DIARY OF A GHOST HUNTER

 We took some time off recording to experience something that many of you just wont be interested in - Newgrange and Checking out Galway. It was another down time we allowed ourselves. Newgrange has been on my bucket list for years and the last time we were in Ireland we rocked up only to find out that bookings were necessary it it was not going to happen. This time the tickets had been booked for us and we could hardly contain ourselves. Newgrange is a 5,200 year old passage tomb. It is one tomb were you can go inside to see what it looks like although you are packed in with at least 30 other people and once inside you cannot move around. All cameras and recording equipment are left outside and the tour guide tells you why it is so special. It IS VERY SPECIAL.                                                    Museum.ie We were allowed about 15 to 20 mi...

 We arrived in Ireland the day before yesterday exhausted from travel, plane, airports and then getting to our first night's destination in Belfast. We had to transfer most of our luggage into one bag and leave the rest with our travel buddy, Gayle so we could guarantee being under the weight restrictions for Ryan Air or the charges are exorbitant. We made it and when we arrived at our B and B for the evening we knew we have made the right choice. GWEEBARRA Bed and Breakfast in Holywood is a pure joy for rest and respite. The owner, Tim, is a beautiful soul who has an amazing attention to detail and made sure we had everything we needed for assure comfort. We met his crazy two year old Labrador Dylan and found out he is also a Medium and so into all the things that we are! A match made in heaven. We slept from the moment out heads hit those beautiful comfortable pillows. In the morning our mission was to have breakfast and head to MUFF - our last stop on our Naughty Names Trail. I...

 Today was really all about getting to Chillingham Castle ....and finding a spot for breakfast. After a few failed attempts we finally got to a place called SUTRA and I can safely say we were the youngest there BUT it was lovely and the food was delicious. So pumped with coffee and good food it was on to Chillingham and of course we arrived much sooner that admission time so we thought we would soak in as much of the Castle as possible we unfortunately tomorrow we must get up early to head to the airport and leave for Ireland. So we arrived and parked the car in the public car parking space and took the walk to the Castle through a small woodland walk. Upon arrival we were met with another gobsmakingly awesome edifice. The magnificent wonder of it all and that we were staying the night was a bit much and we learnt later on as we walked around that the LADY GREY APARTMENT is the most popular of all of the rooms (I now know why) and is now solidly booked out for two years!!! Or so th...

 Where these tours good? Hell yes! The Greyfriar's Tour was booked with City of the Dead Tours who have been running the tours at Greyfriar's for years. We had a wonderful guide named Charlie and she was an anatomist plus guide plus worked for the NHS plus another two jobs and worked on these tours most nights. She was amazing and managed to tell us the truth behind many of the myths and legends about Greyfriar's Kirkyard and the legend of Bloody McKenzie and also served up a good dose of spookiness to make us feel uneasy at the same time. Why some people tell tales on these tours always amazes me because fact is always stranger than fiction! This time a treat for me as we actually went inside the Covenanter's Prison which houses the Black Mausoleum which is the haunting ground of the ghost of McKenzie where over 140 encounters have been recorded - from scratches to fainting to smells to burning sensations. I actually had smells.  Whilst in there I smelt a really weird ...

 Last night Anne and I headed out to the Abbey ruins to do some filming and a 'live' for our followers to see if we could catch any of the ghosts that are supposed to haunt the Abbey. We picked a walkway where we placed down some motion sensor balls, K2 Meters and Rem Pods and Anne started to play some Cistercian Monk Chants. This would act as a trigger to bring in the monks as we asked them to join us and walk down the walk way. We were hoping to see something during this short investigation and we were not disappointed. The motion sensor ball started to flash in answer to our questions. We do think it was one of the monks, maybe even the famous ghost of the Abbot. Especially when we asked him to walk up to us and stand near us and the motion sensor ball right near our feet started to light up! We were very happy with that - but this was all. No other instruments were activated and no other energies were felt. To bed it was as it was getting quite cold outside. Another wonderf...

 We arrived at Whalley Abbey last night and we had really no idea what it was going to look like other than what appeared on the booking.com page. What we arrive to was not what we saw! The Abbey accommodation was stunning. But was is going to interest you is the Abbey ruins and the ghost stories. The site was consecrated in 1306 with the Church completed in 1380 and rest rest of the Abbey took another 60 years! In 1537 King Henry V111 cams and seized the land and destroyed the Abbey. Anyone who did not recognise King Henry as the head of the Church was punished by hanging. The Abbott John Paslow was taken to Lancaster Castle and later hanged drawn and quartered. Some people ay that he was killed at the gates of the Monastery and his remains are at the Church yard. Other say his remains were scattered and not buried in consecrated ground. Whatever is the correct story he is said to be one of the ghosts that haunts the Abbey site, his singing can be heard and apparition of hooded mo...

This morning we woke up and got ready very quickly to head into the local BBC Radio station in Sheffield for an interview on breakfast radio with Toby Foster. Toby had interviewed us once before when we answered a Facebook callout asking who would sleep in a cemetery? Of course - WE WOULD. We told him that we would be in contact when we were in Sheffield and he kept his promise. Toby was lovely and really sincerely loved chatting with us. To our surprise we were then asked to come back for a night time radio session - which we are still to do as I am writing this post around 4pm. They want us to talk about what we have encountered at the Cemetery. Now this could be very dicey and we do not want to offend the Cemetery Trust and put a bad view on the B and B as it is such a beautiful space. We would hate it to be overrun by ghost hunters nd people seeking some sort of creepy experience and disrespecting the opportunity. So we are going to have to be pretty careful with what we say. But t...

I love all of these really wonderful places that we are so privileged to visit on this trip but not everywhere has internet or WIFI - not often can we get good reception or when on the road we often dip in an out of connectivity. How did we ever live without these devices! Since I last wrote we have stayed at the Skirrid Inn in Wales - the most haunted site in the country and the oldest public Inn in Wales. Now we are in Sheffield and that is a whole other blog post - you will have to wait for that one tomorrow.  But now I will get onto the last 36 hours. Somewhere between Chestnut Cottage and the Skirrid Inn some sort of rodent got into my suitcase and found a box of alcoholic chocolates that I had bought as a gift to take home and ate through the protective plastic box and into the chocolates and then proceeded to nibble into my brand new hoodie that we had made for the Ireland leg of our trip! I did not find this out until I reached Sheffield (did it happen last night?) and open...

 We said goodbye to Glastonbury this morning with the timetable making sure that we were heading to Wales today to visit Hay on Wye and the Skyrrid Inn. As everything is pretty expensive and we are on a tight budget we looked for accommodation that was affordable and Anne found a place called CHESTNUT Cottage just outside of Hay on Wye. We drove into Wales and spotted an enormous ruined Castle and so decided to turn off to pay a visit as we had not been to a castle yet. By the way, Wales is the castle capital of the world with about 600 of them dotting the landscape. This was Raglan Castle. The castle was built in the 1430's and is a motte and bailey construction. If you want to know more, more than you ever need to know about what a motte and bailey is check out our TRUE HAUNTINGS PODCAST all about Jedburgh Castle/Jail - I go into it in great detail! This place just took over the vista and you eye was drawn to it from all directions. We spent time checking it out of course but I r...

 We had to switch off for one day. All of that social media stuff can be too much in your face at times and a day where we just wandered around beautiful Glastonbury was needed. The heavy scent of incense filled the air and the riotous clang of singing and guitars from different corners of the High street filtered through the noise of shoppers and gawkers. It was lovely. The weather was lovely today - very sunny but it certainly still had a bit of chill in it. We also took ourselves to Wells by car, only about 15 minutes away as we were told there would be a Farmers Market on. Wells is a beautiful township with a magnificent Cathedral. I had seen it the last time I was in England and frankly, it was rather depressing to think of the amount of wealth that went to the Churches while to peasants starved and froze to death. Yes, It is HUGE and outstanding but I only needed to see it once. We purchased fresh hummus and flatbreads and Anne bought a quiche and I got a goats cheese pastry ...

After a glorious uninterrupted sleep at the Jamaica Inn ( yeah...no ghosts during the night) we had a beautiful breakfast and a bit of a shop in their merchandising area. Might have purchased a few things! The day started rainy, then it cleared and got a little warmer so after leaving we drove to the Dozmary Pool only 5 minutes away. The Dozmary Pool is part of the Arthurian legends and it is claimed that it is here that you will find the Lady of the Lake, the enchantress Viviane and where the future King Arthur rowed out to be given the sword Excalibur. The moment we took our cameras out to record it started to literally pour down with what was firstly rain and then hail. Then it cleared. We took that moment in time to try and record a little and again, the moment we started it began pouring again. So we decided to move on and find our next quirky place name destination which was Minions . This was about 45 minutes away and upon reaching this tiny village we stopped for morning tea...

 We woke in the morning and looked out the window to find the sun shining - and we were told it would rain so we decided to have a big day of adventuring. After two hours on the phone with my SIM provider here in England asking why I had no credit after purchasing a pack with unlimited everything I finally had to chuck a tanty to get it fixed.  I was not happy and very frustrated. We headed off to the church on the hill - unfortunately they were setting up for a funeral so we did not have much time, but got a few nice shots. As you can see beautiful blue skies but the wind was icy. We then headed to Tintagel Castle which was closed due to the windy conditions so we have to just make do with photos of the surrounding area. I had been before so it was not that much of a loss for me. The photo above is from another trip a few years ago. One thing that is now very different is that they have added a bridge which is awesome and cuts out some really difficult steps that used to take...

 Wow, what an awkward and really weird day. Firstly the weather varied from 8 degrees to 15 degrees every 15 minutes. Cloudy - sunny - cloudy - sunny. We travelled to Burley and got lost because we had no God damned internet for most of the day. How do you find directions when you cannot get onto the internet to find maps! We did finally get there and boy it was cold! There was one coffee shop open so we headed in for Dorset Apple Cake and Coffee ( coffee was A+++) we wandered around for a bit and quickly had enough plus we asked a young girl in the coffeeshop how to get to Tintagel and she told us that she had never heard of the place. OH LORD. In the car and across the bottom of England we went. We finally found Shitterton - the beginning of our naughty adventure. Shitterton consisted of a small turn off which was very easy to miss and a few streets and it all smelt a little of fresh poop while we were there!!?? So, we took photos and headed out to find the Cerne Giant. It was ...