Take a ghostly journey with me.

After work, waiting for the Ghost tour bus to pick me and my fellow ghost busting staff up, we partook on some liquid courage and greasy yum yum to get us through the next four hours. It's the only way to start such a night. Am I right?

Snippets of our conversations were about if we believed, what we believed, no spooking or I'll kick your eyeballs out of your face (that would come from my mouth), counting how many were nominated the skeptics of the group, and of course....hey bartender pour me another...you know the usual stuff?

We were chillaxing in our outside dining area and noticed the bus pull up early...like 2 drinks early (sacrilege, if you ask :) ! I go over to introduce my slightly inebriated self and make friends with our driver for the night. He's funnier than hell and when I ask if he wanted something to drink (soda or H20) while waiting for us lushies to, as we say here in Hawaii,....SUCK EM UP, he joked that he already took in a 6 pack before he got there.

Haha, your joking right?
Wait, your not?!? Um.
Um.
Um...
Oh..
got it...
you WERE joking!

I yell last call to the group and we tank what's left in our glasses and file like ants to an ant hole after a long day of carrying crumbs to its queen (or whoever gets the food?).

As I mentioned in the last post, we had our own bus so with all of us feeling groovy, we got introduced to the driver via his microphone, and drove to another area to meet the other half of the tour. We would be meeting our "tour" guides Uncle Joe and Robert. We are urged to go pee pee and we decide that would be wise. I know I wasn't gonna pull MY pants down in the dark! (you know, outside...not in my house, without my husband... :)

And then, the de-brief from Uncle Joe. He was a little intense and I was trying to get out of my cosmo-buzz and be focused. For fear of being yelled at for not taking it seriously. Or thinking I heard something like, throw this salt at any ghost if you see one.

Mr. Tourguide to the ghost, did you say to pelt this salt at the ghost if they appear?

...(yeah, I asked that and got a look...a dirty one...)

Back on the bus we head to the first of five places...

GHOST STOP #1Pali Lookout.

It's a pretty popular place for locals and tourists to visit. It's got a beautiful view overlooking one of our towns and is the location of a great battle, it was a large battle where many died and it's said at night, warriors roam the mountainside. (Dum, dum, dum...supposed to sound like that theatrical sound). I'm sure right as we were coming, the ghostly gang were sitting around, sharpening their spears, smoking a cig when their chief boss said...Back to work boys, the tour is here....

We are encouraged to use our cameras to see if we can catch Orbs (aka spirits). We were clicking our cameras in the dark like our life depended on it. Yah, I caught some orbs on my camera, yah when you zoom in on them, it could look like a face...but I don't understand science and how light zapped in the dark plays out on a camera. You tell me.

We stayed in the area for about 30 minutes and left for the next place...

GHOST STOP #2 Morgan's Corner.

It's pretty dark as you can see by the video (if you clicked on it:)...and some of us were stupidly inspired to grab branches and twigs and try to spook some of the "believers". Which didn't fare well with Uncle Joe and he soon put everyone back in respect mode.

Walking down a pretty long road, listening to the history...it was all interesting. Uncle Joe told us if we took photos to look for 2 orbs together and that might just be the two men responsible in 1940ish for murdering a woman, Theresa Wilder. Below you can catch two things. The woman with the leaves in her hand...(yah, she's with us) trying to spook the boss. And in the left hand side of the photo above the person's head are two orbs?!? You tell me?


I have to admit, our group was very large so I felt safe, too safe. And not scared. Like I wanted to be.

Being complete adolescents in high school, there were many a time 6 of us smashed into a small car and braved that dark road by ourselves...(THAT was ALOT scarier).

GHOST STOP #3 heiau...

Again, with the group so large, the scare factor wasn't there....BUT I grew up here and heiau's are very very sacred to the Hawaiians. You can hear Uncle Joe here talking about this site...

Back on the bus and onwards....

GHOST STOP #4 Manoa Chinese cemetery.

Children's graves were on one side, buried together so that their spirits can play with one another.

The part of this that was interesting was we were told about this tree that was supposedly a center for spirits coming and going...they called it the "PORTAL" We would all be given a chance to step inside and might feel the spirits coming or going....

I will say this though, the whole time we were being given the lowdown of the place, it was dead calm (no pun intended here) for it being 11:00 at night, in the back of a valley. We talked about the cemetery for a bit before we all went to have a go at the Portal.

As soon as we walked toward the Portal, the winds gushed like something fierce! Weeirddd.

We were told to stand with certain people inside, and told to close our eyes, and asked if we felt tingling in our hands, or a warmth coming over us, etc...

Part of me knew this couldn't be real, and some small part hoped that maybe my dad would "stop" by. You know, to say hey! Tell your sisters I said hello!

NOTHING :( oh well...

GHOST STOP # 5.

The Night Marchers at the Manoa Valley Park Trail. Not to far from the Cemetery. I'd been there in the day, but NEVER at night...that's like inviting a lunatic, wearing a bloody white shirt licking his knife like an ice cream cone, in your car.

It was dark, and some of us were a little scared...just because you don't know what's in the dark. I asked my other friend who grew up here like myself...

Me: "Don't they have wild pigs up here?"
HIM: "Yah"
Me: "I'm running if I hear a squeal"
stupid HIM: "Oink, oink..."
Pause
Me: "NOT funny"

A plane had flown overhead, giving a rumbling noise causing some uncertainty amongst us. Something crackled in the bushes to our left, making me completely paranoid and push past the old lady on the tour that was being helped by her 60 year old son (sorry he he nervous laughter), the winds kicked it up into high gear. And then....

It was over.

The Tour.

So, was it The Ring part10?

No.

But, I had a great time with a bunch of my staff, who I've affectionately named my second pair of kids along with my boss who's been nicknamed my work husband (I'm not sure who I argue with more? The real one or him.), AND learned a little more history of my native land I call home.

Thank you. This ride is over...now get the hell off! :)