1. Stay on the paths. No cutting through the corn. It's still our crop, and we combine it after Halloween. Cutting through also makes new paths that confuse everybody behind you.
2. Carry your flag. Every group gets a flag on a tall pole. If you're lost, tired, or need help, wave it high and holler, and one of us will come get you.
3. Children under 12 stay with a grown-up the whole time.
4. Walk, don't run. The paths have sharp corners, and there are other people around them.
5. No smoking, no matches, no lighters anywhere in the maze. Dry corn burns fast.
6. Take your trash out with you. There's a barrel at the exit.
7. Lightning means everybody out. If we ring the bell at the barn, head for the nearest exit flag or wave yours.
8. Flashlight nights: bring your own flashlight, one for each person if you can. Please, no laser pointers.
9. No pets in the maze or anywhere else on the farm.
10. Be kind to the corn, and to the people in it.

The checkpoints. There are eight checkpoints hidden in the maze, each with its own paper punch on a string: a pumpkin, a star, a heart, a cow, and four more you'll have to find. Get all eight on your maze card and turn it in at the exit for a free cup of cider.

The seat. Up over the big back wheel, right where the driver would sit, is a wooden lookout platform eight feet up. From the top you can see over the corn to the barn roof. Getting there is the real puzzle.

That old trick won't work. You may have heard that if you keep one hand on the wall of a maze, you'll always get out. It's true, and in ours it'll walk you right back out of the corn without ever getting you up to the seat. Margo made sure.

Use the barn. The barn is east of the maze. If you're walking toward the barn roof, you're heading for the front of the tractor and the entrance. The smokestack is on the north side.

The big wheel is a circle. If you've passed the same broken stalk three times, you're going around the back wheel. Take the next turn you haven't tried.

Bring water on a warm afternoon, and wear shoes you don't mind getting dusty, or muddy, depending on the week.

Don't panic. Every path meets another one sooner or later, and the corn is only taller than you until you find the way out.