Since this is the Samhain season, I thought I'd share some freaky travel stories with everyone.
These are true stories about some of my travels, and those of certain members of my family. I've got twelve to tell, and more still I could tell...

Story 1: The Canadian Sasquatch
Location: The Canadian Border

When I was about four years old, my family and I went on a trip to Canada to a re-creation of a frontier town where they had rodeos and all kinds of re-enactments of the old frontier days things.
On the way there, we stopped by a hotel where we spent the night. I was playing on the swings and accidentally fell off, getting a black eye in the process. I was basically alright by the time we got to the frontier town, and we were all in good spirits. It never occured to me that what was my earlier misfortune may have been a strange omen.
Dividing the town in half was a dark old covered bridge that spanned a stream. A crowd of people were screaming that something was in the bridge, and the people who ran the frontier town said it was some kind of wild animal, and to be careful.
We decided to cross the bridge with caution, but once we started across... my mother reached out her hand and yelled that she touched something hairy. My grandmother said the same thing, and I looked up and saw an honest-to-goodness sasquatch.
It was about six feet tall, and at first I truly thought it was a tall, hairy man. Until I saw it was more like a bear than a man, and had a huge mouth full of fanged teeth... as well as wild and dark eyes. It was almost like a neandethal's face but more hairy and feral than any movie caveman. The thing made animal sounds and could not speak. The security guards arrived and told us to run as fast as we could across the bridge. We turned to look behind us as we did, and saw the beast had vanished. The security guards found no trace that anything had ever been there, even though we and so many other witnesses had seen the sasquatch. The rest of the day passed perfectly and normal.

Story 2: U.F.O. Over the Beach
Location: Hadley, Mass.

When I was fourteen years old, my mother decided it would be fun for us all to go up to a local beach and have a party. The group of us were her and her then-boyfriend George. Me and my then-girlfriend Jenina. My cousin Carey and her then-boyfriend Tim. We all went in my mother's T-Bird, and blasted AC/DC the whole way there. It rocked!
Once there, I taught Tim how to start a bonfire, whilst my mother and George went off into the woods. So it was just me, Jenina, Carey and Tim on the beach... when suddenly this huge V-shaped craft appeared over the water with bright lights flashing the length of it. None of us were drunk. In fact, I never drank in my life, nor done any drugs. Naturally, since my mother was running the party it was a clean, good time. So, you can well imagine our surprise at seeing this odd U.F.O. in this otherwise quiet place. I honestly thought it was an airplane, perhaps a Stealth fighter. But the quietest Stealth still makes noise, when it flies. This craft was silent. And just as it had appeared suddenly, it likewise vanished. In one second, it was a small sight going up higher and higher until it was gone entirely. Carey said to me: "Did you see that? It was a U.F.O.!" And she was right. It was... indeed... a classic U.F.O.
Note: The "Beach" as we called it borders the Connecticuit river, which runs through Hadley.

Story 3: The Alien and the Glasses
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

My mother, my cousin Carey, and I were all out for a walk past the big pond in Easthampton one night when I was fifteen. One year exactly since we saw the U.F.O. over the beach. My mother saw a group of white discs floating through the sky that seemed to follow us. We ignored them, and my mother discovered a pair of black sunglasses on the ground. She picked them up and put them on, thinking they were cool. Suddenly, she saw this woman walking towards her down the street. The woman had black hair, pale skin, a large mouth, and huge black eyes. The woman's shirt said:
"Baby: '91" My mother screamed, took off the glasses and gave them to Carey to put on. Carey saw the woman, but to Carey she was blonde, with a small mouth, large black eyes, and a shirt that said: "Trouble is Coming". I, however, saw no one there at all. No woman, even with the glasses on.
So, my mother dropped the glasses into an open car window and a friend of ours complained that it was his car. So, we ditched the glasses into another car and went back on our way. We started to walk up to the park past the pond, when the white discs came back. They got bigger as we had neared the park, and we could see details like lights, and windows, on the strange discs that made us realize they were U.F.O.s and strangely they beckoned us towards the park. We resisted the urge to go there and hurried home, where we told my grandmother the entire frightening tale.
Years later, around 1991, my mother got pregnant by her third husband, Tom, and gave birth to my brother. So the Alien's prophecy came true: Baby '91! Carey got in trouble with a blonde girl who wanted to beat her up over some petty issue, so for her too the Alien's message came true. My own warning was that I saw nothing. When I was sixteen, I took a walk up the park to relax and enjoy the fall colors, which in New England are unmatched. It was 5:00 in the afternoon on my watch, and it was starting to get dark. This was in October. I hit the trail leading back to the road that goes out of the park, and what should I see in the bushes nearby but someone all in white standing there with no face. The face was metal and shiny, like a mirror helmet if that makes any sense. The being spread it's arms out like Jesus on the cross and it vanished into paricles of white light. The same kind of white light as the U.F.O.s my mother had seen when we walked past the pond when I was fifteen. My warning came to pass: I would see the same Alien my mother and Carey saw, but I was not meant to see it's face.

Story 4: The New Jersey Crater
Location: Somewhere in New Jersey

When my mother was a teenager, she went swimming with my grandmother, her mother, at a pond in New Jersey that everyone avoided. Years later, they read in a U.F.O. magazine that the real reason why everyone did avoid that pond was because a U.F.O. landed there long ago, and a local legend held that the pond was truly a crater formed by a U.F.O. that crashed. It was radiation everyone feared, but miraculously neither my mother nor my grandmother had any in their system. Perhaps this is where the first Alien connection in our family began, that would over the years recur. It is, indeed, quite a mystery, and one I often think of.
My grandmother still has that magazine; real and true proof that some things are not of this world!

Story 5: My Brother and the Death Bear
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

A Native American legend tells that there is a being known as the Death Bear, that appears to an innocent as a warning when someone is destined to die. One day, my brother went for a bike ride up to the park. Yes, the same park where I saw the Alien! In the woods, he saw what seemed to be a big, black bear. Except this bear had a horrible, skull-like face and red, piercing eyes. Scared, my brother hurried home to tell us about this. Shortly after this encounter, one of my uncles died. We knew my brother had seen the Death Bear.
Thankfully... no one has seen the creature since.

Story 6: The Ghost of Cindy Lue Baxton
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

Cindy Lue Baxton was tortured and murdered long before I was born by a group of drunk men. Some of those men went to prison... whilst others got away with their foul deed. She was murdered at the park. My grandmother had, in fact, actually known Cindy... so our family had a faint, certain connection to her. I never knew her, obviously, but one day in December, I went for a walk up to the park. I was Seventeen at the time. The fog was so thick you could not see *where* you were going, and I ended up in the field where Cindy Lue Baxton had been murdered... all those years before. I suddenly saw several shadowy figures. One was a woman, and the others were men. They seemed to be all intertwined together, and the woman was screaming like a banshee over and over.
I walked right through the shadows, and relized I was witnessing shadows of an event long past. I went home and described what I saw to my mother, and my grandmother told me Cindy's story for the first time (I had never heard it previously). I had seen her ghost, which is stuck replaying the moments of her death over and over, eternally. Years later, my brother was caught in the same fog and heard Cindy's screams. I passed on her story to him, and he learned who she had been. Apparently, the paranormal runs in our family!
Note: I'm not sure about the exact spelling of Cindy's name, so forgive any inaccuracies here.

Story 7: A Real-Life Poltergeist
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

The house where I've lived most of my life, we used to visit when I was a child, before I hit five years old and we purchased it and moved in.
My great-grandfater died in that house, and it is beleived his spriit still dwells there. You can hear the basement door open in it's own at times, and both I, my mother, and my ex-wife all saw dark shapes in the basement that caused us to run up the basement stairs, terrified out of our wits.
One evening, my ex-wife and I were awakened from a sound sleep by very heavy footsteps just on the other side of our bedroom. So, we turned on the light, and went over to the source of the noise. Floating in the air was the statue of an Efreet (An Arabian Fire Djinn) that I had set solidly on a nearby shelf. I reached out my hand to take it, but before I even could, it just dropped unto the floor, gently, without breaking. After I moved it to another location, the poltergeist activity had fully stopped. In recent years, it had all become quiet and even in the basement there is nothing.
I guess some spirits just want things their way, and once they get what they want, they are happy!

Story 8: The Shadows in the Woods
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

I used to practice Druidry and Wicca at the park when I went through those particular religious phases in my life. One evening, as I was looking for a stick under the moonlight from which to make a magical wand from, I noticed that a ring of shadowy beings was standing all around me. They were human in shape, but were featureless and transparent, like shadows. A friend was with me, and we stood, transfixed, for two long hours whilst we regarded those watching us. After this span had passed, they flitted up into the trees and were gone. It turns out the park used to be sacred Nonotuk Indian tribal ground. Perhaps we saw some of their sacred spirits, or the ghosts of the Indians who were buried there in the past.

Story 9: The Devil's Hop Yard
Location: Somewhere in Connecticuit

This famous place in Connecticuit was one of the inspirations for H.P. Lovecraft's great horror story "The Dunwich horror." and the movie they based on it. My grandfather took me to see it when I was about nine years old, one the way to Mystic Aquarium and Seaport, which was a favorite travel destination for our family. We got out of the car and looked at the national park which is what the Devil's Hop Yard is. And what should I see in the distance, between two rocks, but a large, shaggy black beast with five horns and a white, skull-like face. I went to point it out to my grandfather, but by the time he looked, it had moved into the woods in the distance and vanished.
Perhaps the Devil's Hop Yard does indeed serve as a home to ancient, demonic entities from beyond. Some say certain Lovecraft tales were based on true stories exaggerated for sensational stories.
I believe there was, indeed, some truth to them!

Story 10: My Guardian Angel... The Devil?
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

All my life, I've had dreams about a tall blonde woman with glowing green eyes who serves as my guardian angel. I used to think it was Gabriel, since Gabriel is often depicted as a woman. One day, I was out for a walk up at the park. It was an odd day, to say the least. First off, I got hopelessly lost and ended up in some deep woods. There, I heard the sound of a dog right behind me, but upon turning my head I saw nothing there. The barking became howling, like a wolf, and then it was gone. A little further on, I came to a place where hundreds of ravens were perched in the branches of the trees. Suddenly, they all swarmed about me, but never touched me. Then, they returned to their perches. Something was definintely strange about these incidents, but I never imagined what was to come. Oh, if I knew!
Soon, I came to a desolate place full of sand, rocks, and not much else. Today, they converted the area to a baseball field, but when I was in my twenties, which I was at this time, it was a wasteland. There, I saw a tall woman wearing all black, dressed like an Arab woman from the Middle East. She walked towards me and asked me in the voice of a young child: "Are you lost?" I told her that I was, in fact, since I strayed far from the trails and paths I was used to. Her face was covered by a hood and a veil, so I was frightened at her reluctance to show me her face when I asked her to. "Are you ready to see my true face?"
She asked, and I replied: "What could be so bad?"
She responded: "The truth of knowing we have met before, and will meet again." Then, she took the veil off and threw back her hood. It was her, the woman from my dreams. She suddenly threw her arms about me, and I was lost in her eyes for a time. Green eyes like emeralds! Then, she became a black, wraith-like shape surrounded by a nimbus of pale, green light. She said to me: "I am not the archangel Gabriel. I am Lucifer, and I am your Guardian Angel. As long as I watch over you, you will be loved, at least by me." And then, she turned into a black raven and flew off towards Mount Tom, in the distance. I never again called Lucifer evil after that day, although I am not a Satanist or a Luciferian. I am just someone who saw a side of the Fallen Angel that was not evil. To this day, she watches over me and along with Jesus gives me strength in times of great need.

Story 11: The Faceless Horseman
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

One day, a friend and I were walking past a local cemetary on nearby College Highway. It's known to be haunted, but we didn't believe the story since it seemed only old drunks told it. So, one night, we started to walk down the tree-lined paths that run through the graveyard. The trees seemed to be forming almost a dark tunnel, the deeper into the place we walked... and we could make out shapes, indistinct shapes like formless hunched humans, near certain tombstones. Suddenly, we could hear the sound of a horse's hoofbeats. In Easthampton, which is where this graveyard is, some people do own horses and live in farms still, so it's not too strange, except that it was exactly midnight.
At once, we saw the horse and it's hooded rider, who was holding high a Civil War cavalry sabre. It looked exactly like a Black Rider from Lord of the Rings. No face, and even stranger still, it was totally see-through. Both horse and rider! It rode hard, riding past us madly, and dissipating when it neared the light of a street light. As if the light itself dispelled the frightening ghost!
We ran out of that place, and we never went back.

Story 12: Look at me!
Location: Easthampton, Mass.

The Civil War touched many places in America, as did the American Revolution. In Easthampton, more than a few people lost their lives from sickness and war in those days. In fact, the town has a memorial plaque commemorating those who died from sickness and war in those times. But the town is indeed a haunted place. The house where my great-grandfather died was built on the site of what once was a neighborhood garden. Before it was a garden, the place was Indian ground. The house itself was built by the Martins, a family who my grandmother used to know. The oldest Martin son had an obsessive interest in the Nazis, and he has a collection of memorabillia from the Second World War. However, many believed his interest was from a dark side he never showed to anyone.
My ex-wife once claimed to see the ghosts of Nazis in the basement, and my grandmother found a ouija board there when we first moved in. It had belonged to one of my aunts, who to this day says she sees ghosts. Had ghosts of dead Nazis been drawn to the house by her use of the ouija board and Martin's obsession with their cause? Perhaps, for I too saw these ghosts. They took the shape of blue-skinned bat-like imps or of human-like shadows wearing S.S. uniforms. But one thing I did not expect, was to encounter a ghost from the town's past. I fell asleep one afternoon from a hard day at work, and I woke up around 6:00 late afternoon. I went to stand up, and a woman stood over me. She was wearing a victorian dress and a frilly white blouse. She also wore a wide-brimmed hat trimmed with lace. Her face showed she was a beautiful black woman. She curled her finger in the "come here" motion, and I stood up to see what she wanted. For a minute, I looked away and she got angry. She screamed loudly: "Look at me!" and her face turned into a bleached white skull. Then, she ran out into the hallway where my ex-wife saw her. She said: "Lady, what are you doing in our house?" when the "lady" produced a red rose and vanished into a solid wall. It turns out that in the 1700's to 1800's, a *lot* of people died from war and illness, as the memorial plaque said. While the memorial only mentioned soldiers, we realized: what about the soldiers' families and loved ones? Indeed, some it seems want to be remembered. So we contacted the spirit by drawing a ouiji board on a piece of paper and using a pen as a planchette. We learned the ghost came from somewhere down south, but died in Easthampton in the days of the illness mentioned in the plaque. All she wanted, was to be remembered. We told her that we would never forget her, and she never did bother me or my family again. The odd Nazi ghosts also went away after this, so apparently the lady ghost being laid to rest also laid their spirits to rest as well. They have never returned since.

So, if you ever find yourself in Easthampton or Hadley Massachusettes, or if you ever go to New Jersey, Canada, or Connecticuit... take the time to take in the ambiance of the paranormal aspects of the land in which we live. Because, there is more to see in one's travels than just the sights!

right

yes

i read all of that

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of" - Hamlet, William Shakespeare. That man really spoke the truth! ;) There are indeed more things than we can imagine.

I slept with faith and found a corpse in my arms on awakening; I drank and danced all night with doubt and found her a virgin in the morning.....Aleister Crowley

Good quote, Etrain!

Actually, back when I went through a dark phase in my life, Aleister Crowley was quite a bit of an inspiration to me. I did not consider him to be the villain popular imagination made him out to be, but actually a misunderstood genius in the mystical arts. My grandmother had a lot of books by him that she studied before turning fully to becoming a Methodist reverend, which she went on to achieve. It is, perhaps, ironic that a soul so filled with as much darkness as light like me, would come from such a religious family. One of my uncles being a Mormon priest, too! Lol. To this day, I believe very strongly in the creed of: "Do as thou wilt, shall be the whole of the law!" Indeed, do as thou wilt, but harm no one, as the Wiccans added. "One Law, under Heaven."

For is free will not the one thing we are gifted with by Heaven? That alone proves Crowley's words to have been worth consideration for their truly spiritual and mystical value. Very deep stuff. ;)