DP08: The REAL Ghost Hunt

[Aceman]

The Real Ghost Hunt – Saturday Night at 10:30pm.

So my wife and I made every attempt to get an afternoon nap so we’d be ready for the late evening. We were scheduled to participate in a ghost hunting event that evening, which was to be hosted by Jason, Grant, Kris, Dave, and Steve from the SciFi Channel show “Ghost Hunters”. Being rather big fans of the show my wife and I were rather excited, which made getting a good nap in during the after break nearly impossible.

After mulling around the local small town of Estes Park Colorado, we made our way back to our hotel room at around 7pm. We were in room #411 which is obviously on the forth floor of the hotel, and just down the hall from the infamous room #401. We found ourselves watching channel 42 of the hotel, which normally would be continuously showing “The Shinning”, but during our weekend was looping the Ghost Hunters episodes which dealt with the Stanley Hotel. I highly encourage everyone to catch that episode because it actually had some of the coolest paranormal events caught on tape. But I might recommend that if your actually at the hotel, you watch it after you’ve departed, otherwise you find yourself actually seeking out strange noises and bumps.

During that episode Jason is actually staying in room #401, he’s sleeping when his bedroom door opens and second later a glass on the nightstand next to him shatters. He wakes up, retrieves the night-vision camera and records the evidence of the glass breaking and that the closet door is open. After a few minutes, he places the camera on the nightstand such that it’s facing the still opened closet door. A few minutes later after Jason has returned to bed, the door swings closed and latches.

I’ve recounted that episode for a few reasons. The first of which is that room 401 will be the first stop during our ghost hunt tonight. Secondly, having seen the episode I wanted to check out that closet and room, you know, find the hidden trap door in the closet etc. I’m a skeptic or on the fence as it were.

So around 9pm my wife and I decided to get out of the room and head down to the lobby where I was sure we’d find other members of the press who were there for the event. When we opened our room door we were surprised to find that ALL of the lights on the forth floor were turned off. I was relatively pitch-black, except for the green glow from the two exit signs which remained lit. My wife opened the door and scared a passing guest of the hotel, who shrieked at my wife’s surprise opening of the door. They both laughed. The fun was starting.

Down in the lobby we did find other members of the press milling around. They had set aside a ballroom as a meeting place for the people going on the hunt. In addition to the press who were going, there were about 30 other people who also were going. I believe they were contestant winners and were getting to do the ghost hunt just like we were getting ready too. They broke the attendants into groups of about 10 people, and headed to 1 of 4 locations we were going to be checking out during our evening. The locations we’d be checking out would be Rooms 401, known for Jason’s experience I described earlier, Room 418 which is known to have kids playing around in it, Room 1302 which is in the Manor House – a table jumped of the floor in this room in this room, and finally the hallway in the Manor house on the second floor where people have heard strange noises and seen shadows of children running around.

My group, which was all press and Scifi celebrities (Amanda Tapping and they guys from Scare Tactics) were in our group, were divided into two small groups. Tapping was not initially in my group, more on that later. My group was what I’ll call, “Special” simply for the fact that we had a wide range of participants. We had a stoned/drunk female from some organization who was held up on her feet by another quirky individual, we had a few serious ghost hunters, and we had a few comics in the crowd. In total we had 10 people in our smaller group. Our first stop was room #401 where Jason and Grant would be conducting a ghost hunt.

We arrived on the forth floor via the stairs and headed down the very dark hallway towards room #401 which was in the middle of hotel. Grant saw us coming and turned on his red flashlight, held it under his chin and welcomed us with a smile. Apparently we were the second group that night to go into the room, and in the first group, a female felt so uncomfortable that she left the floor entirely. So Grant instructed everyone that should they feel the need they could leave at any time. He smiled and said, “Ok.. let’s head in.” and we were ushered into the room which was completely dark accept for Grant’s red light, when he turned off the light, only a little light came in through the windows.

Jason started going over the various pieces of equipment they use to communicate with “the ghosts”. The first item was a simple flashlight. They would unscrew the back of the light so that it was just barely on, then they would place it on the floor. In this state, the light would turn on at the slightest touch, but wasn’t so sensitive that it would turn on if you stomped your foot. The second item was they “K2 Meter” which is a small rectangular box that uses a series of lights to measure the amount of electro magnetic fields in the immediate area around the device. When we first started that meter had only a single green light on it, which is a 0 or baseline reading.

As Jason started to move from the center of the room towards the end of the bed, which would basically position everyone in the room around the outer walls, two glass on a small table smacked together loudly. In fact so loudly that everyone in the room jumped. I personally thought that Jason had struck the table when the glasses banged together, but he even jump. We all froze. Someone asked Jason if he’d struck the table. He said no, and that in fact he was still three feet away from the table. Reflecting on the event, he was rather distant from the table when the event occurred. In fact, no one was standing next to the table, there was about 5 ft of space all the way around it. It got everyone excited.

At this point we turned to the K2 and Jason and Grant began asking questions. After a few moment of no activity the device lit up in what appeared to be a response to one of Grant’s questions. They would ask the spirit to make the device light up one time for yes, and two times for no.

“Are you with us in this room.” – the lights pulsed once.
“If you are a male, make the lights light up two times. If you are female make it light up only one time.” – the lights pulsed two times.
“Are you happy at this hotel.” – lights pulsed once for yes.
“Are you alone in his hotel.” – two lights for no.
“Do you know what year it is?” – lights pulsed once for yes.
“Is the year 2008?” – no response.
“Is the year before 1950?” – response (yes).
“Is the year before 1940?” – response (yes).
“Is the year before 1930?” – response (no).
“Is it before 1935?” – response (no).
“Is the year 1936?” – response (yes).

Everyone in the room was riveted to the K2 meter. A few people asked a few questions.

“Do you see more then 10 people in this room?” – response (yes.)
“Do you see more then 15 people in this room? – response (no.) *13 people were in the room.
“Would you light up the device when I say the number of people in this room.”
“11” – no response.
“12” – no response.
“14” – no response – they tried to trick the ghost I think.
“13” – the device lit up for about 5 seconds.

By this point my wife is crushing my hand. I’m actually standing behind here very near the closest door, which was open just about all the way. So silly me, I wanted to see if the ghost would move the door, so I gently pushed the door so that it was just barely open. Now when I did this, it whined as most 100 year old doors do. Everyone jumped and turned. I immediately piped up that I had moved the door. Which actually disappointed a few people.

The group continued to ask a few questions, some of which were just plain stupid. The drunk girl knelt down next too the K2 meter and started talking too it. Everyone in the place rolled their eyes. She was really annoying. After about 20 minutes we were told we had to move onto the next location which was Room #418 where Kris Williams was waiting. Before I left, I checked out the table that held the glasses and using my flashlight I couldn’t find anything hidden and I promise I was looking.

Room 418, 1302, and the hallway in Manor House, were all ghostly duds. Other then meeting Dave Tango, Steve, and Kris it was a non event. They Ghost Hunter hosts were all very cool and very laid back. Steve was very mellow just like on the show. Dave was into the ghost hunt and said that earlier in the night they heard loud banging in the hallway as they walked down it.

After we finished with the other locations at about 1am, we returned to the ballroom where we had started and decided to wait for the “free for all” hunt which was going to take place in the Concert Hall at 2:15am. My wife and I and a few press people were waiting in the lobby of the hotel. A small group of use decided to see if we couldn’t get back into room 401 while a group wasn’t in there. To our surprise the room was empty, as Jason and Grant had decided to take a break. Everyone stood outside the room in the dark hall. I couldn’t miss this opportunity, so I went into the room by myself. My wife thought I was nuts.

In the room the meter sat quietly where it had been all night, no pulsing lights. I wanted to see if this thing would light up when no one else was in the room. So I asked about three questions and nothing happened. On my forth question I said something like “Do you like Jason and Grant.” And to my surprise the lights pulsed. I was like “woah” that was interesting. The group that came up with me saw the light move and decided to risk life and limb and come into the room with me. It wasn’t about 2 minutes and Jason and Grant returned from their break. They didn’t mind us being in there, and in fact asked me if anything had happened. I recounted the question and response. They laughed, and said, “Well that’s good!”. I had noticed that the glasses that had moved earlier in the night were currently stacked one on top of the other. The top glass was position off center and looked as if it were ready to fall over. I pointed this out to Jason and asked if they had stacked the glasses. He told me that right before the last group ended they had stacked the glass, but they did so such that the top glass was exactly over the bottom glass. Jason asked if I had touched it. I told him no, that that’s how the glasses had been since I walked into the room. He responded, “That’s interesting.”

It was at this point that the next group arrived at the door and their guide, or scifi handler, told us that we had to leave. Not wanting to over stay my welcome we all decided to leave and head back downstairs.

The 2:15am Concert Hall ghost hunt was hosted by Kris, Tango, and Steve. And because it was a come if you want event there were about 50 people in the room when we started. Honestly with that many people in the room, I know that it was going to be a bust. Tara (my wife) and I talked to Kris Williams for a few minutes and then decided to head back to our room and get to sleep, we had an early flight in the morning.

When we got to the forth floor all of the lights had been turned back on, and room 401 was locked up tight again. So I snapped a few photos and we headed to bed.

[Aceman]

Here are a few photos from the hotel. The Scifi Channel is sending me more photos AND VIDEO of the events so I will post that just as soon as I get it.

Chris.

[backstept]

man that sounds like so much fun!

[Halo Buff]

Wow. Funny, I'm watching the new Ghost Hunters at the moment. Jason had one of his filp-flops stolen and they found it in a room that was untouched by any of them that night.

[Aceman]

He told me about the flip flops event.. didn't understand what he ment at the time but I do now after watching last night's episode.

I gotta tell you - everyone there from the Scifi Channel, to include our hosts from New Media were just awesome. They gave us complete access to the talent. Additionally, they told me that next years event will more then likely be moved back up to Vancouver Canada, possibly Toronto because of the new show Warehouse 13. They didn't have any new information at this time on the Prequel series for BSG, nor anything to report on SGA, or any of the upcoming films for the SG1. Amanda Tapping said if they needed her for a film for SG1, she would make herself available. But she had not heard anything at that time.

[B.J.]

Hey Aceman, I saw some of this event on TV Guide Channel's "InFANity" (I think) last night. I know they were talking mostly with the contest winners (as well as the Ghost Hunters, of course), but any chance we caught a glimpse of you or your wife?