I've heard many different things about these woods since researching haunted places in San Diego...that gypsies cursed the developers for tearing up their land, that there were witch's covens there, that there is a ghost of a lady in white. Whatever it is, it sure is stunningly beautiful and eerily quiet.

When I was there, my pragmatic side realized that it was pretty foolhardy as a woman to be there alone, because it was completely empty. A man ran by and after I caught my breath, I quickly sized him up and thought of various ways of defending myself if needed- my camera was heavy and could give a large whack if needed. Luckily he was as he seemed, a runner on a trail, and quickly left. As I was walking further into the trail, I realized how silly it was to be alone and spooked myself out thinking of Chelsea King and how she was murdered while alone on a trail in San Diego. If god forbid something happened and I was found, that the images on my camera would be shown as "the last thing she photographed before her murder." Needless to say I grabbed some photos and got out of there stat.

The Whaley house was not only a family home, but also a bilingual general store, a courthouse, and the first theater in San Diego. 

Thomas Whalen and his family members.

The courthouse was used for years after the Whaleys passed and still sometimes used ceremoniously.

This room hosts items that would have been sold at the time that the Whaley's lived there. It sold medicines, thread, lamps, and other odds and ends.

And of course it sold guns, it was the Wild West after all!

This is an assortment of items that the Whaley's would have had in their home or shop.

In their kitchen area

The parlor area. Supposedly ghosts have been seen underneath the archway separating the room. 

Upstairs was the first public theater in San Diego. In modern times, they play something of a video loop of plays that might have run there.

I love the piano and the row of seats.

This room was the nursery. This doll in the corner creeps me out!

The below image is the parent's room.

Admittedly, this was where I got a sudden intense headache that went away when I walked away from there. When I left the Whaley House, they asked me if I experienced anything, and I told them that. They were like, well, I'm glad you got something.

There is also a room upstairs that has some of their personal belongings- university students did an archeological dig on the grounds and found 10,000 objects belonging to them, because before there were trash collectors, people would bury their garbage.

I was taken by the curtains and the light from inside and outside the house.

This is a rebuilt recreation of where the Whaley daughter shot herself in the chest after a failed marriage that ended in divorce. Unfortunately she missed her heart and did not die for another week.

Overall, I enjoyed seeing the Whaley House and getting to spend time by myself taking photographs at will. It really is so interesting how historic homes are designated as haunted- I wonder if it's a way to get tourist dollars there, or if there really is several verified sightings, or...I guess we'll never really know.

My first foray into this project was joining the Haunted San Diego Ghost Tour on a busy Saturday night in April. The bus picked us up in Old Town, just down the street from the Whaley House, the "Most Haunted House in America".  Our tour guide was an actress in her late 20s, dressed in a long black dress and wearing a black lace bonnet in her hair. She seemed to relish the part as host, and told the story of each place with gusto and flair.

Our tour guide gave us a corny joke that this was the original Ghost Bus and that "Ghost Busters" was named after them. Very cute! The night was filled with a lot of silly quips.

Our first stop was a quick jaunt to the Whaley House, where we stood outside the fence and our tour leader told us about the horrific story of what happened to the residents of the house, the Whaleys. Mr. Whaley bought the land where all the hangings were, so it was already had an evil past. Mr. Whaley's daughter tried to commit suicide after a painful divorce, and unfortunately missed her heart when shooting herself in the chest, so she had a gruesome drawn out death. While visiting the family, the Whaley's grandchild picked up a biscuit off the floor which was infested with rat poison, and also died. 

The outside of the Whaley House- on the left is the reconstructed outhouse where the daughter shot herself, and on the right is the house. The top right hand corner is where her bedroom was where she would look out.

The next stop on our tour was the Villa Montezuma Museum in Sherman Oaks, just outside of Old Town. It is a stunning Victorian home built for reknowned musician and mystic Jesse Shepard. No expenses were spared as the home has stunning stained glass, spires, gothic gargoyles on the roof, and more. We were given a tour by the chair of the volunteer board, who brought us in and told us the story of his musical seances. 

I just love the details in the wood paneling, the oval and round windows, and the towers! 

The stained glass is really stupendous, and the building and glass was $26,000 to build, a ton of money in the late 1800s! As it turned out, James Shepard only lived there for two years as he was called away to perform in Europe. It then went through a long line of owners before it was named a historic home and now museum.

The next stop on the haunted tour was the Horton Grand, a historic hotel in the Gaslamp quarter. It used to be the location of a notorious brothel, where sailors would come and leave a red lamp to mark that they were there, hence the name the "red light district."

Our wonderful tour guide teaching us the history of the Horton Grand.

Supposedly there was an outlaw that was hunted down here and was shot. He quickly ran up the stairs while being chased and hid in the armoire of room 309, where he was found and shot dead. 

Truth- I probably could have stayed in room 309. I asked if it was available as I checked in, but it would have been more since it had two queens (compared to my one) and honestly I chickened out. 

The next stop was the Gaslamp Museum at the Davis- Horton House. Anna Scheper was a former nurse and used the house as an infirmary during the Tuberculosis outbreak in the late 1800s. 

This was the main room that we went into, with beautiful antiques. I see a green orb to the right of the door, and both my camera and cell phone captured that same orb in several places around the room. I didn't see it until I downloaded the photos. I'm not sure if it's the light that was in there reflecting off my camera lens (like some sort of refraction) but I didn't get the orb anywhere else that evening and didn't have my flash on the camera or cell phone. I don't know if it was the specific light that was used in the room that caused the light refraction, or if it is indeed a ghost? 

I have other photos that I've done with my cell phone that shows a defined light. It's very bizarre. 

More images from the Horton-Davis house. From what I understand, most of the furniture and home decor were brought in from that time but aren't original to the site.

 The last place we went to on the Haunted ghost tour was the El Campo Santo graveyard in Old Town. It's got 477 graves visible with more unaccounted for- the whole of Old Town is presumably haunted.

Overall I greatly enjoyed myself and learned a lot of history!