Like tourists!

This year, the maze was shaped to celebrate the Edmonton Oil Kings, though really, the aerial shots and overall design are good for publicity only – once inside the corn field, the shape is irrelevant.

We arrived at dusk as planned, paid admission, and entered the maze just after 7 o’clock. We were both shocked at how low the stalks had become. The website had warned than an early frost and winds had caused the corn to die and fall over, but it was worse than I had thought. When on the lookout bridge, Mack and I were actually able to count the number of people “getting lost” in the maze (twenty), something not possible during our visit the year before. We hope the corn stalks hold up for the Maze’s Farm of Fear event that starts next week.

Poor corn.

View from the lookout bridge

Mack, ever impatient or adventurous (more likely a bit of both), decided to take us through a stalk-infested short cut. And a few photo stops later, we were out.

Dying corn stalks

A cob of corn

The website pegs the average time spent in the maze to be over an hour, but with some creative directionality, we made it out in less than 30 minutes (besting our 40 minute route last year). It occurred to us for a second to go through it again honestly, but with the chilly conditions, we decided it wasn’t worth it.

We’ll be back next year, hopefully earlier in the season, armed again with a camera, my crank-powered flashlight, mittens, but this time with a desire to finish the maze without self-made shortcuts.