For students willing to put a few extra miles on their cars and leave the boundaries of Mount Pleasant, houses of terror and imagination await in the mid-Michigan area:

Ashley

Terror on 27 is the closest haunted house to Mount Pleasant. Located a few miles south on US-127 at 8691 S. Bagley Road, Terror on 27 is home to two different haunts.

The first haunt offered is a traditional walk through house with special effects. The second is a haunted, foggy maze.

Ross Fowler, co-producer of Terror on 27, said the attraction offers high startles and low gore.

“We have some pretty special effects and a very large, talented staff,” he said.

Terror on 27 is open from dark until midnight Friday and Saturday, and from dark until 10 p.m Sunday.

Bay City

East of Mount Pleasant, Bay City is home to two featured haunted houses: the Haunted Temple at 700 N. Madison Ave., and the Red Barn of Terror at 1055 S. Pine Road.

Joy Butler, executive director of the Bay Arts Council, produces the Haunted Temple and said visitors to the haunted attraction would have the opportunity to wander through a Masonic Temple, getting a chance to see history and a glimpse into the past as it would have been.

“It’s really an interactive event, not a typical haunted house,” Butler said. “I call it a thinking-person’s haunted house.”

The Haunted Temple is open from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday nights until Halloween weekend.

Also in Bay City is the Red Barn of Terror, 1055 S. Pine Road. The two-story barn features different rooms with between 45 and 60 monsters working inside. The house takes between 20 and 30 minutes to venture through.

“It’s a pretty intense haunt,” said Red Barn of Terror representative Nancy Meyer.

The Red Barn of Terror is open Fridays and Saturdays.

Corunna

Emma Drive in Corunna offers McCurdy’s Revenge: a university-themed haunted house, complete with classrooms and labs.

McCurdy’s Revenge serves as a fundraiser for the creative problem solving organization Odyssey of the Mind. Each year, the overall theme of the haunted house changes, but the visitors remain the same.

Organizer Dan Flynn said McCurdy’s Revenge said guests come to experience the thrill of the attraction and the mind tricks that ensue.

“Our characters do a lot of interacting with people in the haunted house,” Flynn said.

McCurdy’s Revenge is open from 7 to 11:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 7 to 9 p.m. on Sundays through October.

E-mail the author: Randi Shaffer