Halloween Night, 6-10pm
Burbank Clown House is so good it makes us like clowns – which is truly amazing!
Circus of Nightmares
113 S Brighton Street, Burbank
Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm
Circus of Nightmares is another clown-themed yard haunt we adore in spite of our aversion to clowns! And it’s only a hop-skip-and-jump from Burbank Clown House. Incredible!
Hamilton Halloween
4209 W. Jacaranda Avenue, Burbank
Lights on through November 3, 5pm-1am.
Hamilton Halloween is one of those yard displays that earns respect through sheer scale. It’s a corner lot where a big yard provides room for a multitude of decorations, and the house itself, lovely though it is, looms large and imposing when bathed in the eerie lighting.
More 2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Burbank & Toluca Lake
Rotten Apple 907 at 907 N California Street in Burbank has been around for decades, but they offer a new theme every year. For Halloween 2024, it’s “The Last Stop” – promising a terrifying train ride!
Holiday Fantasies at 1505 N Valley Street in Burbank offers a new theme this Halloween: “Alice in Wonderland.” It’s always spectacular, with its multitude of figures augmented by an enormous backdrop and a few mechinical effects. Open November 3, 6-10:30pm.
Rotting Hill Cemetery at 4848 Sancola Avenue in Toluca Lake offers a comedic live show with ghostly voices trading deliberately bad jokes. Open through November 3, Sun-Thurs 7-10pm, Fri-Sat 7-11pm/
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: San Gabriel Valley
Haunt223
223 West El Sur Street
Mayflower Village, 91016
Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm
Haunt 223 has been around for over a decade, so it’s about time we paid it the attention it deserves. The walkthrough is apparently shorter this year (all on the sidewalk instead of running up the side of the house), but it still contains plenty of scares. The architecture is pretty straightforward, but in the manner of amateur haunts, there’s a lot of enthusiasm, and most of the actors put on a really good show. It’s the sort of thing where you walk in expecting to have fun with it – and you do – but every once in a while, coming around a corner, someone catches you off guard, giving you a legit fright.
Kraken Cove
1030 Manley Drive, San Gabriel
https://www.facebook.com/TheKrakenCove
Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm
Kraken Cove is one of the more consistent yard haunts in the San Gabriel Valley, always worth a visit.
Macdevitt Manor: Asylum
2436 W Macdevitt Street in West Covina
Open through November 2, 7-11pm
Macdevitt Manor has been haunting for 20 years, so they are hardly new, but like Rotten Apple 907, they offer something new every year. Halloween 2024’s theme is “Asylum,” which should be ghoulish fun for those brave enough to enter this short but effective walkthrough.
Maniac Mansion: Cirque del Sol
476 Rancho Del Sol Drive, Covina
October 31, November 1-2, 6:30pm – 10pm.
Celebrating its 27th season, Maniac Mansion looks almost like a pro-haunt when you see its giant clowns and almost life-sized Ferris Wheel looming above the sidewalk. The huge yard display is augmented with a short walkthrough containing a vertigo tunnel. There is also a mechanical effect or two – and maybe even a live spook. This year’s theme, “Cirque Del Sol,” is winner of  City of Covina 2024 Spooky Town Halloween Home Decorating Contest.
We first visited this yard haunt in 2023, which also featured a circus theme, but we were too late to post any coverage of it, so we are taking this opportunity to post those photos. We had a great time at this one.
Maniac Mansion Halloween 2023 Photographs
2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Santa Clarita
Sombras Cemetery
26041 Sombras Ct, Santa Clarita
Open Halloween Night, 7-10PM
facebook/sombrascemetery
“Sombras” sounds like “somber,” which captures the vibe of the moody yard display. There are many cemetery-themed yard haunts, but this one is weirdly beautiful. Definitely worth visiting while in Santa Clarita
Pumpkin Hallow Haunt
22702 Pear Ct, Santa Clarita
instagram.com/pumpkin_hallow_haunt
Open through November 1, 6-10pm
Pumpkin Hallow is a very nice yard haunt featuring lots of pumpkins. That doesn’t sound like much but the decorations look beautiful, and the cemetery gate you enter from the driveway creates a sort of walkthough effect as you approch the front door for treats. And it has one of those giant, pumpkin-headed skeletons, its size emphasized by posing it to leer down at you through the branches of a small tree.
Pumkin Jack’s Haunted House Presents Jungle Cruise
Natalie Ln & Redwood Canyon Pl
facebook/pumkinjackshauntedhouse
Open Halloween Night, 7-11:30pm
Pumkin Jack’s Haunted House is another old favorite that keeps it fresh by switching up themes every year. Last year was “Backwoods Cabin;” this Halloween offers a “Jungle Cruise.”
More 2024 Halloween Yard Haunt Recommendations: Santa Clarita & Valencia
Beware the Dark Realm at 28621 Sugar Pine Way in Santa Clarita is haunting again under its old name (last year it was called Coven of Witches). It’s great to have this old favorite back in action for the first time since it went on hiatus to do the Bones Gulch fundraiser haunt in 2022. Open Halloween Night, 7-10pm.
Coffinwood Cemetery at 27159 Waterford Drive in Valencia is a lovely display with a bit of a walkthrough a haunted garage. Some days are kid safe, but Halloween Night should be scarier. Open October 31, 7-10pm.
