Yahoo Finance Here's What Happened When I Stayed At A Haunted Hotel for a Week
When I booked my stay at San Francisco's Sir Francis Drake hotel last week, I thought I was getting a great deal. Then I found out the true story behind the property, and I desperately wished I had been kept in the dark about its history.
It all started two weeks ago when my my best friend Courtney and I went on a weekend leaf peeping drive in the Pennsylvania countryside. Finally chilly enough to wear turtlenecks and boots, we spent the afternoon driving around and catching up. We talked about what was new in our lives, and I told her that I was headed to San Francisco the following week to see some friends. "I just can't believe how expensive the hotels are out there, but luckily I found something through a friend that is still pricey but in an excellent location," I told her. Courtney mysteriously turned her had to me and asked, "Wait, is it the Sir Francis Drake Hotel?"
I thought it was pretty weird that she guessed the exact hotel that I had chosen. I nodded my head and she said, "Oh Micaela, the hotel is haunted. I booked a stay there a few years back and ended up only spending one sleepless night there. I was so spooked I had to change my reservations. If you want to look for another hotel, I have plenty of other recommendations." Of course this would happen to me. I decided to put the thought of staying in a potentially haunted hotel in the back of my mind. I didn't really think about it again until I boarded my flight from Philadelphia to San Francisco and decided to Google the hotel.
But first, a little background on my "haunted" past: I'm a self-proclaimed scareoholic. My best friends from college, Courtney (the same one who told me about the news above) and Liz, and I all lived together our sophomore year of college and would tell each other ghost stories every single night before we went to bed. Looking back on it, that was pretty bizarre of us. But we loved it. I still enjoy getting spooked, but only to a certain degree. I love watching American Horror Story and horror movies. Halloween is my second favorite time of the year-second only to Christmas, of course. I love this stuff! Well, the thought of it, at least. But when it came down to me being face-to-face with *real* ghosts for four days straight, it turned out not to be as exciting as I thought.
So, on my flight, I Googled "Sir Francis Drake Hotel haunted." I found entries on TripAdvisor and haunted blogs that said things like, "I was so scared, I didn't sleep for the three nights I was there." I also found this kicker: "Suicides, murder and ghostly figures add to the mystique of this Bay Area legend." Fun!
One site offered this haunted fact about the hotel:
"The Sir Francis Drake Hotel is also found in Union Square in the heart of the city. TV star Paul Lynde was involved with a terrible accident that took place here back in 1965. A man, who was said to be his lover, took a fall from an 8th story window after the pair had spent the night drinking. Since then guests report windows opening by themselves, curtains moving as well as strange shadows and disembodied voices."
With these spine-chilling rumors, I decided to do a little experiment. How many days could I last in this haunted hotel? And if I could make it the whole time, I planned to journal each day and talk about any experiences or new things that I hear about the hotel. Here's what happened.
I. Check in. Thank God I'm not on floor 12.
First off, the hotel is ornate and gorgeous. You enter up a grand staircase and are greeted by a glittering chandelier, regal bar, and cranberry velvet chairs. The lighting is dim and romantic. At check-in I chatted with a man behind the desk. We shared some friendly banter about traveling, the weather back home, and if I had ever stayed at a Kimpton property before. Typical check-in conversation. Then I took him quite aback (I'm guessing they don't train you on how to answer questions about ghosts) when I told him I had read the hotel was rumored to be haunted and asked if he had any information. "Yes, there are ghosts," he said and winked. I pressed a bit further, "Can you be a little more specific with me? I'm weirdly fascinated by this sort of thing." He looked at my reservation closer and said, "Don't worry. You're not on the 12th floor. If you were on the 12th floor we would change that for you." We shared an awkward chuckle and I made my way to the "non-haunted" 15th floor.
II. My room.
My room was really beautiful. I had nice lighting and there were two queen beds that were beautifully dressed in soft linens. One of the beds had a mirror at the foot of it though and anyone who loves horror movies knows that ghosts and spirits love to pop up in mirrors. I could just imagine myself waking up to get a glass of water in the middle of the night and seeing a small ghostly child waving at me in the mirror. So I decided to sleep in the bed that didn't have the mirror in front of it. The room was perfectly lovely except for the artwork. It was as if the hotel was actually trying to scare their guests. One painting was a scary haunted looking child with praying hands and the other was a creepy boy with a crown.
III. Night one. Make the noises stop please.
After a long day of travel and scaring myself on the plane I was ready for a deep sleep. I got cozy and started to drift off to sleep but whenever I was just about to doze off I would hear a strange noise. The pipes in my bathroom. My faucet would leak a bit. At one point a piece of note paper I had on my desk mysteriously floated off the desk to the floor even though the AC was on low. I was paranoid and couldn't get a wink of sleep, so I downloaded a white noise machine, put it on loud, and finally drifted off. I only got a few hours of sleep because I was so paranoid the whole night.
IV. Night two. What happens in room 823, stays in room 823.
After a dinner out with an old friend I returned back to the Sir Francis Drake hoping for a more comforting and longer night of sleep than night one. I took a spinning class early in the morning to make sure that I would truly be exhausted and so that I would hopefully fall asleep more easily. When I got into the elevator after dinner an employee of the hotel was inside. He was a very nice old man with white hair and light eyes and a cheery demeanor. He told me he was investigating a problem with the elevator. I asked what the problem was and he said that many guests were trying to take this elevator to go to the 21st floor where the hotel's famed "Starlight Room" was located but the floor wouldn't light up. He seemed open and honest about the elevator issue and so I started to ask him questions on our elevator ride, that seemed to mysteriously stop at every floor. "Sir, I know this may sound a bit outlandish but I've heard the hotel is haunted. Have you heard anything about this?" He smiled, kind of creepily at me and smiled "Oh yes dear. The hotel is haunted." I asked if he knew about any specific incidents. "Well, guests complain about things all the time. Hearing voices. The 12th floor gets the most complaints but room 823 is apparently the most haunted. We had two maids that had an incident there some time ago and they refused to ever clean the room again. But as the staff changed we haven't heard anything about it. But yes, people definitely do see and hear things." The door opened to my floor. And I got off and said goodnight. He gave me a somewhat creepy wave and I was back in my room. The spinning worked, I put on my white noise machine for safe measure and passed out without hearing any sounds that night.
V. Day three. Stranger things.
This is when things got weird. I started to write this very article in my room the morning of day three. I started really digging into research on the property and searched through Google results to find more specific incidents. Especially about what happened in room 823. But I couldn't find anything about room 823. Mysteriously, I had a few pieces of paper on the table near my bed and one just suddenly fell off. Then the next one. I got a little spooked so walked down the hallway to get some ice and I saw one of the maids preparing one of the rooms on my floor. I peeked my head in, like a total weirdo, and asked her if I could ask her a strange question. She nodded her head. "I know this is going to sound weird. But there's something in my room that doesn't feel right ma'am. It's like the energy is off and I'm hearing weird noises. Is the hotel haunted?" She looked right at me, strangely, and said "It might be. But it's also old, so the noises you're hearing are probably just old pipes. Don't worry." So... she didn't quite deny the fact that the hotel was haunted. But she brought up a good point. Maybe the hotel is just old and has questionable artwork hanging in the rooms and dim lighting. I went back to my room and made myself a glass of ice water and turned the table lamp on next to my bed to continue writing. Then the lamp died and went dark. Coincidence? Honestly, I felt like the more prodding I was doing about the hotel, the weirder the experiences I was encountering. But maybe I was just starting to let the hotel get into my head.
VI. The final night. Could this be the ghost that haunts the Sir Francis Drake?
I MADE it. I went to the Bar Drake after dinner to do some further investigating. I made small talk with the bartender and told him I had been creeped out the whole time that I had been staying at the hotel and that I had read the place is haunted. I asked him if he knew anything. He stared at me for a quick second and went back to mixing his drinks. He told me that, yes, it is rumored to be haunted by spirits. "The owner of the hotel committed suicide and still haunts the hotel," he said. "He killed himself on the 21st floor, in the Starlight Room." I continued my spooky investigative work, pressing him further. "Ah, this one elevator wouldn't stop on the 21st floor the entire time I've been here. There have been people trying to fix it, but it won't stop on the 21st floor," I said. "That's spooky," he responded. Indeed. The whole place is.
The verdict:
While a beautiful hotel with great service, the energy at the Sir Francis Drake put me on edge the whole time I was there. But, if staying at a potentially haunted hotel doesn't bother you, then you should check it out. And if you're really brave, ask for room 823.
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