Best Places To Experience Paranormal Activity

Many people remain skeptical of paranormal activity because they haven't personally come into contact with spirits or inexplicable encounters firsthand. Yet, those who dare to have a more open mind can take a vacation to a hotspot known for paranormal spirits. While there's no guarantee that spirits will manifest themselves, paranormal research shows that some places are more popular for ghosts than others. In this article, you'll read about the best places in America to experience paranormal phenomena.

Just like a jungle safari, there's no such thing as guaranteed sightings, but you can significantly increase your odds of witnessing paranormal happenings if you visit one of the most haunted places in America. To experience paranormal phenomena, experts say one must go to a location that is perpetually haunted by lingering spirits. Some mediums come into contact with spirits wherever they go and seem to attract that sort of energy, but this seems to be the exception, rather than the rule. Here you'll read about some of the creepiest haunts this country has to offer.

Haunted places in America range from historical sites and battlefields to old mansions and hotels. Guests can choose to embark upon a haunted tour, participate in a paranormal project, or stay overnight in these possessed places. Many a haunting will occur following a tragic accident, a brutal murder, improper burials or unspeakable atrocities. The best way to experience paranormal doings is to visit a known haunted site and spend some time there. While there's no guarantee of sightings, the following locations are, at the very least, historically spooky!

It can be angering to think that there is a whole paranormal world out there that you haven't witnessed. How can so many people simply imagine objects moving across the room, shadowy figures, doors slamming, ghastly moaning, chills in the room and apparitions? Surely some of the furor over paranormal phenomenon are hoaxes conjured up by people who wish to capitalize on people's superstitions, yet there is also some validity to supernatural elements witnessed by hundreds of individuals, many of whom never thought they'd experience paranormal phenomena in their lifetimes. To increase the odds of seeing the undead, many tourists stay the night in a haunted hotel, visit bloody battlefields or tour mansions said to be haunted by spirits of long ago.

Over 10,000 American soldiers died in the Battle of Gettysburg, which makes this Pennsylvania location an ideal place to experience paranormal phenomena. Many tourists report having met "Civil War re-enactors," even though there are no hired professionals at the park. During one investigation, the West Virginia Ghost Hunters captured several photos of an overall-wearing apparition in a field. Another frequently sighted apparition is a sentry who stands guard, pacing back and forth in the cupola at the top of Pennsylvania Hall at Gettysburg College. White smoke and orbs often appear in photographs and tourists report sometimes smelling lilacs, which were used to cover up the smell of death and decay after the battles. Many soldier apparitions have been spotted at Devil's Den, the site of a particularly gory battle, where bodies were moved by war correspondents for better photo ops. As Union Major General Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain said in 1889, "In great deeds something abides. On great fields something stays. Forms change and pass; bodies disappear; but spirits linger, to consecrate ground for the vision-place of souls."

The Bell Witch Cave in Adams, Tennessee is another excellent place to experience paranormal phenomena. Rumor has it that Kate Batts was a mean neighbor of John Bell. She believed he had cheated her in a land purchase and she swore to haunt John Bell, as well as his descendents. In the summer of 1817, the Bell family began seeing strange animals on the property, hearing knocking sounds on the walls and choking or gasping noises echoing through the house. Daughter Betsy was reportedly struck, bit, beaten and had her hair pulled by invisible forces. Though the original house is gone, the cave on the Bell Farmland is available for tours of paranormal sightings during the summer and the month of October.

The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado is the inspiration for Stephen King's "The Shining." In fact, King wrote the book while staying at The Stanley one empty night before they closed for renovations. The Atlantic Paranormal Society has filmed several incredible episodes of Ghost Hunters there, where cupboard doors unlocked, beds cracked right down the middle, apparitions ran through the hallways, and tables leapt in the air. Witnesses have seen the apparitions of children and objects moving across the room, they've heard the piano playing or a ghostly party taking place in the ballroom, they've lost items and have seen ghosts walking through rooms in the middle of the night. Even those who didn't have the opportunity to experience paranormal events here say they had trouble sleeping just thinking of "The Shining."

The Waverly Hills Sanatorium in Louisville, Kentucky is another place to experience paranormal commotion. Shadow people, nurse apparitions, singing voices in the attic, cold spots and floating orbs are all commonly reported on tours at Waverly. While the original tuberculosis hospital was only built to hold 40-50 patients, 150 sick people filled the rooms before extensions were added onto the building. Because so many patients inadvertently died there, staff had to build a "body chute" -- a 500 foot tunnel for dropping dead bodies directly onto hearse carts. It's believed that 10,000 or more patients died during the first three years of Waverly's existence, so one can imagine the amount of haunting that go on there!

Jail is never a comfortable place to be -- especially when the opportunity to experience paranormal phenomena presents itself. Many visitors come to the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which is often referred to as "a haunted house within a prison." Built in 1829, the penitentiary was the first fortress to incorporate solitary confinement. Even when a prisoner was allowed to leave his cell, he had to wear a hood to remain utterly confined. Many prisoners were said to develop mental illnesses as a result of their treatment. The prison closed in 1970 and became a den for gangsters like Al Capone and Willie Sutton. They abandoned the joint in 1971 and Eastern State soon became a museum and haunted house thereafter. Visitors report paranormal sightings of shadowy guards watching over the prison, as well as numerous sounds like footsteps in the yards, pacing in the cells, eerie wailing and disembodied laughter.

There are many other top places to experience paranormal presence. For instance, the St. Augustine Lighthouse in Florida has left visitors with ghost stories of hearing little girls cry out "Help me," mysterious lights appearing out of nowhere, and the sound of rapid footsteps -- probably remnants of the three little girls who fell out of a rail car into the waters below, where they drowned. Mount Misery Road in West Hills, New York (near Long Island) is another great spot for paranormal activity, which includes sightings of ghost faces in trunks of trees, strange lights and misty apparitions. The Queen Mary in Long Beach, California was a luxury cruise ship at one time but has since been converted into a hotel that features haunted sightings of a 17-year-old sailor killed in a fire, children who drowned in the ship's pool, and a mysterious lady in white.

Unfortunately, not all ghost stories stem from true stories. Amityville in New York is said to be one of the top places in the nation to experience paranormal entities, thanks to it being the site of a brutal family murder committed by 23-year-old Ronald DeFeo Jr., who shot his parents and four young siblings on November 14, 1974. The next owners, George and Kathy Lutz and their four children, claim that the place was incredibly haunted. They experienced banging noises, footsteps, mysterious odors, jelly-like substances leaking from the walls and swarms of insects inside the house. George became ill, went days without bathing and lost weight, while the children fought nonstop and Kathy had nightmares. Paranormal investigator Dr. Stephen Kaplan later uncovered that the Lutz's story must have been a hoax stemming from their knowledge of the house's history and their preexisting obsession with mystery paranormal stories. How could there have been "demonic footprints in the snow" if weather records show there was, in fact, no snow on that date? Why did the family say they phoned the police if there are no police records of the calls? Why would they say parts of the home were damaged when they remain in tact? Perhaps it's the amateur ghost hunters that haunt the current residents of Amityville the most.