Effie Goebeler ’29
As the weather gets colder and the leaves start to turn, students look forward to Halloween as a fun (and spooky) break from school. And what better way to spend it than to go to The Bates Motel, the best place for a scare and some fun times with friends? The Bates Motel has been an important part of the EA community for a very long time; EA students and teachers have gone on school trips there for years, and it’s easy to see why they continue to return to Bates for their Halloween festivities.
The Bates Motel was founded by Randy Bates, whose dream was to combine fun and fear in the best haunted experience the U.S had to offer. His work eventually paid off: this year, Bates Motel earned its place in the Top 5 US Scariest Haunts list. The immersive experience begins with the hayride, which passes through many horrifically detailed scenes in the woods, like a creepy wild-west town. Actors lurk in the darkness and jump up behind unsuspecting riders! Next comes the corn maze, chock-full of other disturbing haunts and even more actors. Be ready to run, because it finishes off with a chase by a chainsaw-wielding madman! Last is the haunted house, arguably the scariest attraction at Bates. Each room is filled with new horrors, such as a haunted library and a bloody doctor’s office, with actors who are not afraid to breach your personal space. These haunted attractions are perfect to get into the Halloween mood!
Photo courtesy of Fright Review Squad
As well as being phenomenally petrifying, Bates Motel is also a great place to visit with family or friends. Going through an experience as terrifying as Bates will definitely strengthen your bond. Grayson Goens ’29 tells a funny story about his time at Bates: “The first time I went, I went with [my friend] and we decided to go into the corn maze. When we went through, I saw someone in the bushes, but he didn’t see it. So I made him go first and he got so scared that he fell over.” Zachary Richards, VI form dean, Ethics teacher, and a Bates chaperone, recalls, “One of my students from the Class of 2021 lost his phone right before we were getting on the bus to come back to EA. When we tracked the phone’s location through “find my iPhone”, we could tell it was on a hayride. We had to sit and watch this phone go around the entire course before coming back to the drop-off point. Once it returned, we had a small group digging through a ton of hay to find this iPhone. It was a literal “needle in a haystack” situation. Eventually, we found it but I never let the young man live this down!” These experiences clearly serve to create great (and hilariously horrifying) memories.
Not only does Bates bring friends together, but it also unites the EA upper school as a whole. Gabby Chirinos ’28, who attended the trip last year, explains that, “That was the first time, especially since it was in the beginning of the year, we got to interact with all of [the upper grades]”, because Chirinos was a freshman at the time. For the students, this was a fun way to get to know everyone and make new friends in different grades. Sara Gutheil ’27 agrees that Bates is extremely social, stating that “It’s another event that brings us all together. It’s a shared experience. It’s just time you come together and make memories.” Richards adds, “As we get closer to Halloween, and are looking for something fun to do, Bates Motel has been really good to us. It helps us lean into that Halloween spirit and have fun as a class.”
Bates Motel is a perfect place to celebrate Halloween with friends, family, and even those that you might not know that well. It reminds us that even as we get older, Halloween can still be a fun holiday, even if you’re not trick-or-treating, and that the scariest experiences help make the best memories.
