20 Spots to Watch for Paranormal Activity in 2010

I decided to compile a list of 20 spots to watch for paranormal activity in 2010. Not real paranormal activity, mind you. Rather, blogs and sites that focus on paranormal phenomenon and happenings.

Even though there are hundreds of paranormal blogs and sites out there, it’s not always easy figuring out which ones are worth following.

Hence, my list. It won’t be for everyone. I’m geared towards a definite paranormal tourism slant. But these are the top 20 spots I’ll be watching for paranormal activity in 2010.

HOW I CREATED THE LIST

Some might wonder what was my criteria to be included on the list.

It was completely biased, let me tell you. I had to absolutely, positively, 110% without question be impressed, enchanted, WOWed, smitten, blown away or inspired to warrant inclusion. (In many cases all of the above applied.)

I’ll warn you though, some of the following names are ones you might recognize. (Either because you write a blog and wrote about them and that’s how I found them, I’ve referred to them in other posts, or they were an HJ Best of 2009 award winner.)

But if any prove new to you and you end up enjoying them also, fantastic! Or if you’re following any I don’t have listed in my Blogroll (see left hand sidebar) that you think I might like, leave a comment telling me that too. You know me. I’m always grateful to learn about places with paranormal activity!

1. Above the Norm TAG: None WATCHABLE BECAUSE: I named Mike and Julie’s blog a HJ Best of Award winner in large part because of Julie’s recaps. (Those seem so daunting to me. Like writing a report for school or something. Blech! Yet she posts them so fast and makes it look easy. I love reading them but would dread doing them!) Anyway, I’ve since come to appreciate another of Julie’s talents: she’s a poetic, emotionally charged wordsmith. I’m not going to do this for every site I list, but here are links to two examples of Julie’s work that both touched my heart and moved my soul: Santa Bob and Will Rogers and My Grandpa.
2. Chateau GRRR – TAG: Chateau GRRR is a little Gothic-getaway for all of us that love Hallowe’en, horror, and all things macabre. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: This is not a blog, but an actual site. Credit goes to Twitter for the hookup. (CG found me and followed first, I reciprocated, and here we are.) But come on. Any site with “Gothic get-away” in its tag is going to spark my attention. And then it’s kind of rockin’ the whole “check-in to a creepy mansion and meet other guests” vibe. I’ve actually got CG slated as this week’s Friday Fun feature. Stay tuned for more specifics on them then.
3. CreativeSpirits TAG: The worlds paranormal, graphics and fonts in one place. We search, find, and put them in one location for you. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: It’s really different. In addition to including haunted places, EVP vids, and ghost vids in their categories, they also include, as specified in their tagline, graphics and fonts. (Which appeals to my inner artiste.)
4. Entities-R-Us TAG: Paranormal humor for the Ghost Hunter’s Soul. Cartoons from the other side, through the veil, to THIS side. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: I just featured Terri J. Garofalo’s hilarious comic for a Friday Fun post. I love her humor. I was thinking more about why it appeals to me so much. Then I figured it out. I don’t read regular newspapers anymore, so I don’t know if they still print Cathy comics or not (I used to LOVE Cathy cartoons!), but Terri’s style reminds me of that.  Except her comics are geared to the life and times of paranormal investigators, of course, and not women in search of the perfect mate, a slimmer body, or a better career. (Good gravy, I don’t know which is the taller order: Trying to be a modern woman, or a modern-day ghost hunter!)
5. Frog on a Pumpkin TAG: Ridiculously large frog collection and a Halloween obsession WATCHABLE BECAUSE: I didn’t name the Frog Queen’s blog a HJ Best of 2009 winner for no reason. This is a great blog. You get a taste of her two passions: frogs and Halloween. She’s what I’ve come to learn is a yard haunter. And holy crumb does she do her yard up for Halloween. This is heavy duty stuff. I’m not just talking an above average neat Halloween display. I’m talking an all out, no holds barred Halloween smack down where she transforms her yard into a masterpiece. I finally got to see Julie & Julia last night. I thought about how the Frog Queen is like a Julie for the Halloween yard haunting world. It’s a fun blog to follow. My inner yard haunter gets to live vicariously through her posts!
6. Ghost Eyes TAG: Most Haunted Places in America WATCHABLE BECAUSE: I forget about Ghost Eyes. Their articles pop up in my Google Alerts, I always check them out, Tweet their links, but then I forget about leaving comments. Compiling this list made me realize I hadn’t yet added them to my RSS feed. They’ve been on the Blogroll almost since HJ’s inception, but for some reason I hadn’t been following them in my RSS too. That’s been remedied! I will now follow them more diligently in 2010!
7. Ghost Grrls! TAG: The Official Blog of the Charlotte Area Paranormal Society WATCHABLE BECAUSE: The name caught my eye right away, but then I discovered their posts are fun. Plus, there’s a heavy emphasis on the Charlotte, NC area. North Carolina’s loaded with great Haunt Jaunts. It’s fun to see their spin on some of them.
8. Ghost Hunting Theories – TAG: She kind of has one, but it’s not a true tag. It’s really more of a condensed “About.” But in case you aren’t familiar with her great blog (is that even possible? doesn’t everyone know Autumnforest?), she grew up in a famously haunted house called Aspen Grove and kicks around theories about the paranormal. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: She’s easily the most prolific blogger I follow. And perhaps one of the most caring, compassionate, and empathetic. She takes time to respond to ALL comments. In depth and with much thought. Then, she often follows blogs in return and leaves remarkably insightful comments on those posts. THEN she takes it further and welcomes readers and bloggers into her posts. A superb example of her thoughtfulness is one of her recent posts Custom Movies for My Followers! And on top of all that, she posits incredibly interesting theories about the paranormal and looks for evidence to corroborate them. Smart, charming, and also witty…all wrapped up in a pretty paranormal bow. (She’s maddeningly modest about it, but if you see her pics…she’s gorgeous!)
9. Ghost Stories and Haunted Places TAG: If you are looking for a little daily haunting, this is the place. Every day will bring you a new terror, or at least a new story at this haunted blog. Come follow me to old cemeteries and legendary castles! WATCHABLE BECAUSE: This was a new-to-me in 2010 find. And it was actually her Pere La Chaise post I found first. Which was VERY exciting. It’s a French Haunt Jaunt. (Which, as I’ve noted before, are not as easy to come by as one might think.) Anyway, she combines interesting writing with neat pics to create some wonderful posts. I expect to refer back to her blog a bunch in 2010.
10. GhostTheory TAG: None WATCHABLE BECAUSE: As I noted when I bestowed a HJ Best of Award on GT, Javier and his guys deliver news the old-fashioned way. No, not on your driveway every morning in time for your morning cup of Joe. I’m talking about with integrity. They seek to get the real scoop, the whole scoop, and nothing but the truthful scoop. I not only like this blog, but admire it a ton. (And I just now realized I like it so much I have it listed twice on my blogroll! HaHa! Whoops. Oh well. But that does prove how much I feel it needs to be listed!)
11. Haunt Spots Tours – TAG: “What’s your ghost story?” WATCHABLE BECAUSE: She’s been quiet lately, but Susan (who’s also a frequent guest blogger here) runs a different sort of ghost tour company. A sort of DIY deal. It’s fun reading about her adventures finding new places to include on her tours and the impressions/experiences tour takers have.
12. Haunted Britain – TAG: The blog of Haunted Britain Author Richard Jones. “Follow my journey around this spectred isle as I visit haunted houses, castles, inns and ruins. This is very much an ongoing project and will be updated with photographs, musings and even videos on a regular basis.” WATCHABLE BECAUSE: This is what Haunt Jaunting is all about! Richard Jones is keeping a blog of his Haunt Jaunts as he tours around Britain for the first few months of 2010. Which gives me a chance to virtually venture vicariously to haunted places across the pond. He’s only got a few posts up so far, but I’m already hooked and eagerly awaiting more!
13. Hollow Hill –  TAG: Researching ghosts and haunted places since 1978. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: Fiona Broome exudes a calm repose that emphasizes her unpretentious nature. Which only serves to enhance her authority on all things paranormal. I love her down-to-earth, practical approach and style. Again, I’m making a Julie & Julia reference…she’s my Julia. I aspire to add into the world the same quality level of information that Fiona does. (Not the same, because my focus is more paranormal tourism whereas she’s also about investigating and evidence. But as far as quality, I’m striving to be like her.) I don’t know how active she’ll be on Hollow Hill in 2010. She’s working on two books (The Ghosts of Salem, Massachusetts and The Ghosts of New Orleans’ French Quarter), but I’ll look forward to whatever she offers!
14. Paranormal Scene Investigators of Indy TAG: None WATCHABLE BECAUSE: Without fail, the first 12 days of 2010 so far something from PSI Indy has caught my eye in one of my Google Alerts. They’re a paranormal investigation team out of Indianapolis, Indiana and I’ve been having a lot of fun stalking their posts so far. (I say “stalking” because I don’t think I’ve left a comment yet.) I like their perspectives and am interested to see what all they’ll post in 2010.
15. Pennsylvania Haunts & History TAG: Pennsylvania and its neighbors are bursting with tradition, legends, tall tales and ghosts. Each week we’ll introduce one or two of their strange and spooky stories to you. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: PA is just one of those states with more than their fair share of hauntings, isn’t it? This blog intrigues me because it enables me to virtually visit PA’s Haunt Jaunts. (Not to mention it also lets me do research for when I get to make a Haunt Jaunt of my own there someday!)
16. Phasma Ex Machina TAG: Edison failed. Houdini couldn’t do it. He won’t be so lucky. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: This is the only movie site I’m linking up to in my list. (However, they also have a Phasma Ex Machina blog.) I AM SO EXCITED FOR THIS MOVIE! I don’t know when it’ll come out, but I am taking that day off and going to see it when it does. If you can’t fathom why I’d be so excited and didn’t see my Movie Monday post about it, you didn’t see the trailer. Watch it. Find it on my post. Find it on their site. I don’t care where you find the trailer, just do it, watch it, and if you aren’t 100% excited, I’ll give you your money back.
17. RottenWorks – TAG: Flaming pumpkins and paranormal investigations. WATCHABLE BECAUSE: Do you appreciate scathing, biting humor? I do, and no one does it better than RW! Like Julie at Above the Norm, RottenWorks posts a lot of ghost hunting show recaps (and, also like Julie, does it brilliantly), but what I like is when they write about the farce that most of these shows are. (Or have become.) That’s what often elicited comments (usually in the form of Bravo! and Kudos! from me.) But this is really about one person’s passion for carving pumpkins and then setting them spectacularly on fire and taking pictures of it. (Read their About section for more on that. If it doesn’t make you at least smile, if not burp out a chuckle, my Money Back Guarantee applies here too!)
18. ScaryGeek TAG: None WATCHABLE BECAUSE: If I had known about this blog last year, it would have been bestowed with a HJ Best of Award for Best Header. Check it out. CREEPY! And then there’s the subject matter. Everything I love: dreams, Halloween, horror, haunted places, the paranormal…oh yeah, once I found it I zapped it immediately into my RSS and placed it on the Blogroll here.
19. Screamstress TAG: Horror & paranormal news WATCHABLE BECAUSE: I don’t know why I like horror movies, paranormal TV shows, vampires, zombies and all the rest, but I do. And so does Alison. And she likes to write about them and follows the industry with an Eagle Eye. It’s a great place to learn not only about what’s coming out next, but she also digs up gems from the past. A recent example of that is her Video Vault: “How to Survive a Horror Movie” post. I never saw these webisodes…until Alison pointed them out! (Pssst, Alison. In case you read this, have you heard of Phasma Ex Machina yet? See #16 above. I’m not sure I’ve figured out your movie tastes yet, but I think if you don’t know about this one yet you’ll want to and will be excited about it too.)
20. Supernatural Hotspots TAG: Hosted by Beckah and Katie Boyd WATCHABLE BECAUSE: These ladies are my kind of Haunt Jaunters! They like to explore places with haunted reps. All public. They concentrate on the New England states (specifically Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut), but this is the kicker: they film their Haunt Jaunts and post them on their site! It’s an ingenious way to promote Katie’s book, Rhode Island’s Spooky Ghosts and Creepy Legends. And it’s a really fun way to Haunt Jaunt around the New England area without leaving home.

Courtney Mroch

Courtney Mroch is a globe-trotting restless spirit who’s both possessed by wanderlust and the spirit of adventure, and obsessed with true crime, horror, the paranormal, and weird days. Perhaps it has something to do with her genes? She is related to occult royalty, after all. Marie Laveau, the famous Voodoo practitioner of New Orleans, is one of her ancestors. (Yes, really! As explained here.) That could also explain her infatuation with skeletons.

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Speaking of mystical, to learn how Courtney channeled her battle with cancer to conjure up this site, check out HJ’s Origin Story.