Inside 7 Haunted Abandoned Theme Parks Where Time Stands Still and Secrets Linger

Ever wandered into a theme park expecting laughter, cotton candy, and roller coaster screams, only to find it eerily silent, with rusted rides slowly surrendering to time? It’s a weirdly fascinating sight—joyous playgrounds frozen in a ghostly pause. Why do these once-happy kingdoms of fun end up abandoned, left to decay as nature and neglect take center stage? From the chilling radiated silence of Ukraine’s Pripyat Amusement Park to Brazil’s Santa-themed Park Albanoel slowly crumbling under the weight of lost dreams, abandoned theme parks around the globe tell stories far creepier than any haunted house ever could. Grab your courage (and maybe a flashlight), because here are seven of the creepiest international examples where the fun stopped but the eeriness never did. LEARN MORE

Theme parks tend to be joy-filled places bustling with people, which makes the contrast extra stark if they end up abandoned. While some out-of-business amusement parks are demolished, others are simply left to decay, becoming empty and eerie places that only the bravest people are willing to explore. There are numerous abandoned theme parks across the U.S., but there are also many more scattered all around the world. Here are seven of the creepiest international examples.

1. Pripyat Amusement Park, Ukraine
2. Park Albanoel, Brazil
3. Hồ Thủy Tiên, Vietnam
4. Western Village, Japan
5. Yongma Land, South Korea
6. Yangon Amusement Park, Myanmar
7. Gulliver’s Kingdom, Japan

Pripyat Amusement Park, Ukraine

Pripyat Amusement Park was due to open to the public on May 1, 1986, but preparations ground to a halt when the nearby Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded on April 26. The residents of Pripyat—many of whom worked at Chernobyl—were evacuated as deadly radiation blanketed the area, leaving the city and its amusement park frozen in time.

Although the Exclusion Zone still isn’t fit for human habitation, tour groups are usually allowed to enter (everyone is monitored for radiation exposure), which has resulted in some chilling photographs. Basically all of Pripyat looks spooky—there are abandoned dolls in the nursery and overturned chairs in school classrooms—but the theme park is particularly unsettling. No patrons ever got the chance to drive the bumper cars or take a spin on the towering yellow Ferris wheel, and the unridden rides have been left to rust in the radioactive area.

Park Albanoel, Brazil

Brazilian politician Antonio Albano Reis had dreams of building a huge multi-land theme park. His plans included a Wild West-themed town and water slides, but—in line with his tradition of dressing up as Santa every Christmas, which resulted in him becoming known as the “Santa Claus of Quintino”—his first priority was the Santa-themed park. Work started on the park in 2000, but just four years later, Reis died in a car crash, and Park Albanoel died right along with him.

The only part of the project that had been completed before the whole project was abandoned was the Santa Park. Once a holly jolly place, after it was deserted, time quickly took its toll on the many different statues of Kris Kringle, along with the decorative candy canes, reindeer, and sleighs.

Many of the photos of the spookily decaying Santas that circulate online were taken by Christopher Jones, a British school teacher and amateur photographer, who stumbled upon the park while driving through Itaguaí with friends. “[Christmas] is designed to be so happy, isn’t it? And joyful. Yet these things are riddled with cracks and mold,” Jones told CNN. “We were just fascinated by the whole thing.”

Hồ Thủy Tiên, Vietnam

Just a few miles away from Huế’s busy city center are the derelict remains of Hồ Thủy Tiên. Opened in 2004, this water park—which also featured an aquarium and crocodiles—only lasted a few years before shutting down. But the park then took on a second life as a destination for urban explorers. The highlight of the park is the massive dragon curled around a building in the middle of the lake. Although now covered in graffiti, the dragon is no less impressive than when it was first built, and visitors can still walk up the staircase to admire the view from its open jaws.

Western Village, Japan

Anyone wanting to get a taste of a real-life (although significantly less technologically advanced) Westworld should head to Japan’s Western Village, which opened in the mid-1970s and shut in 2007. The Old West replica town features all of the buildings you would expect, from a saloon to a sheriff’s office. There’s even a Mount Rushmore replica. Ghost towns are spooky enough as is, but Western Village is extra creepy thanks to the numerous decaying animatronics—including one that looks like John Wayne—that populate the park.