The Buford Trail of Terror is coming back for 2026. After the sale of its original haunting grounds and a two-year hiatus, the fan-built Georgia haunt reopens at a new home on Lake Lanier, opening Saturday, September 26 and running select nights through Saturday, November 7.
The new address is 7650 Lanier Islands Parkway, at Lanier Islands Resort on the shores of Lake Lanier. The attraction is part haunted house and part open-air trail, staffed by 50 “restless spirits” who stalk guests across 13 scenes, some of them set out on open sand.
The Buford Trail of Terror first opened in 2017 and grew fast, from crowds of 50 a night to at-capacity nights of well over 1,000. Along the way it collected several of Haunt Junkies’ Golden Ghost Awards. The two-year gap followed the sale of the original property, and the move to Lake Lanier gives the haunt more room, more parking, and a lake already steeped in local legend.
The haunt is the work of Matthew Miller, owner of Matthew’s & Co. Salon in Flowery Branch, who has said he was inspired by Stephen King novels and by a 1993 youth-football Trail of Terror he walked as a kid. Each year he hires dozens of professional actors, and his salon stylists and local artisans build the hair, makeup, and costumes. Miller says the lake setting shaped this year’s new characters…