Annual ghost train ride

Savor the fright for a few minutes and move on down the track.

That's the joy of the Mills Park ghost train.

The annual train ride - ghost style - will start tonight and run through Saturday. The rides start at 5:15 p.m. and run until about 9:30 p.m.

The 20-minute ride costs $3 for children and $5 for adults.

The child-size train is provided by Carson City Railroad Association.

The train passes several scares, which are provided by the Carson High School's drama department.

This year's skits will include medieval magic, a combination of dragons, moats and knights; a graveyard, with zombies and vampires; a Salem witch trial; a monster marriage; Roswell alien land; fairy tale land and a headless horseman.

The event, which attracts about 1,100 people, is the drama department's biggest fund raiser, said Karen Chandler, the high school's drama teacher.

Proceeds pay for the department's trip to the Oregon Shakespeare festival in Ashland.

The ride is perfect for elementary-school age children.

"There is none of the fear of being caught or trapped," she said. "We gear this event for that age."

The highlight of the ride is the headless horseman, Chandler said.

On each of the four nights Steve Summers brings his horse to Mills Park and rides it around.

"He doesn't have children in the high school, he's just a community member who likes to help out," she said.

The school has been putting on the skits for about six years,

"We have the props, the costumes and rehearsing isn't really an issue because we do a lot of improvisation," she said.

The biggest challenge is continuing the skits late into the night.

"By 9 p.m., it's pretty cold and dark out there," she said.