Bucket List: Going on a Ghost Hunting Investigation

Ghosts scare the crap out of me…yet, I can’t resist seeking them out. If there’s a haunted castle, hotel or restaurant in the area, then I’m there hoping (and kind of not hoping) to see if I can see a spirit or two.

So being a ghost-lover, one of the things on my bucket list was to go out with an official ghost hunting team and check out a supposedly haunted place for real. Yes, that’s right. I wanted to see the ghosties for myself with the special equipment and everything. I want the complete experience -- and then not sleep for a week.

Charlotte Kosa, the founder of California Haunts, totally gets my ghost craziness – that’s because she’s got a little bit of a spirit addiction of her own. She told me she’s one of those people who is afraid of the dark, which surprised me because she’s been conducting ghost investigations for the last 10 years.

“I got into this because my house is haunted. Very haunted. I grew up with it and it scared the living daylights out of me so I had to understand it,” Charlotte said.

The more I spoke with Charlotte, the more I couldn’t wait to find what (or who) I would see on my investigation with her team. She agreed to let me to tag along while they checked out the haunted Sequoia Restaurant in Placerville.

The old mansion was built in 1853 and many guests to the restaurant and staff members have mentioned seeing strange things happening over the years -- ranging from doors closing and bottles moving to seeing actual ghosts.

“We usually get Class A EVPs at this restaurant. We record and hopefully pick up voices from beyond,” said Caren Clarke, one of the mediums on the California Haunt team.

Warning -- I'm about to impress you with my nerdy ghost gadget knowledge.

EVPs stand for Electronic Voice Phenomena. It's not as complicated as it sounds.  Basically EVPs are sounds or voices that are caught on recording device - which is standard ghost hunting equipment for the team. On the Sequoia investigation I tagged along on, they captured a man's voice on the device while checking out the women's restroom. At the time, we didn’t hear it, but later when they played back the tape, it was there. Creepy.

"I checked with Dave, the restaurant manager, and there were no men working on the first floor during the EVP time. We also did not pick up on anyone in the hallway via a static video cam," said Charlotte, when I asked if there was a chance the voice came from someone in the house.

The group started out the investigation by doing a baseline reading on the building. This way they knew in advance where the outlets were and where noises could be coming from. They do this to make sure their investigations are as accurate as possible. They also use a number of different gadgets to help them such as such as EMF readers which pick up magnetic fields and temperature changes, dowsing rods (Caren is holding them in the photo to the left) to help talk with the spirits, and psychics to help them zone in on possible spiritual hotspots. They also have scientists on their team who try to debunk their findings.

“I like to use the PX box,” Charlotte said. Charlotte is a gadget girl like me. “The theory behind this thing is that it will pick up electronic frequencies and the ghost can talk through it. We also use several different types of digital recorders. I’ve gotten my best EVPs on the Sony recorder.”

I admit that I love the spirit gadgets. There's even a ghost hunting iPhone app that one of the investigators was testing out. It measures electromagnetic fields, vibrations and sounds.

SO WHERE ARE THE GHOSTS IN THE SEQUOIA?

The gadgets are cool, but I wanted to see how they find the ghosts.  Good thing the Sequoia House is filled with spirits.  The team told me the spirits of the original owners of the home tended to hang out in the upper rooms. Plus, last time they were there, they discovered ghosts in the attic. But there are two apparitions who have been spotted often.

“The ladies bathroom is one of the most active spots in the Sequoia. We are going to run one camera down there,” Charlotte said.

Sequoia staff members claim there is the ghost of an older woman in the restroom. Caren says in the past, she has felt her presence.

“She gets very jealous of young women who look in the mirror. I have never seen her, but sometimes visitors or people who work here see her,” Caren said.

Man...as soon as she told me that, I had to pee, but there was no way I was going to go in that house.  Like I said, I like to hunt for ghosts, but they scare me.

The other apparition who has appeared in front of guests is a young woman. She tends to hang out on the second floor by the staircase. She sounded much less scary to me and if I had to run into something spooky, I was hoping it would be her.

“Supposedly, the owners and a lot of the employees have seen a woman apparition come down these stairs in a long flowing dress. I’ve talked to a lot of the employees over the years and many have said the same thing,” said Caren.

Caren says she hasn’t seen this spirit either, but seeing an actual ghost is rare. She says capturing an apparition on a camera is the holy grail of ghost hunting. They haven’t captured one on film in the Sequoia, but at the Woodland Opera House, they took three shots back to back and could see a Catholic school girl coming into the frame.



the unexplained hot spot

 “We could see this girl coming into focus. That was really exciting,” Caren said. “Sometimes you can see them with your eyes. It depends on how they want to manifest themselves. Sometimes you get vibes and feelings. It’s a pseudo-science. A lot of people don’t believe in it, but that’s okay.”

So while I didn't see an actual ghost on this investigation, I did witness one really creepy thing.

While checking out the bathroom where the old woman is supposed to hang out, one of our EMF readers picked up a hot spot on toilet stall above one of team members. The hot spot only appeared when Caren was asking the ghost questions using the dowsing rods and disappeared later on. 

Very spooky.

To find out more about California Haunts, visit their website at http://californiahaunts.org.