The following is cut and pasted from an abandoned site, on Tripod. I would have reposted more newsletters, but I only found two.

Welcome, to The STRANGE TRAVELER Hi. I'm Fred, the Robin Leach of haunted castles, alien landing fields, mystical monoliths and really cool bars. You have just stumbled into the only travel Website on the Internet that takes a "Twilight Zone" approach to vacation planning. This is how it works: First, dim the lights. Stare deeply into your computer screen. Then imagine you are in the black-and-white world of early 1960s television, sitting in a AAA travel office filled with happy brochures on Disneyland, the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas. Suddenly, you realize that the terse, thin-lipped agent marking up your TripTik is actually Rod Serling, host of "The Twilight Zone" and one of modern society's first supernatural tour guides. In your head, you hear his clipped, dramatically inflected words offering guidance in your search for vacation ideas that don't center on theme parks, relatives or all-inclusive resorts: "You're traveling through another dimension - a dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's the signpost up ahead. Your next stop ...Alton, Illinois." Or Pascagoula, Mississippi. Or Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Paris, Roswell, Loch Ness, the Nazca Plain, Stonehenge, Area 51, The Queen Mary or that spooky old house everyone whispered about in the neighborhood you grew up in. The Strange Traveler thinks vacations should be more than sunscreen and lengthy discussions about where to eat dinner. Your travel tales should make jaws drop around the office water cooler, and widen the eyes of fellow parents on the T-ball sidelines. You see, the world is filled with Strange Travel possibilities: destinations reputed to be haunted, cursed, charmed, visited by aliens, inhabited by monsters, worshiped by strange cults, or infested by vampires, faeries and zombies. Some of these places are the doorways to true mysteries. Others are heavily hyped tourist traps. Most have overnight accommodations, lots of local color, and at least one decent bar. That's where The Strange Traveler comes in. This Website and its newsletter are your tour guides to bizarre, out-of-the-way destinations. This e-zine both guides readers to strange places they can visit, and advises them of the supernatural undercurrents flowing beneath traditional getaways. Travel Advisories ===================================================================================================================== Strange Travel Advisories ... Strange Travel Advisories ...Strange Travel Advisories ... _ July 10. Mummified monk has red lacquer day Modern science can't figure out why the body of Vu Khac Minh, a 17th century Buddhist Monk, hasn't rotted in the jungle heat of Vietnam. Minh sits in a lotus position inside a glass case in the Dau Pagoda about 30 miles south of Hanoi. Unlike mummies elsewhere in the world, this one still has all his internal organs, according to a BBC News report. Legend has it that when Minh felt death closing in on him in 1639, he locked himself in his pagoda and asked to be left alone. One hundred days later, his disciples opened the door and found his body perfectly preserved. They figured he had reached nirvana and decided to preserve his body in red lacquer. The original coating, however, is starting to crack around Minh's head and legs. The Vietnamese government recently gave scientists permission to slap on another coat. **_** July 7. Romanians plan "Dracula Land" theme park Romanian officials hoping to immortalize the countries infamous, bloody hero as a tourist attraction hope to begin construction of "Dracula Land" this year near the medieval city of Sighisoara in Central Romania. The 148-acre amusement park will celebrate the Romanian national hero Vlad Tepes, better known as "Vlad the Impaler," Agence France-Presse reported. Tepes is thought to be the inspiration for Bram Stoker's thirsty undead count in his novel, "Dracula." The project will cost about $32 million and is expected to draw a million tourists a year. Organizers are counting on attracting a large number of Germans, Tourism Minister Matei Dan said. ____ July 6. Is psychic fare fair? The city council in Pueblo, Colo., is debating a measure that would end its long-time ban on psychics who charge for their services in exchange for a $25 annual license fee and a criminal background check. The proposal has rankled some psychics who make a living giving others advice about lottery numbers, cheating spouses and job promotions, according to an article in The Pueblo Chieftan. "Why should people with this gift have to pay a business license fee to the city?" asked Patty Artichoker, an ally of the psychics.  Local police fear dropping the ban will lead to many residents paying large sums of money to unscrupulous pseudo psychics. _ July 4. Sewer lizards terrorize Big Apple New York City's most prevalent urban legend got a boost this week from some enterprising hoaxers who plastered the city's manhole covers with official-looking stickers reading: "Stay clear. Sewer lizard fumigation in progress." Pranksters have handed out cards in busy areas informing people of the spraying and directing residents to a website (www.sewer-alert.org). The site describes the fumigation as an effort to kill 10-foot, 200-pound mutated lizards that evolved from reptile pets flushed down city toilets in the 1960s, according to New York Daily News. The myth began 40 years ago after a trend of people keeping lizards and baby alligators as pets resulted in many or the animals getting flushed down city toilets when they got too big. _____ June 29. Canadian Bigfoot makes an impression Residents of a Native American reservation about 1,000 miles north of Toronto recently discovered 14-inch footprints they think may have been left by a mysterious ape man that elders have talked about for generations. "It's definitely not a bear," Abraham Hunter, chief of the 260-member band, told Toronto's National Post. The tribe, however, has reportedly not ruled out Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti or Shaquille O'Neil. __ June 27. Loch Ness believers shaken, not stirred Persistant sightings of a lake monster in Scotland's most famous body of water are likely caused by the combination of an active geologic fault and a very imaginative regional culture, according to an Italian scientist. The same mix of earthquake activity and primal fear could account for Greece's Oracle at Delphi and other sites the ancient world associated with dragons or supernatural forces, Luigi Piccardi, a Florence researcher, told World Reporter. Beneath Loch Ness runs the Great Glen fault, one of the few active fault lines in Great Britain, Piccardi said. Its rumblings could cause a churning on the surface of the lake. A regional culture predisposed toward making and preserving myths could do the rest, he said. Hmmm. This could explain a lot of the things I've seen in Los Angeles.... __ June 25. The cave conversationalist Ghostly voices from a cave in a remote village in Dubai have driven 50 families from their homes, according to World Reporter. Every night, residents of the Village of Al Jeer gather at the mouth of the cave to listen for what sounds like a man's heavy breathing. Fear, however, has kept anyone from actually entering the cave, World Reporter wrote. Travel advisory: Dubai would NOT be a good place for an asthma attack. ____ June 24. Hundreds pack cover-up conference More than 600 people crowded a 500-seat University of Colorado auditorium to watch two hours of video testimony from former government and military workers about extraterrestrial beings and our government's efforts to monitor them. The screening was part of "The Disclosure Project", a North Carolina physician's attempt to get Congress to hold hearings on the government's alleged interaction with alien life forms. The physician, Dr. Steven Greer, told those gathered that he believes people from another planet are monitoring the earth. Fascinating. Who would've thought reality TV would catch on outside the solar system? _ June 21. Witch trials a bad acid trip. It wasn't witchcraft that caused eight teenage girls to have convulsive fits, prickly skin and hallucinations in Salem, Mass., in 1691. It was an LSD-like fungus, according to a PBS program, "Secrets of the Dead II". The symptoms shown by the girls who were allegedly "hexed" by Salem's witches could by explained by the effects of a fungus that infected the village's rye crop, according to D. Linda Caporael, a behavioral psychologist. Caporael, who grew up in San Francisco during the psychedelic `60s, noticed the similarit ___ June 17. Bats swarm Vegas hotel The Luxor Casino is one of the most bizarre hotels in the world, even by over-the-top Las Vegas standards. This gigantic, pyramid-shaped hotel stuffed with King Tut-themed craps tables and slot machines is also haunted by an ancient curse, some unlucky ghosts and the occasional flying saucer. Now, the hotel's "sky beam," a column of light pouring from the top of the pyramid that's so bright you can see it from 250 miles away, has created a new Strange attraction. Bats have discovered the smorgasbord of bugs attracted to the light, and swarm there by the thousands, according to The Los Angeles Times. Motorists have started pulling over to watch the frenetically flapping clouds of winged rodents. Most of the bats are common, Brazilian free-tailed bats. None are the bloodthirsty vampire kind, although that doesn't mean you won't find any suckers in Las Vegas. _____ June 15. Salem may officially tell "witches" it made boo boo Three centuries after the good people of Salem, Mass., executed 20 people accused of practicing witchcraft, the descendents of five of the women put to death by the infamous witch trials are lobbying to have their ancestors exonerated. In 1957, the Massachusetts Legislature approved a resolution specifically clearing the name of one of the accused, but identifying others worthy of exoneration only as "certain other persons," according to CNN.com. The hysteria that claimed 20 people's lives and led to the arrest of about 180 more, has been a lucrative legacy for Salem, which bills itself as "The Witch City". The town draws thousands of tourists - and real, practicing witches - to see its witch museums, witch statures and witch shops filled with potions, spells and commemorative T-shirts. ________ June 13. Plans underway to clone Dracula A group of U.S. businessmen wants to dig up the remains of Vlad the Impaler, the Romanian prince who inspired Bram Stoker's original vampire novel, and scrape out the genetic material needed to clone the infamous count. "I am sure he was not as bad as people have made out," Nicolae Padararu, president of the Transylvanian Society of Dracula, told World Reporter. "If we could meet him in the flesh, I am sure we would clear up some of the more negative images that have grown up about him." Yeah. That bit about publicly impaling all his enemies was probably just media spin. The group has talked with the creators of Dolly the Sheep, who basically rolled their eyes and said, "We'll get back to you." Romanian newspapers, however, report that the group is serious and is actively pursuing the idea. _ **June 11. Room service, get me ... oh thanks. ** Wouldn't it be great if the staff of your next hotel knew exactly what you wanted, when you wanted it, without you ever having to deal with that condescending little guy at the front desk? Well, Loews Coronado Bay Resort in San Diego may be working on that kind of psychic service. The hotel recently hired a Iris Carlton, a so-called psychic "intuit", to work with its 18-member management team, according to a report in the Chicago Sun Times. The one-hour sessions were offered as a way to motivate managers and move them "to the next step," said Kathleen Cochran, general manager of the hotel. Can Miss Cleo's room service or Sylvia Browne's valet parking be far behind? ____ June 9. Ghost gator moves to Midwest An 8-foot-long ghost alligator is haunting the Milwaukee County Zoo this summer. Although the pale reptile with the white, leathery skin avoids the sun, preys at night and comes from the mysterious bayou country outside New Orleans, zoo officials say there is nothing supernatural about him. Archbishop Antoine Blanc - even reptiles get funny names in N'awlins - isn't even an albino. He's something rarer: a leucistic. Instead of lacking the dark pigment of melanin like albinos, this alligator has two recessive genes that produce their white color, according to an article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal. The archbishop has 13 surviving siblings, all of which suffer from the same problem. They are the only known alligators of their kind, and  live together at an alligator farm in Golden Meadow, La., that's owned by an oil and gas company. The ghost gator arrived in Milwaukee several weeks ago. He will be on display through Sept. 3. ____ June 5. Short, flying man spotted in Turkey Authorities sealed off a field near the village of Narli in the Usak province of Turkey, and scientists were called in to investigate claims that a space alien had landed in the area Ayhan Cevik, governor of the province, told the Associated Press that he doubted the claim, but had ordered the area cordoned off to be safe. A man and two women apparently spotted the alien while riding a tractor to a tobacco field. They said they threw stones at the creature, which was wearing a shiny, yellow-gray outfit with an amber light on the front. The alleged alien was about two feet tall with a wide, round head and wide eyes. "It didn't have wings or propellers, but it could fly upward," witness Fevzi Cam said. Two other villagers said they saw strange lights in the area. ____ uthorities sealed off a field near Narli village in the Usak province of Turkey and scientists were called in to investigate claims that a space alien had landed in the area. AAA June 4. Irish wart-curing well in trouble A well used since pagan times to cure ills ranging from warts to backache is threatened by a new highway, residents of County Meath told Reuters News Service. St. Ciaran's well near Kells is on a pilgrimage route used for centuries. It would be made almost inaccessible under a plan to upgrade a busy nearby highway, said Oliver Usher, who gives guided tours of the area. The well has its cherished rituals. The cure for warts, for example, requires that the sufferer not speak to anyone on the way home after obtaining a sample of water. Once a day for three weeks water must be sprinkled on the wart. At the end of three weeks it will be gone. Legend says it does the same thing for the common cold after a week to 10 days. __ June 1. UN moves to protect sacred sites The extremist whackos who run Afghanistan stone women to death for infidelity and force Hindus to wear identification patches similar to the Stars of David Hitler required during the Holocaust's warm-up. But it took the dynamiting of two ancient religious statues to provoke a global outcry. The United Nations this week passed its first-ever resolution protecting religious sites, primarily in response to the Taliban's destruction of  the world's tallest standing Bhudda statues at the historic site of Bamiyan. The resolution calls on all countries to pass laws against threats of violence against religious sites and to promote respect of them. That could be good news for Strange Travelers - as long as they include Druid megaliths, mystical vortexes and chapels made from skeletons on the list of religious sites. It COULD be good news, that is, until somebody calls them on it. Somehow, I can't see the baby-blue helmeted forces of the UN storming a beach to save a saint's mummified jawbone or a sacred Wiccan tree. _ orities sealed off a field near Narli village in the Usak province of Turkey and scientists were called in to investigate claims that a space alien had landed in the area. May 31. Couch potatoes want to believe A recently published study by a Purdue University professor found that heavy television watchers are more likely to believe in supernatural phenomena like ESP, UFOs, reincarnation, haunted houses, angels, devils and the abominable snowman than normal human beings. The survey, by communications professor Glenn Sparks, found that TV habits had more to do with folks' willingness to believe than their religious practices did. Trekkies binging on late-night "Deep Space Nine" reruns, for example, are more likely to see space aliens. "Buffy" fans might be more inclined to get hickies from vampires, and "Touched by an Angel" devotees are more likely to believe that they have been. To me, the implications are clear ... I've got to watch more "Xena Warrior Princess". _ May 30. SETI finds life in cyberspace Several hundred of the millions of computer users enlisted in the search for intelligent life in outer space had a close encounter over the Memorial Day weekend that had them reaching for their dictionaries. Computer geeks with time on their hands attacked the Berkeley, Calif. servers of the <SETI@home> project and harvested information on as many as 50,000 volunteers, according to an article posted by MSNBC. More than three million people around the world participate in <SETI@home>, using their home computers to analyze radio signals collected by the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. <SETI@home> is a screen saver that uses the computing power of PCs to search "units" of information from Arecibo for anomalies. Those anomalies could indicate someone out there is trying to communicate with us. But, instead of hearing from E.T., hundreds of volunteers this weekend received disturbing e-mail messages from the "UFCF Team 2001," alerting them that security had been breached and SETI's "intire" user database had been stolen. Repeated e-mail requests for the hackers to spell "Mississippi" went unanswered. ___ May 29. Mars creates red light district in London Astronomers in Great Britain are bracing for a flood of UFO sightings this month, as the planet Mars gets closer to the earth than it has been in two years. Mars will appear as a bright red circle hanging low in the horizon, according to an article in London's Daily Mail. Because it is so low, it is likely to appear to many motorists as though something strange is keeping pace with their car just above the treetops, experts with the Royal Astronomical Society said. The red planet will be at its closest to earth on June 13. It should remain visible as an unusually bright object in the sky for about two months. _ May 28. Close encounters of the herd kind Ranchers in Burleson County, Texas are getting frustrated with local authorities' failure to get to the bottom of a decade-long string of mysterious cattle deaths and mutilations. The deaths, which UFO followers in this and other parts of the country often attribute to extraterrestrial experimentation, are most likely the work of some kind of cult, ranchers told the Abilene Reporter-News. Once or twice a year, a rancher in this rural area about 100 miles from Houston find a dead bull with his abdomen sliced open and his genitals missing. Sometime, the tongues and internal organs are gone as well. Always, the prime cuts of beef are left to rot in the sun. Local authorities have found no tire tracks, shoe prints, cigarette butts or shell casings near the carcasses, so have concluded the animals died of natural causes. So, why the selective dissection? Officially, it is attributed to skunks, possums and other scavengers who experts say tend to go after the softest tissue first Throughout cyberspace, male visitors to this website just convulsed in a silent, but unanimous, crotch check. ____ May 28. Bruce Springsteen: Rock 'n Roll Shaman Plenty of people in New Jersey think Bruce Springsteen is God. In fact, the owner of an Asbury Park Park nightclub recently credited him with having supernatural powers. In Newark's Star-Ledger, the owner of the Stone Pony said an impromptu appearance by The Boss at his club chased away dark clouds that had threatened to drown out the Pony's anniversary celebration. That normally wouldn't be worth mentioning, except that I saw him do the exact same thing.  I was sitting in the rain at an outdoor concert in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. in 1985, when Springsteen walked out on stage about 40 minutes early. He was alone, and carried an acoustic guitar. When the cheering died down, he sat down on a stool. With no backup, The Boss played his version of "Who'll Stop the Rain?" The clouds parted. The rain stopped. Honest. And no, I wasn't smoking anything. _____ May 27. Nazca Lines Threatened by Progress The enigmatic Nazca Lines - giant figures of animals and geometric shapes carved into the rock and sand of Peru's coastal desert 2,000 years ago - are being erased. These are the lines that "Chariots of the Gods" author Erich von Daniken claimed were actually landing instructions for ancient astronauts. New Agers the world over travel here because it is one of the supposed "power places" where lines of invisible mystical energy converge. Unfortuneatly, those aren't the only folks drawn here. Over the last decade, trucks from nearby copper and gold mines, floods and mudslides from El Nino weather patterns, and infrastructure construction by utility companies are defacing the shapes, which have baffled archeologists for decades, according to an article in The Plain Dealer of Cleveland.  Advertisers and political campaigns have carved modern messages between the designs, which are popular tourist attractions. "If we do not act quickly to perserve these sites, the world may lose out on an oportunity to understand some of the earliest known and greatest secrets of ancient human civilization," said Alberto Urbano of Peru's National Institute of Culture. __ May 26. Werewolves and Monkeys and Bears, Oh My Villagers in India's remote Assam state have reported a spate of attacks by man-like furry creatures similar to the "Monkey Man" whose alleged rampage has caused hysteria in New Delhi, the nation's capital, this spring, according to a May 26 report posted on CNN.com. Some accounts say the new creature, which roars loudly and disappears whenever it is confronted by light, resembles a bear. Other reports say it is more wolf-like, and is able to enter homes even when the door is locked, according to an article in The Indian Express. Reuters news service reported more than 20 people have been injured in the attacks. Villagers have organized all-night patrols and performed rituals against evil spirits. Indian officials who investigated are dismissing the attacks as "figments of people's imagination" and mass hysteria.   List Name Strange Traveler (Strange Traveler) Purpose: This is a travel guide to paranormal vacation destinations that are haunted, mystical, visted by ufos or space aliens, inhabited by monsters, infested with vampires or just plain bizarre. Website URL: http://members.tripod.com/strangetraveler List Type: Announcement (read only) Subscription: Does not require owner approval Archive: Readable by subscribers only Created: Jun 04, 2001 Owner: Frederic Pierce To Join: Subscribe here, or send an email to Strangetraveler-subscribe@topica.com Stats: 1320 subscribers / < 1 messages per week   the S T R A N G E T R A V E L E R The Best Vacation Ideas This Side of The Other Side Tuesday, July 31, 2001 Fellow Travelers, Welcome, to the only travel newsletter on the Internet that defines a "necktie" as two vampires reaching the same victim simultaneously. Today's visitations include: * BRAM STOKER'S FOOTPRINTS * ENGLAND'S DRACULA EXPERIENCE * HAUNTED WHITBY ABBEY * TRAVEL ADVISORIES ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? BRAM STOKER'S FOOTPRINTS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Everybody - from my preschool son to the barely functional glue head sleeping under the downtown bridge - knows that Count Dracula, the world's most infamous vampire, lived in Transylvania. It's a tenant of American culture; a nugget of knowledge as universal as the pledge of allegiance and the sexy parts of the Starr report. Romania, the former Eastern bloc country that counts Transylvania as one of its poverty-stricken provinces, has begun taking advantage of this. Its tourism board has sponsored Dracula forums for academics, created Dracula tours for travelers and churned out reams of historic literature about Vlad Tepes, the bloody Romanian folk hero who inspired "Dracula" author Bram Stoker. Plans are on the drawing board for a Draculaland theme park. (No, that's not a joke. Just imagine your Mickey Mouse beanie replaced by Nosferatu ears.) But Romania isn't the only country trying to cash in on people's lasting fascination with fangs. Both England and Scotland have laid claim to parts of the Dracula legend and are courting travelers who may be curious about the count. The English town of Whitby has the most obvious connection, and the one we're going to focus on today. Whitby was the first of the two to develop its fictional vampire heritage into a marketing tool. Located about 50 miles northeast of York on the North Sea, this community of 14,000 served as the setting for several chapters in Stoker's novel. The city of Aberdeen, Scotland, however, claims to have inspired Stoker before the Irish writer stumbled upon Whitby. The Aberdeen tourist board has revamped its tourism campaign and is promoting the ruins of a 16th century castle and the steep cliffs and rocky shore of Cruden Bay as the true source of Stoker's imagination. The heads of the two tourist boards slugged it out on BBC television early this spring, according to a recent article in the Scottish Daily Record. Which group is right? Maybe both. Maybe neither. My money, however, is on Whitby. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? ENGLAND'S DRACULA EXPERIENCE ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There's a bench on the west cliff overlooking Whitby Harbor that all Strange Travelers should visit at least once. Bring a breakfast thermos of bloody Marys and your tattered copy of "Dracula." Read chapters six through eight while sitting on the bench, and watch the novel come to life before you. Gaze across the harbor to the east cliff where the red-roofed houses seem to pile up on top of each other against the hillside, just like Stoker's character Mina Harker described. At the top of the cliff are St. Mary's Church and its graveyard of limestone markers, worn blank by the North Sea wind. This is the graveyard where Stoker's ill-fated character Lucy is first seduced by the count. Towering above it all are the ruins of Whitby Abbey and the 199 stone steps described by Stoker that lead down the cliff face. Below are the cold sand beaches that welcomed the Russian schooner "Demeter," the ship that brought Dracula to England from Transylvania. In the book, the ship's captain is dead and lashed to the wheel. The crew is missing. The only sign of life on board is a huge, black, dog-like creature that dives from the ship and disappears into the narrow alleys of Whitby's east side. A real Russian schooner called "Demitrius" washed ashore on those sands in 1885, about a decade before Stoker visited Whitby for a holiday weekend. He knew the story that he wanted to write, but needed inspiration for a setting, according to "A Walk in Whitby", a guidebook. (<http://www.roamintoursofyork.freeserve.co.uk/pages/drac.html>) The inspiration allegedly came during a visit to Whitby in 1890, just after he'd started putting his ideas for his vampire novel to paper. Stoker allegedly spent hours gazing across the harbor from a vantage point on the west cliff. You can look at the view and read Mina Harker's description of Whitby at <http://members.nbci.com/_XMCM/ripbeks/whitbyindex.html>. The Bram Stoker Memorial Seat was erected on the southern end of the West Cliff by the Scarborough Borough Council and the local Dracula Society in 1980. ([http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~emiller/whitby.htm](http://www.ucs.mun.ca/%7Eemiller/whitby.htm). This might be a good time to refresh your memory of the Dracula story. If you've never read the book or seen one of the movie or television adaptations (They're more common than "Police Academy" sequels.) there's a good abridged version at the Whitby website: <http://www.whitby-uk.com/dracula>. Whitby has gone out of its way to mark and memorialize every possible sight in the town that had a place in the novel. You can pick up a Whitby Dracula Trail guide at the tourist information center, and spend the day walking in Stoker's footsteps. The lawyer who arranged Dracula's passage to Whitby, for example, lived at No. 7, The Crescent, a location that's clearly marked. The colorful "Dracula Experience" at 9 Marine Parade in Whitby, (call 01947 601923 ) offers an interactive journey through the novel. With the help of live actors, animation, special lighting and sound effects, this well-designed house of horror tells the story of the most famous vampire of them all. The museum is one of the biggest tourist draws in the town and spawned The Whitby Dracula Society, a group that sponsors events and concerts in the same vein as Dracula. The society has a new Website up at <http://www.ninemuses.demon.co.uk/wds/>. It sponsors Gothic Holiday weekends featuring head-slamming bands with names like Intra-Venus, Slimelight and Killing Miranda, as well as special "Tramps and Vamps" entertainment nights at local pubs or hotels. Check the society's website to find out what's going on. If you'd rather go looking for strangeness with a genuine Man in Black, contact Harry Collett; story walker, tour guide, singer, broadcaster, writer, author and raconteur. (At least that's what his business card says.) Harry runs a variety of historic and supernatural walking tours of Whitby, including "In Search of Dracula", a stroll that dares participants to "Walk and talk where Dracula stalked ... follow the trail and linger in the streets where vampires still abound." ([http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~fcoll/InSearchOfDracula.html](http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/%7Efcoll/InSearchOfDracula.html)) Harry dresses in funeral-parlor-black top hat and tails and wears heavy, blues-singer sunglasses. His knowledge of Whitby is said to be bottomless, and his story-telling technique apparently includes bursting out into spontaneous song. Show tunes, black spirituals, ancient seafaring ditties - it doesn't matter: Harry's got it covered. When he's not out walking and talking, Harry Collett is helping run his family's inn, the Ashford Guest House, 8 Royal Crescent in Whitby. ([http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~fcoll/agh.html](http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/%7Efcoll/agh.html)) This is where I recommend you stay in Whitby. As far as I know, it's not haunted, but it does have a nice view of the sea and the royal crescent gardens. Besides, you're with Harry. He knows so many haunted places in Whitby that he created "Whitby Ghost Walks" to point them all out. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? HAUNTED WHITBY ABBEY ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ One of those haunted places is Whitby Abbey. The majestic ruins were first built on the cliff's edge in Whitby around 657 A.D. It was sacked by Vikings about 200 years later, and rebuilt by conquering Normans in 1067. It was founded by St. Hilda, who saw the 199-step climb up the cliff face from Whitby as a test of faith. (<http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/Hilda_Whitby.htm>) St. Hilda died in 680 AD, but many people think she still wanders the abbey. Her ghost, wrapped in a shroud, frequently appears in one of the abbey's highest windows, according to the Ghosts of England website. ([http://miavx1.muohio.edu/~kielyka/england.htm](http://miavx1.muohio.edu/%7Ekielyka/england.htm).) Sightings were numerous enough a century ago to lead Stoker to include the tale of the apparition in "Dracula." St. Hilda is also thought to be responsible for one of the most bizarre apparitions I've ever heard of. Visitors to the abbey have reported a large, hearse-like coach, guided by a headless driver and four headless horses, racing along the cliff's edge. Its mad dash always ends with a plunge off the cliff. Hilda gets the blame because of her peculiar - but effective - method of ridding the area of snakes. Armed like Indiana Jones with a long, nasty whip, the no-nonsense nun would drive the reptiles to the cliff's edge and crack their heads off with the lash. Folks, I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried. Back then, nuns didn't have much use for tolerance. Constance de Beverley, a rather pitiful spirit said to haunt the abbey ruins, found that out the hard way. De Beverly was a young nun who broke her vows after falling for a gallant knight. The wayward girl wasn't advised to say a few thousand Hail Marys or told to pack up and go back to the farm. No, back then, they knew how to deal with fornicators. They bricked her up alive in a dungeon wall, where she died screaming like the unlucky sot in Poe's "Cask of Amontillado." To this day, people say they've seen her on the winding stairway leading from the dungeon, cowering and begging to be set free. And then there are some entities hanging around the abbey's stone carcass that defy explanation. Tony Spera, a former police officer, wrote about an early morning visit to the abbey and his subsequent run-in with a miniature black cyclone that pulsed and spun but made no sound. Spera identified it as "evil itself," and said one of his companions chased it away with liberal splashes of holy water. You can read the account for yourself at <http://www.warrens.net/england2.htm>. The abbey is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day during the warm months. It closes two hours earlier during the winter. Call ahead before you go: 01947 603568. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? TRAVEL ADVISORIES ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Those of you who have checked, know that I've been having some serious technical difficulties with my website. I suppose it's only fitting that a site dedicated to paranormal vacations should be filled with gremlins and unexplained phenomena, but it sure is annoying. So annoying, in fact, that I've given up trying to fix the Travel Advisories page that many of you found difficult to read. That page will be scrapped, but I plan to continue with the concept - via e-mail. In between your regular Strange Traveler newsletters, you should soon start receiving a Strange Traveler mailing focusing on travel advisories. These are paranormal or bizarre news events from all over the world that could affect your travel plans. Past advisories have updated readers on miraculous Vietnamese mummies, bat swarms in Las Vegas, UFO cover-ups in Washington DC, Canadian Bigfoot sightings, Romanian efforts to clone Vlad "The Impaler" Tepes, and much more. For a taste, go to the Travel Advisories page on my website. It should be there until I figure out how to fix the site. Anyway, let me know what you think. As always, you can contact me at: <a href=" mailto:<fred@strangetraveler.com> "</a> Well, the sun is rising ... Fred P.S. - Chances are, you are NOT the strangest person you know. Do you have any friends, co-workers, relatives, cellmates or members of your coven who might enjoy this weekly walk on the weird side? If so, just forward this e-mail to them. They can sign up by using the links below. ************************************************************ TO SUBSCRIBE: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Send an email to: <a href=" mailto:<Strangetraveler-subscribe@topica.com> "</a> OR: Go through the Topica website at <a href=" <http://www.topica.com/lists/Strangetraveler> "</a> The travel destinations and events that appear in this newsletter have been selected by me, largely on whims determined by the phase of the moon and what I ate for lunch. Apart from those offers clearly set apart from the text, none of the links presented here are paid promotions for any company or organization. Feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others. If you just use pieces of it, please give me writer's credits and list The Strange Traveler URL. Or pay me. That would be good too. (c)2001 The Strange Traveler. All rights reserved. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Welcome to ... The S T R A N G E T R A V E L E R The Best Vacation Ideas This Side of The Other Side! <http://www.strangetraveler.com> ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Monday, Nov. 19, 2001 Fellow Travelers, Welcome, to the only travel newsletter on the Internet that dares you to toilet paper and egg your motel next Halloween. Today's visitations include: * STRANGE TRAVEL AND THE NEW NORMAL * HALLOWEEN: AFTER THE CANDY * GO TO HELL IN STULL, KANSAS * SUSPICIOUS SPIRITS * LAWRENCE AND LOGISTICS ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? STRANGE TRAVEL AND THE NEW NORMAL I was ready to press the "send" button for this newsletter early last Tuesday morning, but accidentally deleted a portion of it instead. I bit my tongue, counted to 50 and went to bed. I woke up a few hours later to CNN reports that an airplane had fallen from the sky and hit New York City again. Deja vu. Evil-looking black smoke. People running, screaming, crying. Rudy Giuliani wearing his somber face. Once again, I felt like a pawn in a chess game I never agreed to play. Suddenly, delivering an Internet newsletter about visiting the gateway to Hell seemed redundant. Mailing out stories about restless spirits felt wrong. It felt cruel. It felt ... pointless. Who wants to read about scary places to travel to when the basic act of traveling itself is terrifying? That's one of many philosophical questions I've begun asking myself since Sept. 11. The world has changed over the last two months. People everywhere view travel differently than they did on Sept. 10. Goals, values and lifestyles are being privately evaluated and altered as folks cancel vacation plans in light of the War on Terror. Boredom is no longer a concern. People's desire for the different, the offbeat and the disturbing are suddenly being filled by the unbelievable events warping our reality daily. During good times, people yearn for the excitement of the dark corners of their lives. In times like these, folks yearn for the light. What does that mean for The Strange Traveler? I am seriously thinking about temporarily suspending the newsletter. With all that's going on in the world, I sometimes feel guilty tossing this newsletter into cyberspace. It feels like I'm throwing confetti at a funeral. What do you think? Has the time for The Strange Traveler come and gone? Or are there ways I can make it more relevant to the "new normal" our leaders have described? Should I offer guides to Strange destinations that offer hope and spiritual enlightenment? Or do these times call for dark, yet campy, escapism? You know, Alice Cooper, Elvira, the Addams Family; making fun of Miss Cleo. Or does this new normal mean I stay the course? Are haunted houses, monster-infested lakes and alien landing sites immune to the threat of global terrorism? I don't know. I'm at a crossroads. You can help. Let me know your thoughts about this newsletter in light of recent events. Let me know what kind of stuff you want to read. Let me know how I'm relevant. My email address, as always, is <a href=" mailto:<fred@strangetraveler.com> "</a> I look forward to hearing from you, and I promise anyone who writes will get an answer. Hey, it's cheaper than therapy. In the meantime, here's the newsletter I was going to send you before American Airlines Flight 587 nose-dived into Rockaway. With Thanksgiving on the horizon, the Halloween references are a bit out of date, but, then again, in this newsletter, Halloween is always relevant. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? HALLOWEEN: AFTER THE CANDY Last year, I spent Halloween with my oldest son, checking out the local legend of the Ghost of 13 Curves near Syracuse, NY. We found a handful of people who'd seen the apparition, a scouting crew from Fox Family's "Scariest Places on Earth" and lots of teenagers jumping out of bushes and giggling. I wrote about it last year in my "Strange Destinations" newsletter. If you missed it, drop me an e-mail and I'll send you a copy - revised just enough to avoid copyright problems. My address, as always, is <a href=" mailto: <fred@strangetraveler.com> "</a> Bobby is away at college now, so I decided this year's Halloween adventure would involve my youngest son, Joey. Problem is, he's 5. My wife and I dressed him like the kid in that "Little Vampire" movie and I took him out begging for candy. Then, after tucking him in, it was a couple of glasses of cabernet, about 40 leftover Twix bars, and an hour or so scrolling the internet newswires for indications that the Great Pumpkin had indeed found that sincere plot of farmland. That, you might recall, had been my idea for a terrorism-free Halloween: A tailgate party in a supposedly haunted pumpkin patch. A stakeout for the legendary apparition that ruined so many Halloweens for Linus Van Pelt. An excuse for staying up all night washing down all those perfectly good candies my kids thought were "yucky" with some kind of holiday-themed spirits. (I suggest Black Magic Stout, Hobgoblin ale or Old Nick barley wine. See the Beer Hunter website for more suggestions: <http://www.beerhunter.com/documents/19133-001404.html>) The concept was good. All I needed was a location. After hours of Internet searching, e-mails to my normally helpful paranormal sources and deafening silence from my Strange Traveler readers, I can reach only one conclusion: There are no more sincere pumpkin patches left in North America. Apparently, every pumpkin patch now includes an array of gourds painted and propped to resemble the cast of "The Wizard of Oz". Every patch now offers "haunted" hayrides and pawns off bundles of dead corn stalks to suburbanites as Halloween decorations. It doesn't matter. I've changed my mind about the whole thing. Why waste an evening waiting for a spirit whose roots go no deeper than the panels of a comic strip? Why wait for a supernatural vegetable, when you can use the same magic night to stalk something much, much bigger and darker? Why not stake out the Prince of Darkness? ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? GO TO HELL IN STULL, KANSAS There are more players starting for the Kansas City Royals than there are houses in Stull, Kansas, a forgotten town off Route 70 between Lawrence and Topeka. Nevertheless, next Halloween, Stull could be a great vacation destination. Think about it: No one is going to plant a bomb there. No suicidal hijacker is going to smash a 747 into a barely inhabited Midwestern hamlet. And no one within miles of the place is going to worry about opening an envelope full of mysterious powder: Stull's post office closed about a century ago. But I won't guarantee your safety next Halloween if you spend it in the old cemetery that anchors this nearly extinct Kansas town. Satan is expected to drop by. A combination of local lore, urban legend, gothic imagination and cool web sites maintains that Stull Cemetery is one of the legendary seven gates of hell. It's one of two places the devil is said to appear simultaneously on earth after midnight on Halloween night, according to a 1980 article in the Kansas City Times. The other place is somewhere in rural India. Why Stull? Rumor has it Satan's son is buried in the cemetery. According to local legend, the Devil consorted with a Stull woman who practiced witchcraft and gave birth to a son who was so deformed he couldn't survive. Both he and the witch are allegedly buried in the cemetery. Some say the ghost of the demon boy still haunts the cemetery. A few years ago, some photos surfaced of a werewolf-like boy peering out from behind a tree, according to Troy Taylor, one of the most reliable ghost experts in the business. A gravestone marked "Wiitch" is said to be the resting-place of the wolf boy's mother; Beelzebub's consort. The cemetery acquired a cult following in the early 1990s when the alternative rock band Urge Overkill released a CD titled "Stull". The cover featured a photo of the cemetery and the church and one of the songs included references to the town, hell and evil. (<http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Station/9092/>) There's a lot of information about Stull's supernatural connections, and some photographs that really give you a feel for what it's like to visit available at <http://www.geocities.com/Baja/Outback/2960/>. Ghost Source also has some decent information and photos at <http://www.ghostsource.com/location_spotlight.html>. In 1998, the caretakers of the cemetery cut down a pine tree that was said to have been used to hang a suspected witch. In modern times, Wiccans are said to have congregated around the tree during the spring equinox. When the tree came down, folks interested in the supernatural began to smell a cover-up. You can read about that legend at the Haunted Kansas website: <http://www.hauntedkansas.com/stullks.htm>. Among the legends swirling about Stull: - Neither rain nor sleet nor nuclear fallout will enter the ruins of the church, even though it no longer has a roof. The ghostly parish, in other words, is precipitation proof. - In 1993, when the Pope was flying to Colorado, he asked that the pilot fly around Kansas, into Nebraska, because the area around eastern Kansas, where Stull is located, was unholy. The source of this legend is supposed to have been Time magazine, but nobody has yet been able to come up with an issue that carries that reference. - A secret set of stairs in or near the church leads to the bowels of Hell itself. The doorway is hidden, and once you find it, a mysterious force is said to beckon you downward. People have supposedly ventured down those stairs for just a few minutes and returned to find a couple of weeks have passed. If that's true, no one ever filed a missing person's report. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? SUSPICIOUS SPIRITS Troy Taylor, editor of Prairieghosts.com (<http://www.prairieghosts.com>), is skeptical of the alleged supernatural activity in Stull. He notes that, although strange occurrences are said to have happened here for more than a century, the first published account of weirdness appeared in the University of Kansas student newspaper in 1974. The article featured interviews with students who said they'd learned of the legend from their grandparents. One student claimed to have been grabbed by the arm by an invisible assailant. Others talked about unexplained memory loss while visiting the place. I don't know about you, but when I was in college, memory loss was part of every weekend. And the residents of Stull, the supposed grandparents of the students who started the story, say they've never heard of anything like that. Well then. Dismiss it. Unless of course, you think they're lying. Remember "The Stepford Wives?" How about "The Wicker Man"? In both movies, the whole town was in on the dirty secret. Stull is a tiny place, easily organized, easily intimidated. How do you know they're not covering something up? I covered a lot of small towns and villages when I worked for a newspaper in northern New York. They routinely hid instances of substance abuse, domestic violence, nepotism and politically creative snow plowing. Once, during a meeting of the village of Evans Mills, the mayor cut a fart and tried to blame it on the village clerk. So yeah, Stull seems suspicious. Every year, on Halloween night, they post sheriff's deputies around the cemetery. (OK, there's been quite a bit of in year's past) And every year, on Halloween, right before midnight, just when the unholy one is scheduled to arrive, they kick all the media out. (The official line is, they didn't want to encourage trespassers; and they do get a lot of trespassers.) One story tells of two young men who visited Stull and got scared when wind began blowing out of nowhere. They ran back to their car, only to find it on the other side of the road from where they'd parked it, facing the opposite direction. (OK, this is familiar too. Hey, it was the 70s.) ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? LAWRENCE AND LOGISTICS Daytime visits to Stull aren't a problem. Nighttime visits could cost you as much as $100. That's the fine for trespassing. Build it into your vacation budget. But don't plan to stay overnight in Stull. You'll end up sleeping in your car. Your best bet is probably Lawrence, Ka. Stull is about 15 miles west on Route 44. Directions and a map are posted at a Stull web site created by a former Kansas State University student who made a few uneventful visits there in his cranky yellow car, "the Flying Dog Turd." The site's also got some photos. Check it out at [http://jove.prohosting.com/~chads/stull/index.html](http://jove.prohosting.com/%7Echads/stull/index.html). Lawrence has a thriving arts community and a well-established blues scene. You can check it out at <http://www.visitlawrence.com/index.shtml>. It also has the Eldridge Hotel. (<http://www.eldridgehotel.com>) This historic building, once known as the Free State Hotel in the slave state of Kansas, has had its share of legendary hauntings. In the latter part of the 19th century, this building burned several times. In 1863, it was the focus of Quantrill's raiders, a rampaging unit of 300 to 400 pro-slavery thugs whose orders were to "kill every man and burn every house" in Lawrence. (<http://www.ci.lawrence.ks.us/local_history/quantril/quanraid.html>) The Elbridge Hotel that stands today contains an original cornerstone used in its rebuilding after Quantrill's raid. During Quantrill's sacking of Lawrence, many hotel guests died in the smoke and flames. Their tortured spirits are said to remain. There are numerous cold-spots throughout the home, doors open and close inexplicably, and lights flash on and off without explanation, according to The Shadowlands web page: <http://theshadowlands.net/places/kansas.htm>. If you stay there, ask for Room 506 and you may not have to trek all the way out to Stull. The room, while not a rumored gateway to Hell, has a reputation as a "portal to the spirit world," according to The Shadowlands. Lights flicker there for no apparent reason and breath marks have appeared on recently cleaned mirrors. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? So, what do you think? Is there a place for The Strange Traveler in this not-so-brave new world? As always, you can contact me at <a href=" mailto:<fred@strangetraveler.com>."</a> Well, the sun is rising ... Fred P.S. - Chances are, you are NOT the strangest person you know. Do you have any friends, co-workers, relatives, cellmates or members of your coven who might enjoy this weekly walk on the weird side? If so, just forward this e-mail to them. They can sign up by using the links below. ************************************************************ TO SUBSCRIBE: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Send an email to: <a href=" mailto:<Strangetraveler-subscribe@topica.com> "</a> OR: Go through the Topica website at <a href=" <http://www.topica.com/lists/Strangetraveler> "</a> The travel destinations and events that appear in this newsletter have been selected by me, largely on whims determined by the phase of the moon and what I ate for lunch. Apart from those offers clearly set apart from the text, none of the links presented here are paid promotions for any company or organization. Feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others. If you just use pieces of it, please give me writer's credits and list The Strange Traveler URL. Or pay me. That would be good too. (c)2001 The Strange Traveler. All rights reserved.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   I expect I did track down something of Fred. I'm not sure, 100%. Strange CNY - http://blog.syracuse.com/strangecny/about.html  

About the Author

I'm Frederic Pierce, your tour guide to all that is offbeat and unbelievable in Central New York. From haunted bathrooms and telepathic cats to bizarre yard ornaments and alien abductions, this is the place to share the kind of tales that make people look at you funny. Every day, I'll update you on the latest strange happenings in the Syracuse region and beyond. And I'll use this blog as a bulletin board for readers just dying to share their own unusual stories and sightings. My qualifications? After spending more than two decades as a newspaper reporter -- much of it covering politics - I tend to be skeptical about EVERYTHING. That same experience, however, has taught me that just about anything is possible. I've learned not to ever say, "Well, now I've seen it all." Because that's when life will throw me an oddball, just to prove me wrong. When I'm not pulling together Central New York's version of "The X-Files," I'm a general assignment reporter for The Post-Standard's Onondaga County team, focusing on Syracuse's Eastern suburbs. I also teach journalism at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. When I'm not working, I'm with my family in Camillus, a short walk from the allegedly haunted Split Rock explosion site, living in a house where sink faucets turn on by themselves. Some blame spirits. I blame old plumbing.

-------- Original Message -------- Subject: THE STRANGE TRAVELER: New Jersey's spooky sanitarium Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2001 08:40:45 +0000 From: Frederic Pierce <fpierce@...> Reply-To: fpierce@... To: Strangetraveler@...

============================================================

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Welcome to ...

       The  S T R A N G E  T R A V E L E R

The Best Vacation Ideas This Side of The Other Side!

http://www.strangetraveler.com

????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Monday, Aug. 20, 2001

Fellow Travelers,

Welcome, to the only travel newsletter on the Internet that believes a $150 trespassing fine can be shrugged off as the admission price to something somebody doesn't want you to see.

Today's visitations include:

• NEW JERSEY'S SPOOKY SANITORIUM
• GHOSTBUSTING WITHOUT GETTING BUSTED
• THE ANARCHIST'S FOOTPRINTS
• NEIGHBORING NEWARK

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NEW JERSEY'S SPOOKY SANITORIUM

If you don't visit this strange destination within the next
few weeks, you will have lost your chance forever.

Up for the challenge? Be forewarned:

This trip will require courage.

It will require cunning.

It will require a case of your favorite malt liquor.

It is a trip best suited to high school rebels, beer-binging
college students and 40-something males in full-blown
mid-life crisis.

I'm talking about a covert expedition to what remains of the
Overbrook Sanitarium. (Listen closely; you should hear
lightning strike and horses whinny every time I mention that
name)

Tucked inside a forest in the middle of suburban Essex
County, N.J., the sanitarium's century-old buildings have
long been magnets for ghost-hunters and bored young thrill
seekers.

The ruins are a breached fortress of massive stone
buildings, underground tunnels and treatment rooms scattered
with the mildewed files of long-forgotten patients. Hundreds
of tuberculosis patients died in agony within the walls of
their complex, and their tortured spirits are thought to
still shuffle though its cracked and graffiti-covered
corridors.

Ghost-like figures have been seen melting in and out of the
shadows. Some people say they have heard the high-pitched
laughter of children playing near the special ward that was
built for terminally ill children.

Some eerie photos of a strange, wraith-like mist inside some
of the buildings are posted at
http://www.mountainsanitarium.net under the "Hauntings"
section. So many people died at Overbrook, that they were
forced to add a large morgue. Many visitors to the ruins
have reported feeling an otherworldly "presence" inside. At
least some of them hadn't been chugging blackberry brandy or
smoking pot at the time.

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GHOSTBUSTING WITHOUT GETTING BUSTED

The sanitarium has been closed and vacant since the 1970s. Over the last several decades, vandals and arsonists have accelerated the buildings' natural decay and added a thin carpet of trash and shattered bottles.

County officials, in an effort to stop the constant trespassing on the site, have been gradually demolishing the sanitarium's 11 buildings since the early 1990s. As of this writing, only four remain. By Halloween, town officials plan to have erased nearly every physical structure on the site to make way for a nature preserve and a commercial park, according to recent articles in the Newark Star Ledger. (http://www.mountainsanatorium.net/updates.htm)

That deadline, coupled with a few websites that either tell ghost stories about the place or tout its virtues as a juvenile delinquent's Disney Land, have dramatically increased tourist traffic to the site. Officials have cracked down, but the sanitarium's lure seems stronger than the law.

They tried posting trespassing signs on the road leading to Overbrook. Visitors just hike through the woods off Mountain Avenue in North Caldwell. If you get lost, just look for a large rock with "Death" spray-painted on it, along with an arrow pointing toward the sanitarium.

Police have tried driving patrol cars onto the grounds to catch trespassers, but savvy youths responded by pulling the security chain across the entrance and locking it, trapping the cops inside, according to a Star Ledger article. In desperation, county and local police have extended checks on the place into the early morning hours and conduct three to four "sweeps" of the campus every day. When they catch someone, they slap them with a $150 fine.

So, is the theme song from "Mission Impossible" running through your inner ear? Here's some advice for this mission, should you choose to accept it:

• Sneak in during the daytime. Contrary to popular belief,

ghosts don't necessarily prefer darkness. Not only can you see where you are going, but you don't give yourself away by waving a flashlight that can be seen from a patrol car half a mile down the road.

• Bring a map. A couple of detailed ones are posted at

http://www.welcometohell.net/map.htm. You can also print out a rough diagram that identifies the buildings that are still standing at http://www.mountainsanitorium.net/plotplanad.htm.

• Be mature about this immature excursion. Kids drink, smoke

and start campfires in the buildings because they are, well, because they are kids. Guys with bald spots and women worried about the babysitter don't have that excuse. Be responsible in your irresponsibility. If a cop with a ticket pad stops you, you don't want to be slurring your words. You want to retain your ability to look wide-eyed and innocent, adopt a fake foreign accent and ask if you're going in the right direction for the local INS office.

If you want to play it safe, and I'll admit I'm at that mortgage- and tax- and tuition-paying stage of life where I give the safe route some serious consideration, you can take a virtual tour of Overbrook by clicking http://www.midnightsociety.com/web/Abandoned/index.html and selecting "Essex Mountain Sanitarium."

The next best thing to being there is definitely http://www.welcometohell.com. The photos, history and first-person commentary of Wheeler Antabanez made me long for the days when I was a confused, live-for-the-moment youth and made me want to visit Overbrook.

And that is exactly why local authorities think Antabanez is so dangerous.

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THE ANARCHIST'S FOOTPRINTS

During an Aug. 7 town meeting in the borough of North
Caldwell, Essex County Chief of Staff William Abele said
that the biggest law-enforcement problem associated with
Overbrook was Antabanez's website. If they could shut the
website down, Able claimed, everyone would forget about the
place and stop coming, according to the Star Ledger.

Wheeler Antabanez is the pseudonym of Matt Kent, a
20-something social antagonist with a talent for writing and
a passion for rebellion without a cause.

His website describes his discovery of the Overbrook ruins
when he was 10, and how he spent most of the free time of
his formative years there - spraying graffiti, exploring
tunnels, starting fires, climbing roofs, abusing drugs.

He writes with E. E. Cummings punctuation - no caps. He
doesn't need them.

Kent's work is Hunter S. Thompson's gonzo journalism told
from the viewpoint of Holden Caulfield, J.D. Salinger's
catcher in the rye. Assuming, that is, Holden survived to
see his 23rd birthday and never got a prescription for Prozac.

Or, as Kent describes it in a recent edition of the New
Jersey music e-zine "Hipnosis"
(http://www.hipnosis.com/web/Current/mattkent.htm): "wheeler
 antabanez could never be that catcher in the rye.  i am too far gone
to
suffer like holden did.  every time i read that
book i cry because holden reminds me so much of matt just
before he gave up hope."

Whoa. Throw the dude a life jacket. I urge you to check out
this guy's work. If, like me, you are fascinated by the
psychology of weirdness and alienation, or - also like me -
you sometimes reminisce about your own rebellious youth, I
think you'll find it fascinating. If, on the other hand, you
currently ARE a rebellious youth, you'll probably end up
robbing a liquor store.

Kent made local headlines last year, when he was arrested
and the authorities tried to shut off his website. They
weren't successful.

Recent efforts, however, seem to have borne more fruit.

In what he said would be his last entry to
welcometohell.com, Kent said he was arrested because of the
things he said on his website. Bail was set at $50,000. His
parents paid it.

He said that, in an effort to stay out of jail, he was
ending his participation in the site. His parting words of
wisdom?

"this world will try with all its infinite power to change
the person that you are.

"Someone or some group of people will always be in
disagreement with your own personal philosophies.

"NEVER LET THEM CHANGE YOU!"

I tried to e-mail Matt several times. There was no response.
I guess he's true to his word.


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NEIGHBORING NEWARK
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Overbrook's campus straddles the towns of North Caldwell and
Verona, bedroom communities in northeastern New Jersey. My
advice is to base yourself about nine miles south in the
City of Newark.

It's grimy. It's gritty. But you aren't looking for
ambiance.

Here's what you're looking for:

THE EXPRESS TRAIN TO HELL: At the stroke of midnight, on the
10th day of every month, a ghost train is said to pull into
Central Station, a Victorian train depot located off Clifton
Avenue. The legend is mentioned on the website of the Ghost
Hunters of Baltimore
(http://www.ghostpage.com/newjersey.html) as well as in
Dennis Hauck's "National Directory of Haunted Places"

The ghost train has never been seen. Witnesses report
hearing the engine's whistle and the screech of iron wheels
against the rails. Sightings, er, hearings, began in the
1870s, when hundreds of people claimed to experience the
phantom rail-runner. On one occasion, nearly 600 people
heard it, according to Hauck.

THE WHITE LADY: Local legend tells of a mysterious
apparition that appears to motorists traveling through
Branch Brook Park on the Belleville/Newark border.

Depending on the version you buy into, either a teen-aged
couple on their way to the prom or a newlywed intent on
getting wedding photos taken in the historic park, skidded
out on a rain-slicked road and hit a tree.

The boyfriend/groom survives without a scratch. The
girlfriend/wife, however, is either killed instantly or
swallowed up by the earth - again, depending on which story
you buy.

To this day, visitors report seeing a mysterious lady in a
white dress standing in front of the tree where the accident
occurred.

For more information, check out what weirdnj.com has to say
about it: http://www.weirdnj.com/_ghosts/ladyinwhite.html.


There's also an entry in the Shadowlands, a reader-fueled
collection of supposedly haunted places:
 http://www.angelfire.com/ny4/halloweencenter/jersey.html.

For information about the park, go to:
http://newark1.com/branchbrook/


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How about you? Do you know of mysterious destinations that
other kindred spirits (no pun intended) might enjoy?  Any
paranormal travel experiences you'd like to share? You can
contact me at:
<a href=" mailto:fpierce@... "</a>

While your at it, please visit my website at:
<a href "http://www.strangetraveler.com"</a>

Well, the sun is rising ...

Fred


P.S. - Chances are, you are NOT the strangest person you know.
Do you have any friends, co-workers, relatives, cellmates or
members of your coven who might enjoy this weekly walk on the
weird side? If so, just forward this e-mail to them. They can
sign up by using the links below.

************************************************************

TO SUBSCRIBE:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Send an email to:
<a href=" mailto:Strangetraveler-subscribe@... "</a>
OR: Go through the Topica website at
<a href=" http://www.topica.com/lists/Strangetraveler "</a>


The travel destinations and events that appear in this
newsletter have been selected by me, largely on whims
determined by the phase of the moon and what I ate for lunch.
Apart from those offers clearly set apart from the text, none
of the links presented here are paid promotions for any
company or organization.

Feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others. If you
just use pieces of it, please give me writer's credits and
list The Strange Traveler URL.

Or pay me. That would be good too.

        (c)2001 The Strange Traveler. All rights reserved.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: The Strange Traveller - The REAL Naked ghosts!
Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2001 05:35:32 +0000
From: Frederic  Pierce <fpierce@...>
Reply-To: fpierce@...
To: Strangetraveler@...

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  Welcome to ... 
            
                                                          
           The  S T R A N G E  T R A V E L E R 
						                                         
    The Best Vacation Ideas This Side of The Other Side!
                                                         
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Tuesday, July 16, 2001

Fellow Travelers,

Whoops! Please disregard the piece of Strange Traveler mail 
that preceded this one. I inadvertantly sent out a year-old
draft of my previous newsletter. That's what lack of sleep
and dealing with your first child's college financial aid
applications can do to you. 

Anyway, apologies to the Cool Travel Mail folks. The final
version of that newsletter is their property and I have no
right to publish it. Having said that ...

Welcome, to the only travel newsletter on the Internet that
wonders if a ghost in a see-through blouse would be
redundant.

Today's visitations include:

* Naked ghosts
* Diana of the Dunes
* Singing sands, wandering hills
* Diana's descendents

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Naked ghosts
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Some of you may not have realized it, but last weekend
marked the end of national "Nude Recreation Week"

Aside from those of you who routinely read this newsletter
naked - you know who you are, and I urge you to take your
medication - I am willing to bet most of you didn't strip
down for volleyball or get naked at the barbecue grill.

If you kept your private parts private, you apparently have
something in common with dead people.

Most ghost sightings appear to contradict the old adage "you
can't take it with you." Nearly all reported phantoms are
wearing clothes when they are spotted. Many even
accessorize.

British author Hilary Evans pondered this quirk of the
spiritual world a few years ago in an issue of The
Anomolist:

"Most ghosts come wrapped. Yet if ghosts are what they are
generally supposed to be, visitors from another realm of
being, this is rather strange. We might think that in the
next world the spirits will have abandoned the use of
clothes, with all their inconveniences."

I don't know. No one ever said the after life wasn't drafty.
Actually, Evans' pitch sounds a lot like the PR put out by
The Naturist Society. That's the group - based in Oshkosh,
Wisconsin, or all places - that promoted Nude Recreation
Week July 9-15.  Its tan-line-free website,
http://www.naturistsociety.com, is filled with talk of
comfort, body acceptance and freedom. (personally, I would
have added a few lines about sunscreen, but hey, that's me,
Mr. Careful.) 

These days, even some less-than-tangible people seem to be
buying the naturist line. The Village of Alderly Edge in
Chesire, England, for example, is supposedly haunted by the
ghost of a naked man with long hair who peeps through
windows.
(http://freespace.virgin.net.lightburn/county/chesire.htm.)
If you speak to him, he is said to immediately disappear. 

That's a good thing.

On the opposite end of the revulsion spectrum is New
Orleans. There, the naked ghost of a beautiful woman is said
to appear on cold December nights on the roof of an
antebellum house on Rue Royale. 

The spirit is said to be that of a mixed-race slave who was
kept as the mistress of a French nobleman. Supposedly, she
desperately wanted to marry him.
(http://www.nolalive.com/haunted/ghosts/octoroon.html)

Being a guy, and a spoiled aristocrat guy to boot, the
slave's owner half-jokingly told her that if she spent the
night naked on the roof during a cold day in December, he'd
marry her. 

He didn't think she'd actually try it. Since television,
football and cold beer hadn't been invented yet, he started
drinking absinthe with a buddy. In the morning, they found
the woman's cold, lifeless body outside on the roof
shingles. 

So you see, there are exceptions to the "no shirt, no shoes,
no spirits" rule. But where should Strange Travelers go to
find the most famous spectral streaker of them all? 

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Diana of the Dunes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alice Mable Gray has been seen cavorting naked on the sand
dunes of  the Lake Michigan shoreline since 1915. That's
quite a feat, considering she died in 1925. 

The nude ghost of the highly educated, resourceful free 
pirit who came to be known as "Diana of the Dunes" has been
seen by many, many people, according to Prairie Ghosts,
http://www.prairieghosts.com/dunes.html. 

All along Indiana's waterfront, from Gary to Michigan City,
folks claim to have seen her romp across the sand or
mysteriously disappear into the chilly water of the lake.
The appearances are so legendary that the lakefront
community of Chesterton sponsors an annual "Diana of the
Dunes Festival."
(http://wpl.lib.in.us./chamber/Diana/diana.htm)

Early news reports of this colorful beach hermit began in
1916, when Gray was still alive.

The wives of local fishermen had been grumbling that their
husbands had been stealing away to sneak a peak at a woman
who lived all alone in the Dunes and often went about her
business au natural, according to a Chesterton Tribune story
posted at http://chestertontribune.com/alice_gray.htm. 
Reporters who investigated came back with imaginative tales
of "a bronze goddess," or "water nymph" whose beauty and
hunting skills brought comparisons with the goddess Diana.

In reality, Gray was short, weather-hardened and had rather
plain features. The daughter of  a Chicago doctor, Gray
graduated early from the University of  Chicago and was
named Phi Beta Kappa. She spoke several languages and went
on to study in Germany, but upon returning home found that
the male-dominated culture had no use for her skills and
knowledge. Eventually, she became a low-level copy editor at
an astronomy magazine.

Frustrated ,Gray chucked it all at the age of 34 and moved
into an abandoned cabin in the Indiana Dunes. 

"I wanted to live my own life," she told a reporter in 1916.
"The life of a salary earner in the cities is slavery, a
constant fight for the means of living."

The only things Gray brought with her to the dunes were the
clothes on her back, a glass, a knife, a spoon, a blanket
and two guns, according to Elwin Greening, a columnist for
the News Dispatch of Michigan City
(http://www.michigancityin.com/insidenews.asp?ID=9091) 

She picked berries, made furniture out of driftwood,
out-shot local duck hunters, wrote poetry about nature,
devoured books from the local library, and, every morning
that weather allowed, started the day by skinny dipping in
the lake and air-drying in the sun. 

Many other artists, writers and bohemian types lived in the
dunes during the warm, summer months. Gray lived there all
year long, even braving the brutal winters.

About five years after arriving in the dunes, Gray hooked up
with a violent-tempered drifter named Paul Wilson who moved
into her cabin. Wilson was a suspect in several area crimes,
including a murder. At one point, the pair got involved in a
fight with a deputy that landed Gray in the hospital with a
cracked skull. She suffered poor health from then on.

On the night of Feb. 8, 1925, Wilson pulled a doctor to the
cabin, where Gray was in a coma from ureic infection. Later
suspicions attributed the infection to blows to the abdomen
and other domestic abuse. Near midnight, she died in
Wilson's arms.

Gray had asked to be cremated on a funeral pyre on top of
Mount Tom, one of the tallest dunes on the Michigan coast,
and have her ashes scattered on the wind, according to
Indianapolis writer David Hoppe. She ended up in an unmarked
grave in the paupers' section of Oak Hill Cemetery in Gary.

You can read Hoppe's detailed account at
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/DYaros/ddunes.htm. 

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Singing sands, wandering hills

"The Dunes are to the Midwest what the Grand Canyon is to Arizona and the Yosemite is to California. They constitute a signature of time and eternity." - Carl Sandburg

Many sightings of Diana have occurred at Indiana Dunes State Park, (http://www.duneland.com/parks/idsp.htm) a 2,182-acre, user-friendly preserve about 50 miles southeast of Chicago in northwest Indiana. I recommend you pitch a tent here, as close to the beach as possible.

A map of the park is available at http://www.state.in.us/dnr/parklake/maps/parks/dunes_trail.pdf. Indiana Dunes offers the usual state park activities - swimming, picnicking, nature walks, hiding your beer from rangers - as well as rather unique events like sand dune climbs and insect bingo. A schedule of July activities is posted on the Web: http://www.duneland.com/parks/natact.htm.

The state park is within Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore (http://www.nps.gov/indu/), a 25-long stretch of Lake Michigan coast between Gary and Michigan City referred to as "Dune land."

Dune land is part of a system of wind-blown sand hills that make up the world's largest freshwater sand dunes. These dunes stretch 300 miles, north to south, and 118 miles, east to west, through four states: Indiana, Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan.

An enormous variety of plants, more than 90 of which are on state has threatened or endangered list, anchor the dunes in place. Dunes without foliage do not stay put, and are called wandering dunes. These sand glaciers gradually change location and bury anything in their paths.

The largest of these wandering dunes, at 123 feet, is Mt. Baldy. (http://www.nps.gov/indu/baldy.htm) It is moving inland about four or five feet a year. Currently, it is parked on top of a forest. You can see some pictures of the king of the dunes at http://www.hyper.org/douglas/photography/places-mtbaldy.html

While you are strolling the dunes looking for Diana, keep your ears open. Locals also know the dunes as the singing sands.

There is nothing supernatural about the music. It's the Lake Michigan sand. The specific combination of quartz crystals, moisture, pressure and friction from your shuffling feet, creates a musical tone that is heard on only a handful of beaches worldwide, according to Kitty Kapers, a northern Indiana resident who has a personal website at http://kittykapers.tripod.com/lakemichigan.html.

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Diana's descendents

If you camp near the beach in Indiana Dunes, be forewarned:
There are apparently a lot of Diana wannabees out there.
Nude sunbathing in the more remote sections of the state
park became so popular that, in the summer of 1997, the
state sent in the National Guard to put a stop to it.
(http://www.michigancityin.com/insidenews.asp?ID=1765) 

This is, after all, the Midwest.

There's less skin on the waterfront these days, but Indiana
Dunes is still listed among the nude beaches at
http://rainbow.com/members/gay_beaches.htm, a gay sunbather
site. 

Of course, if you're really interested in seeing some
strange sights in the area, you might want to consider
visiting the Ponderosa Sun Club.

The club (http://ponderosasunclub.com/sun-club.htm) promotes
itself as the closest nudist resort to the Chicagoland area.
That also makes it the closest nudist resort to Duneland.

The 88-acre resort, located in rural Roselawn, Ind., has
been clothing optional since 1965. There's a swimming pool,
horseshoe pits, sand volleyball area and a covered pavilion
where naked dances are held every Saturday night.

Ponderosa's website talks a lot about nudity, family values
and judging people by their personalities, not their
pectoral muscles. Yet, the resort is also host to the
twice-annual "Nudes-a-Poppin'" beauty pageant, an event that
is hosted not by Kathy Lee Gifford, but by famous porn
stars.

This year's host for the Aug. 19 event is Ron Jeremy, an
X-rated film star that I remember from my teen-age years
when we'd skip track practice and sneak into the local
adult-movie theater. 

It was a humbling experience. Jeremy, a hairy, troll of a
man, appears to be some sort of human mutation. I'm sure the
Web is filled with sites where you could see for yourself,
but I'm not going to lead you there. Just ask Jeeves and
make sure the kids are out of the room.

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How about you? Do you know of mysterious destinations that 
other kindred spirits (no pun intended) might enjoy?  Any 
paranormal travel experiences you'd like to share? You can
contact me at: 
<a href=" mailto:fred@... "</a>

While your at it, please visit my website at: 
 http://www.strangetraveler.com. 

Well, the sun is rising ...

Fred

    
P.S. - Chances are, you are NOT the strangest person you know. Do you 
have any friends, co-workers, relatives, 
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The travel destinations and events that appear in this
newsletter have been selected by me, largely on whims 
determined by the phase of the moon and what I ate for lunch.
Apart from those offers clearly set apart from the text, none of the 
links presented here are paid promotions for any 
company or organization.

Feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others. If you just use 
pieces of it, please give me writer's credits and list The Strange 
Traveler URL. 

Or pay me. That would be good too.

        (c)2001 The Strange Traveler. All rights reserved.