Macabre Tours UK - Blogs

Ghosts, Murders, Tourists and the Quality of Fear Why do people enjoy being frightened? Does the subject matter, matter? At Macabre Tours UK, we run highly popular ghost tours in both Bath and in Bristol, but we also have a dedicated Jack the Ripper Tour in Whitechapel, London. One of the interesting features that we have observed is the difference between how people approach the ghost tours compared to the way they approach the true crime story of A beautiful yet infamous la

Haunted Trees of Bath The Haunting of Trees On our Bath Ghost Tour, we visit three very special trees. The first of these is haunted in its own right, with visitors describing chilling experiences beneath its branches. One marks the spot of long-forgotten atrocities, the tree acting as a marker for these dark deeds. The final tree was used to stage unofficial executions; miscreants being strung up from its branches. But why should trees be associated with hauntings? Why

The sight of a ghostly nurse, gliding through darkened corridors has long been a trope of horror movies and literature. But where does this come from? Are hospitals more haunted than other buildings? And if so, why? In Bath we have our own haunted hospital, the Mineral Waters Hospital on Upper Borough Walls. It is an imposing Georgian building that opened for business in 1739 and is currently awaiting redevelopment. Across the road is the old leper hospital and between them i

Why Do We See Ghosts at Night? It is an interesting quirk of ghost hunting that it is largely carried out at night. Why is this? Are the spirits more active during the nocturnal hours or does the daylight itself banish them, in the same way that vampire lore would have us believe? Some estimates have it that 70% of ghost sightings happen during daylight hours, yet we very much associate them with the quiet atmosphere of darkness and dwell on ghost sightings at night. It is a

It is a familiar feeling, standing at the end of a path, perhaps one restricted on both sides by walls or hedges. In the twilight shadows, it can feel a real test of will to start down upon such a path. Paths like Bath’s famous Gravel Walk can feel especially uneasy. Our human instincts scream at us that we should find a different way, avoid being trapped on the path with whatever might be there. It is, perhaps, unsurprising that some places develop reputations of being haunt