The Kenai Chamber of Commerce this month is covered in spiderwebs, caution tape and other frightening features as part of “Haunted Chamber — A Haunted Maze Experience,” which can be visited for free every day through Oct. 19.
Chamber Executive Director Samantha Springer said Monday that the idea for putting on a haunted house was pitched by Programs and Facilities Director Liam Floyd — but he had thought to open its doors in October of 2024.
The idea was immediately appealing, Springer said, and they started to explore what it would take to put together the production this year. The answer, it turned out, was lots of PVC piping — donated by Preferred Plumbing and M&J Plumbing and Heating.
The result is a maze filling the chamber’s large open meeting room. Walls — constructed with the pipe — rise 7 or 8 feet high and passages wind around the space.
“I want something that people can get lost in, something that you have to actually walk through,” Springer said.
Floyd developed the path and directed the assembly process. In the maze on Monday were lights, skeletons, spiders and tombstones, but on Fridays and Saturdays, the chamber is “more extreme.”
Springer said the standard experience, that which will be open Sunday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., features dimmed lights and spooky music, but is “accessible to everybody,” and safe for younger kids who like Halloween.
On Friday the 13th, the more extreme chamber will be open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., and on Saturday it will be open from noon to 6 p.m. Springer said that version is darker, with strobing lights, scary music, and jumpscares. Participants have to sign a waiver before entering.
Behind those jumpscares, Springer said, has largely been chamber staff, but for some of the evening hours this weekend, Friday and Saturday, Oct. 13 and 14, it will be the Nikiski Middle/High School Drama Department bringing those scares to life.
For more information, find the “Kenai Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Center” on Facebook.
Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.
Halloween lights and iconography decorate the corridors of the Haunted Chamber at the Kenai Chamber of Commerce in Kenai, Alaska, on Monday, Oct. 9, 2023. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
