The New Hope Valley Railway is located just 30 minutes south of Raleigh. It’s known as the Triangle’s Train and offers hour-long excursion rides on vintage trains at the North Carolina Railway Museum. The open-air museum features displays of historic railroad equipment and artifacts, a large miniature garden railroad, and a gift shop.

Throughout the year New Hope Valley Railway hosts various events like the Track or Treat Halloween Express and Santa’s Reindeer Round-up Express. We visited during October for the Halloween train and kids are encouraged to attend in costume! If you visit during Christmas you will also get a special visit with the big man in red!

2020 Pandemic Policies

We attended the Halloween Express for the first time during the 2020 pandemic. I believe there are typically a few more interactive Halloween exhibits in the railyard while you wait to board the train, but unfortunately they were unable to set those up this year. However, there was a traffic light setup to help limit the number of people entering the gift shop at one time.

Ticket sales were very limited and must be purchased on the website in advance. We shared the entire open-air train car with only two other families, so there was plenty of space to socially distance. Face Masks are required for everyone over the age of 5, but some people were removing their masks once they were seated on the train.

Ticketing Booth

When you first arrive at the New Hope Valley Railway, you are greeted by the ticketing booth. Here you will check in and get your ticket for boarding the train.

Behind the building is a small train playground that was pretty popular with the kids. It’s not as extensive as the train playgrounds at Brier Creek Park or Knightdale Station, but it’s a great little area to let the kids play while you wait.

Miniature Garden Train

The kids will also love watching the miniature garden train located right beside the ticketing booth. This is the same miniature trains you see setup at the NC State Fair, including everyone’s favorite Thomas the Tank Engine. It’s a pretty elaborate setup and there are lots of trains running through the garden. If you look closely you’ll also find a few friends like Woody from Toy Story riding on the trains!

Railway Museum

Once you’re all checked in, cross the bridge over to the railway museum. Here you will see lots of vintage trains and equipment sitting in the railyard. During the Halloween event they also decorated for the season to make it festive. It was pretty neat to see the train cars up close. Unfortunately you don’t get to go inside any of the cars except for the one that houses the gift shop.

As a part of the Halloween Express, we were given a scavenger hunt list of all of the mummies we needed to find on the train ride. They each had names and we were to cross them off our list as we saw them. During the Christmas train ride they do the same thing, except you are hunting for all of Santa’s reindeer. It added a fun element to the train ride since the kids were intently watching for the next mummy as we rode the train.

Gift Shop

The gift shop is actually inside one of the train cars. It’s small but contains a LOT of train-related toys and gifts. You can purchase t-shirts and hats to support the railway, or go big and come home with your very own miniature train! We didn’t purchase anything, but the staff inside were so nice and friendly!

Train Ride

Boarding begins 15 minutes before the train ride. You can pick whichever car you want to ride in since your ticket doesn’t specify seats. Cars 1 through 3 are identical and car 4 seemed to have smaller windows. Honestly I don’t think it really matters which car you pick, but I do recommend sitting on the side of the train closest to you when you board. There were more decorations on that side of the train so you’ll get a better view. All of the live scenes were also on that side. Luckily there was no one sitting across from us so we were able to switch between the two sides as much as we wanted.

The seats on the train are just regular bus bench seats with no seat belts. They sit a little low so we held our two year old on our lap so he had a better view. It’s also an open-air train car so it gets cold with all of the wind. Definitely pack coats for the ride! If you sit in an aisle seat you won’t get as much wind, but all of our hands were cold by the end!

During our ride we were entertained by lots of festive decorations along the way like ghosts, dragons, and of course the mummies. I was also surprised there were some live demonstrations as well, including Dracula and a group of witches brewing their potion. There were a lot of references to the Wizard of Oz at the railway, so my husband and I decided we need to let the kids watch the movie soon!

Overall the trip took about 45 minutes. It was a 20 minute ride down, about 5 minutes to watch the Halloween Express train ride by, and then another 20 minutes back to where we started.

Halloween Express Train

I was surprised at the end when we stopped and a second train pulled up beside us. This was the Halloween Express, ran by a skeleton crew. It slowly drove past us with smoke billowing past, then turned around and went back by us a second time. For Christmas I’m betting Santa is on this train, waving as he drives by.

Family-friendly Halloween Decorations

The decorations along the train route were spooky, but not really scary. There were men with pumpkin heads, a dragon, and lots of ghosts and mummies. The only decorations that were a little questionable was the giant snake looking like it was about to eat a man, and the bloody, headless man on the Halloween Express, which you can see in the video above. I’ll admit I wasn’t a fan of the headless man just because of the fake blood, but luckily my kids weren’t bothered by it. My husband didn’t think it was a big deal either, so maybe it’s just me!

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If you’re interested in riding the New Hope Valley Railway, check their website for upcoming rides. They offer train rides all year long, with special events scattered throughout. There’s even an opportunity for adults to learn how to drive a train! Either way, you can feel good that every time you visit you are supporting a volunteer-drive non-profit organization! For more train rides, check out the NC Transportation Museum in Spencer!