STERLING, Mass. - The Davis Mega Maze is built from the ground up.

"What are you thinking ? Are you out of your mind?" Larry Davis, co-owner of Davis Farmland in Sterling, said. "It's a nation of couch potatoes. No one is going to want to pay you to come try and get lost. That makes no sense at all."

Davis enjoys giving people an earful and and proving his corn mazes have come a long way since the first one he created in 1996. 

"It was the worst exhibit we ever had," Davis said. "It was just this little tiny maze. The school group just trampled the thing right back into the earth."

After a few more tries, Davis finally got it right. Now, the maze stretches eight acres and is solved by thousands of people each season.

"The corn maze idea just seemed so great. We didn't want to lose sight of it," Davis said. "So, we decided it has to be one of the top three mazes in the world." 

What You Need To Know

  • Davis Mega Maze is in its 23rd season
  •  It stretches eight acres and has grown into a world-class maze, visited by thousands each year
  • There is a new design each year and seven levels of intensity, featuring bridges and corn stalks as tall as 12 feet
  • Kids have the best luck with the maze and most people solve it in an hour and a half 

It's a certified world-class maze and the only one you'll find in New England. It takes a year of planning, organizing and growing to pull something like this together. 

"You have certain dimensions you have to adhere to," Davis said. "How wide is the corn? How wide are the pathways?"

There is a new design each year and seven levels of intensity. The maze is full of bridges and corn stalks reaching as high as 12 feet tall. 

"Everything here is designed to be the opposite of what you should do," Davis said. 

If you're lucky enough to take every right turn, you can make it out in under 30 minutes. However, it takes even the smartest of a lot longer. 

"It just befuddles adults. It just completely spins them around," Davis said. "As it turns out, it's kids around the age of 9 to 14 who get out the fastest. Built for adults, but kids do it best."