Ghosts of Phoenix

Saturday night I went to the Ghosts of Phoenix Tour at the Hotel San Carlos in downtown Phoenix. I was amazed at how many people showed up, which was probably over 50. Before the tour started everyone wandered around the small and crowded lobby or spilled out into the street. The hotel is very, very old but has quite a nice charm to it.

The tour itself was good. The tour guides started off with some basic explanation of hauntings and history of the hotel. Then they split us into two groups for ease of movement. My group started on the 2nd floor where we toured an apartment built for the hotel management. The apartment has been empty for quite sometime due to unusual activity in it. My tour guide told stories about when the apartment had been turned into an office and regularly items were moved during the night. In one case, a whole desk was moved across the room. Apparently hotel employees avoided the apartment because of the strange happenings there. The dark and empty kitchen definitely creeped me out, but I didn't see/feel anything weird.

Next we moved to the basement. In general, I think basements are creepy. This one was creepy just because it's part of the hotel guests aren't meant to see. In typical form, there were maintenance items, items for storage, and various utilities running in the basement. At the beginning of the tour, it was mentioned that there was a lot of "activity" on the ramp leading into the basement. So when we got down there, I was certainly focused on it. I took a number of pictures of the ramp because I was hoping to get "orbs" in my pictures. Many people believe that orbs in photos are ghosts. Unfortunately, I did not get any orbs in any of the pictures I took the whole night. However, I did have a strange experience while I was taking pictures of the ramp. After taking a couple pictures, my camera suddenly stopped. It was still turned on and appeared to be working, but the shutter wouldn't release. (This camera is an SLR digital.) Naturally I found that very strange. I could turn away from the ramp and take pictures but nothing of the ramp itself. After a minute, another woman came next to me and we began discussing the weirdness of my camera. She wanted to check my settings and without changing anything was able to take pictures of the ramp. After she handed the camera back to me, I was able to take pictures again of the ramp and other things in the basement. I'm definitely making a bigger deal out of this than it probably really was, but it's by far the most interesting thing that happened to me that night. I'd like to believe that the ghosts simply didn't want me taking pictures of the ramp at that moment.

I missed the tour guide telling the story about the basement which was quite disappointing. But what I picked up was there is a well in the basement. It was drilled in the late 1800's when a school was built on the land. At the time of the drilling, native Americans in the area opposed it because they said the water supply was a sacred one. Now some people believe the water and this well in particular is a portal to the spirit world. There was also something about three children who died in the well, but I didn't catch any of that story.

After the basement we proceeded to the top floor of the hotel, the seventh floor, I think. In the hallway, we were told about a woman who threw herself off the roof of the hotel in the 20's or 30's. She was apparently having an affair with the bellboy at a hotel down the street and he called things off. Though, there was speculation that he may have helped her off the roof. It is now believed that this woman haunts the hotel and often men staying in the hotel alone see her at the foot of their bed. She only stays a short while and then disappears. Others have seen her floating down the hall and can smell her strawberry perfume. Another event she is believed to have some part of was in the past 5 to 10 years when the seventh floor was being remodelled. One night a guest on the sixth floor called the front desk to complain of the person in the room above him had the television on too loud. The front desk thought this was very strange since there weren't any guests on the seventh floor, but the hotel is haunted after all. So two security guards went to the seventh floor where the discovered every television and every radio on the entire floor turned to full volume. Can you imagine how creepy that must have been to turn them all off?!

Our tour ended outside the hotel across the street. From that viewpoint, our tour guide could easily point out the apartment that was built on top of the hotel. It was built for the owners of the hotel though no one has ever lived there. According to the hotel staff, at times lights will turn themselves on and off in that apartment despite no one being allowed entrance to it. Our tour guide, who seems to know the hotel staff quite well, said she tried to gain entrance to the apartment but the staff had a difficult time finding a key. She finished off the tour by telling us about various bars and buildings in the area that we also haunted.

After the tour, I stuck around and listened to people's stories. One woman showed her friends all the pictures she got during the tour that had orbs in them. Another woman talked about the travel channel episode that was done about the hotel. The tour guide answered lots of questions and told some great stories - like the story about the two psychics on the tour the night before.

All in all I really enjoyed myself on the tour. Despite nothing exciting happening to me and not getting any orbs in my photos, I'm glad I went. I got to see a neat old hotel and hear some good creepy stories. It was well worth my $10.

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