It can be a delicate balance trying to plan a vacation itinerary for two friends outside of the shared interest of margaritas, shit talking, and reading, but it’s all about finding the middle ground… For instance, Amanda loves reality TV and I love all things spooky. How did we compromise on our vacation, you may ask? (Or not ask, but I’m telling you anyway) We decided to go on an after-hours paranormal investigation tour of the most haunted house in America. I know, right?
We visited the Whaley House in San Diego and honestly, it was amazing.
When we arrived for the tour at 10:30pm we realized off the bat it was going to be a different experience than what we were expecting. There were only two other people on our tour aside from the guide.
We were given the intro spiel in the Derby house, a house on the Whaley property but behind the main home. Our tour guide, Paul, seated us against a wall facing a wooden dining table in the center of the room. On the table were a dozen various types of paranormal investigation equipment. That’s when we realized we were on a self-guided tour, and would have free reign of the house.
First up, Paul points out a small cashier's bell, he tells us the bell is Mr. Derby’s favorite. As he says this, the bell chimes. We all laugh. You know me by now, dear reader, I’m a skeptic. Do I adore everything creepy, suspicious, haunted, paranormal? Yes. Do I really believe any of it? God, I want to… but no, I don’t. My immediate thought is how great Paul has his speech down for the timer on the bell.
He continues explaining all the equipment we can use and how it works when, on the table, Paul’s water bottle visibly slides four inches on its own.
“Did that—” me and one of the couple with us.
“…it did.” Amanda and the other.
Our tour guide seemed to have missed this and when we explained what happened, he seemed genuinely bummed on missing out. Nice acting, Paul, I remember thinking. Then we finished up with our intro and were led to the Whaley House.
The Whaley House used to be a bunch of different things, so there are quite a random collection of rooms among the home. There were 3 bedrooms, a kitchen, dining room, parlor, a general store, a courtroom, and an entire theater! Why was it all those things? I don’t remember. There was cool ghost stuff happening and I was distracted.
Ask wikipedia for facts, I’m just serving vibes.
We set up in the courtroom. Paul laid out all of the equipment on a table before the judge’s bench, and explained that the Whaley House is home to more than thirty-five spirits. Now, I will admit that while Paul was busy helping the other couple in our tour… I may have snagged his water bottle from the table to take a closer look. My skeptical self was on the lookout for any signs of magnets or tampering. It was just a regular, half full, bottle of Fiji water. Gotta say, my interest was piqued.
When we were given the go ahead to start exploring (even in usually off-limits areas), I was super eager to get moving. Amanda and I each chose a couple devices from the table, as Paul set up a motion-detecting music box aimed at the judge’s seat.
We settled on a couple basic EMF readers and some dowsing rods, figuring those would be the hardest to have been tampered with, and went upstairs to the theater. The house was wonderfully eerie with only a few low, flickering lights.
The EMF reader we used had five lights on it and seemed to almost always flicker to the first light, green. I climbed up on the stage and paced back and forth. Stage left my EMF reader spiked to five lights right near the curtains. I took a couple steps back and it dropped back to flickering green. I laughed and told Amanda I must have stepped in someone.
“Ask,” she suggested.
Still kind of laughing, I asked, “If I just stepped into someone can you light the reader to the second light?”
The reader lit to the second light.
After apologizing to whoever I walked through, I checked around the rest of the stage getting one and two light readings. I ventured back over to where my reader first hit five lights. I wanted to see if there was just a trigger in that location that made the readers go wild, but this time it didn’t light up at all.
I could honestly fill three or four blog posts with the play by play of the two hours we spent in the Whaley House, but I’ll resist and cut to one other story I want to share from that night.
After wandering the rooms with the EMF readers, and being asked in lights to leave one of the bedrooms, we tested out the dowsing rods. For those unfamiliar they are two metal rods, and you hold one in each hand, then keeping them perfectly still you ask your questions, usually cross the rods for yes or no, uncross, point to, etc.
One of the only rooms we couldn’t enter was the room of eighteen-month-old Thomas Whaley, partly because it still housed a lot of Thomas’ original furniture. I stood at the banister barring the room and balanced the rods.
First, I asked Thomas to cross the rods if he was in the room, and the rods crossed almost immediately.
Then I asked him to leave the rods crossed if he liked to play with Marion, another young child who died in the house. The rods stayed crossed. That was an easy one.
I asked if Marion was in the room as well, and the rods uncrossed.
Finally, I asked Thomas if he could point to where he was in the room and both rods turned to point at his little rocking chair.
Do I believe everything I encountered? shrugs vaguely
Do I have more questions than before the tour? Yes. Did I have fun? Absolutely. Would I do this again? In a heartbeat.
Was there a lesson to be learned in this story? No, not really.
The thrill of exploring the Whaley House wasn't about seeking ghosts; it was about stepping outside of my everyday, embracing the possibility of the extraordinary, and doing it all alongside a great friend. So here's to more adventures where the only real plan is to make memories—haunted or not.
Questions about our Whaley House experience? Drop me a message via Instagram!
Side note as someone asked after my previous post about San Diego: Yes, the Amanda on the trip is the same Amanda I used to cohost with!