Ghosts in the Mohawk Valley

October is here and the familiar signs of Autumn are underway. The leaves on the trees continue to change color, fall harvests are complete or have finished for the year, and Halloween fun is closer than you think! Time for Ghosting Hunting in the Mohawk Valley!

Ghost hunting traditions

When the kids were teenagers they loved to binge watch any show that had to do with Ghost Hunting. As good indulgent parents, we supported the kids’ interests, so we all binged together. To add to the theme we’d turn off all the lights in the house and watch late into the night. Sometimes we’d project the shows onto a wall in the living room so the “screen” was huge. This added to the feeling we were right there with the investigators as they wandered around in creepy dark places encouraging spirits to contact them.  It was all good fun…until someone got scared. ;o)

I don’t mean that we got scared from what was on TV. After watching many hours of these programs we began to take great pleasure in finding creative ways to scare each other. Fun times indeed!

Scary Dad

During a commercial break, when one of us went to the bathroom, someone would find a dark corner to jump out from as the person exited the bathroom just after they turned off the light. AHHH!! SCREAM!!, Hahaha! – all very funny!

My personal favorite as a parent was when my kids worked as servers at restaurants. They would sometimes come home late after closing. This was prime opportunity to ensure lights were all off in the house, and I could hide behind their bedroom door as they came home from a late shift. 

I would stay up late and wait until I heard them pull into the driveway, and sneak across the house to be by their room. Hiding behind a door I could hear the front door open and close, the confident footsteps across the house, the fridge door opened and closed as they grabbed a drink, and then the soft footsteps across the carpet as they approached.

I just needed to wait for them to walk close enough but before they turned on the light. All I ever had to do was just say, “Hello” in the deepest voice I could muster. SHREEEEEEK !!! Hahaha – very funny. This one always delivered!

Rest assured, any scare tactic we parents employed, has been returned back to us by a factor of 10! All good fun and to this day we all remain fair game.

Visit MohawkValleyMuseums.us for information about ghost tours and more at historic sites happening during October.

You can find all the spooky events for October at Mohawk Valley Today Events!