When To Take a Guided Tour (and When Not To)
As a tour guide, I will be the first to admit that there’s a lot of stereotypes about guided tours that are true.…
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When you visit a new city, you might check out the museums, parks, and other daytime attractions, but what about its darker side? When it comes to our favorite haunted tours, we’re talking mobsters and murders, ghouls and graveyards, the secret histories that you seldom hear, all the more shocking when they’re true.
Without a local to show you the way, you might not know what lurks in the city’s past or walks the streets still after dark. Our haunted walking tours are just the ticket. While these spooky guided tours aren’t for the faint of heart, if you enjoy true crime or ghost stories and don’t mind things that go bump in the night, they’ll be the highlight of your trip.
Ready to discover some of our best ghost tours? Here are seven we love, from top-rated favorites to brand-new experiences we just launched.
Haunted Boston Walking Tour
If you want a place that oozes history — and I do mean history — look no further than Boston, where its rich history is best explored with a tour of Boston. It’s one of the oldest cities in America, founded in 1630 by Puritans fleeing religious persecution in England, and it has a slew of historic sites: Paul Revere’s house, Bunker Hill, and the USS Constitution, just to name a few.
But there are so many more sites and stories you might miss if you don’t have a local to pull back the curtain and show you. Our Haunted Boston Walking Tour begins in the late afternoon at the Boston Common, an appropriate starting point for this ghost tour. The downtown park was once home to the infamous Hanging Tree.
As the sun sinks lower, your guide leads you to the spookiest spots in historic Boston. You’ll look at the Massachusetts State House in a new light once you hear the tragic tale of Mary Dyer. You’ll stand close to the very spot where the Boston Massacre erupted in 1770, a riot that turned deadly, changing the course of world history.
We’ll also visit more than one cemetery, including Boston’s oldest, King’s Chapel Burying Ground, as well as the most haunted hotel in America. Don’t be shocked if you run into a few spirits wandering the streets just like you. This is, after all, a ghost tour.
Whether you’re visiting the city for the first time or have lived here your whole life, this is the Boston you need to see to believe.
Paris Ghost Tour
Paris is beloved for many things: the Eiffel Tower, the catacombs, artists, cathedrals, cobblestone streets, and more. With such a rich history, it shouldn’t surprise you that the city also has a mysterious side.
For example, if you’re walking on the Pont Neuf, the oldest standing bridge in Paris, at midnight, make way for the phantom coach that’s known to cross it every night. What could be scarier than a ghost coach? Oh, that barely scratches the surface of Paris’s haunted history! You might spot the ghost of the ill-fated queen, Marie Antoinette, who haunts an old royal palace or hear the phantom bell ringer of Notre Dame Cathedral.
If you’re in the mood for a good ghost story — or just want to hear about some interesting Parisian history — you can’t go wrong with our Paris Ghost Tour. The tour takes you through the heart of the City of Light after it goes dark, and it’s the perfect mix of history, architecture, and the paranormal. Do you dare to walk Paris after sunset? Be sure to bring a friend!
San Francisco’s true crime tour
You might know San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury neighborhood for its role in the Summer of Love in 1967, when more than 75,000 young adults flooded the district, sharing rooms, experimenting with LSD, and protesting against the Vietnam War. But it wasn’t all sunshine and flowers as you’ll discover on our True Crime Tales from the Haight Walking Tour.
This is where San Francisco’s Ripper, rumored to be the same as the Whitechapel villain who strangled his victims, once stalked the streets. And he wasn’t the only serial killer to terrorize the area. Maybe that’s why it has one of the most haunted roads in the city — Haight Street — a hotspot for uncanny paranormal happenings. In 1969, a particularly bloody year, more than 150 fatal crimes took place in the district. As you’ll learn, not every assassin was caught, like the notorious Zodiac Killer.
If you’re a fan of true crime, you already know how these stories can draw you in, but this tour is also for anyone interested in the secrets of the Haight or San Francisco history.
We’ll visit homes of musicians, murderers, and more as your guide shares the chilling truth behind each one. We’ll also tour some of SF’s spookiest places: Haight Street, of course, but also Terror Terrace, Lake Alvord, and the former headquarters of outlaw biker gang Hells Angels. You’ll hear strange tales, like how ordering a certain drink at one local cocktail lounge engulfs visitors in a cold, hostile aura. We’ll even walk on tombstones — as many do every day here without knowing.
Haunted Mysteries of Chicago Mob Tour
Come to the Windy City for gangsters and ghosts!
It’s no surprise that a city once ruled by the Mob is a prime pick for a really good ghost tour. The Mafia rose to power in the 1920s, leaving a legacy of vice and depravity … and more than a few unrestful departed souls who are said to haunt its quiet backstreets and century-old buildings still today.
Hear it all on our Haunted Mysteries of Chicago Mob Tour. Your guide shares ghost stories and spine-tingling yet true tales from history as you explore some of Chicago’s most famous landmarks.Does the site of the scenic Buckingham Fountain have a tragic secret behind it? Who roams the halls after dark in the Congress Plaza Hotel? What happened under the L during Al Capone’s heyday? And why is the Alley of Death a hub of paranormal activity? These are just some of the questions we’ll answer together here in Chicago. You’ll want to bring a friend for this one — there’s safety in numbers, you know.
Haunted Hollywood Walking Tour
For a city filled with bright lights, Los Angeles has plenty of ominous shadows and specters lurking behind the scenes.
Hollywood Boulevard, home to the iconic Hollywood Walk of Fame and several other famous entertainment landmarks, is sometimes called the Boulevard of Broken Dreams, a nickname evoking the struggle and despair actors, musicians, and other artists often face as they fight their way to fame.
Some of these artists, though dead, live on in more than just their work. Some still walk the streets of Hollywood… or so they say.
Our Haunted Hollywood Walking Tour: True Crime, Creepy Tales is just the right balance of true-crime history and ghost tour mystery. We cover haunted hotels, theaters, and other LA landmarks where the spirits of LA’s famous and forgotten stars still linger and where more than a few have met untimely ends.You’ll learn the grisly story of the Hollywood Sign, what happens when the lights go out at the Pantages Theatre, and where you can run into Marilyn Monroe’s ghost!
Barcelona’s Dark History Walking Tour
Think vampires don’t exist? The story of Enriqueta Martí, also known as the infamous Vampiress of the Raval, may change your mind. Her chilling story is just one of many you’ll hear in our Barcelona’s Dark History Walking Tour in El Raval.
Edgy, seedy, and historic — Raval has long been a neighborhood that collected Barcelona’s outcasts. On our tour, you’ll explore their haunts and hear their sad — and often twisted — stories. As part of the tour, you’ll stop at the former Hospital of la Santa Creu. Here you’ll wander the grounds where shows and spells of the most macabre once took place. If you like shocking tales that blur the lines between legend and true crime, don’t miss this one.
Père Lachaise Cemetery Walking Tour
Paris is a city for lovers — and even its graveyards are no exception. Père Lachaise Cemetery, the city’s most famous and largest cemetery, is known for its beautiful headstones, lavish sepulchers, and serene pathways. It’s also steeped in stories of love affairs and celebrity scandal. Like the ménage à trois with Marilyn Monroe ended up here.
If you’re more in the mood for free spirits and forbidden love than frights, our Père Lachaise Cemetery Walking Tour is for you. The tour covers the risqué (but not raunchy) histories of the celebrities who lie buried here. Their tombs may be cold, their stories will make your blood run hot.
As part of the tour, you’ll also get to see the final resting place of legendary artists, writers, and musicians, like Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf, and Jim Morrison. It’s interactive, too — a little rubbing, a little kissing — at the appropriate graves, of course.
Is a ghost tour right for you?
If you enjoy a good mystery or uncovering the hidden secrets of a city, then one of our ghost tours is perfect for you.
Parents sometimes ask if they’re appropriate for kids, and the answer is that it depends. Our ghost tours aren’t scary, but every kid is different, and parents and guardians know best if a creepy-cool tour is right for their child. Our true crime tour in SF is a little more intense — parental discretion definitely advised.
One thing we do know is that these tours are ideal for both tourists and locals. Tourists get an intimate view of the city as they visit famous landmarks while locals learn a side to their hometown most never knew before.
Most importantly, every tour, from Boston to Barcelona, is led by an expert guide with a passion for their city’s unique legacy. No cookie-cutter experiences here. Each tour is custom crafted for the destination. Plus, your guide will be happy to share insider tips for more to do in the area, whether that’s dining, entertainment, or shopping.
Here they are again — our spookiest walking tours. Click below to learn more about each one.
- Haunted Boston
- Paris Ghost Tour
- Haight-Ashbury True Crime
- Chicago Mob Tour
- Haunted Hollywood
- Barcelona’s Dark History
- Père Lachaise Cemetery
Still wondering if a ghost tour is right for you? Join us, and we’ll show you just how frightfully fun they can be!
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