Few ghost tours have included stories that pricked the hairs on my arms, and kept them raised after, like the ones I heard during the Ghost Tours of Anchorage.
I was excited about the tour because shortly after he started it, Richard, the tour’s proprietor, had reached out to let me know about it. (By “started” I mean started his ghost tour business, that is.)
I thought I had written about that on Haunt Jaunts, but if I did, I can’t find the post. (Probably didn’t. I always mean to write about things, but get distracted and don’t. Heck of a way to be a writer, huh?)
Anyway, it was on my Jaunting To Dos to take his tour if I ever found myself able. This last trip to Alaska presented the opportunity.
As far as ghost tours go, it’s pretty standard. You follow your guide and listen to the city’s history blended with it’s mysteries and lore.
But something that does set this tour apart is that even though it’s at “night” like almost all other ghost tours, it’s not dark. Alaska comes by its “Land of the Midnight Sun” moniker honestly!
However, you don’t need the cover of darkness to inspire chills. You just need a chilling tale –or two, or three…
Richard has a lot of stories, all very well researched that also treats you to Anchorage’s colorful history, but a few are just downright creepy.
Here were the four stories that thrilled me the most.
Briefly.
All deserve their own posts, so that’s what I plan to do. Here’s what I plan to title them with teasers about their content:
- The Ghost of the Snow City Cafe – Does the victim of Anchorage’s only car bombing haunt this eatery that’s popular with locals and tourists alike?
- The Last Stall on the Left – Is the last stall on the left in one of the women’s public restrooms in the Hotel Captain Cook really permanently locked due to paranormal activity? (Heck of a place to be haunted, right?)
- The Patroller – Many have claimed to see a phantom “patrolling” 3rd, 4th, and 5th Avenues. Is it the restless spirit of the city’s first Chief of Police, who was killed only six weeks after being appointed to the position?
- Why the Historic Anchorage Hotel’s Room 301 is the Hardest to Get – The Historic Anchorage Hotel has been named one of the most haunted hotels in the country –for good reason. Of the hotel’s 26 rooms, only one hasn’t had reports of paranormal activity.
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.
Speaking of mystical, to learn how Courtney channeled her battle with cancer to conjure up this site, check out HJ’s Origin Story.