Theme parks: Summer’s done, Halloween’s here

Halloween starts in late September at Southern California’s major theme parks, stretching a solitary All Hallows’ Eve into a six-week affair. The granddaddy of them all, Knott’s Scary Farm’s Halloween Haunt in Buena Park, returns for a 35th year with 13 mazes, seven shows, four scare zones and 1,000 costumed monsters on Wednesday through Sunday nights in October 2007 (plus September 27-30 and October 29-31). For a cool $2,000, up to six visitors can get the Very Important Monster front-of-the-line treatment.