[Music] hi I'm Britt and my name is Alissa and this is skeletales and this is the podcast where we strive to answer the age-old question of is my dead Grandma watching me that's right and we tell true Tales of this strange unusual and paranormal heck yeah we do but what are we talking about this week I'm pretty excited about this week I think even though I say that every week we're talking about haunted hotels dude the places you go and stay and have haunted experiences are you explaining what hotels are

you go and stay when you leave your home I was in a hotel for 12 days recently yeah you were ah damn it but we did have a fire drill during the middle of the night that was the closest but it so that was scary to be on the 15th floor in the fire did the ghost pull the fire alarm very possibly they said it was a flood I have no idea that place was like a mess it wasn't a mess I won't name the name but it was not like top-notch yeah it wasn't top-notch basically I wish I had a haunted hotel experience because that would be perfect well you know what I'm gonna give you one right now okay sock it to me hopping into it um I'm gonna start by telling you about the hotel and then I'm gonna tell you this person's story so I have this information from krqe.com they say the Saint James Hotel in Cimarron New Mexico might be one of the most haunted hotels in the state Henry Lambert bought the property in 1870 at the time it was a small Eatery and parlor he saw a good thing going and went all in and grew

they did not write that very well [Music] good thing going and went all in eventually by 1880 he added the second floor and did a grand reopening becoming known as the Saint James Hotel however this hotel was known for its violence a common question asked was who was killed at Lambert's last night Saint James fell into disrepair for decades until Cimarron native Edward sitzberger purchased the hotel in 1985 restoring the property and that's when the Saint James Hotel became notorious for another reason the front desk manager Thea maestas says guests have reported hearing boots walking on the hallways and tapping on room 17. the hotel thrives and still holding up its old western Ambiance if you're in the mood to take a trip to Cimarron make sure to visit the St James Hotel well I have a story from a fella named James ironically all right all right James says my wife and I were staying the night so sorry this is such a good story my wife and I were staying the night and doing an informal investigation at the haunted hotel St James in Cimarron New Mexico I was a paranormal investigator for about 16 years also I am what I call mildly psychic my role with the investigative team was to use my gift to find the hot spots at the places we investigated we would then discuss with the property owner where we would set up our main equipment I was on average about 70 accurate in this case this was a one-off trip with just myself and my wife had I'd been told by several people um to visit this place that night my wife and I ate dinner at the hotel and then had some drinks at the bar and spent the night I ate a steak for dinner but she had had some very spicy green chili smothered enchiladas fast forward to about 2 A.M I hear the sound of someone walking around in our room but it's just her and I and she's still asleep in bed right next to me and the door's been locked since we got back to our room I hear them come over and stand next to me on the bed oh they're not on the bed they're standing next to them on the bed they even bumped up against it and then I felt like they were bending forwards to look over us at that exact time my wife lets out this enormous heart and I feel the presence next to me jerk back from the bed and then the smell hits me and let's just say it was extremely potent I swear I Heard a Voice saying good God at that point I start laughing and I open my eyes and there's no one there I get out of bed to turn on the lamp and check the door and it's still locked and no one is there my wife wakes up and at this point smells the fart then immediately blames me I spent I spend nearly the whole next day laughing the funniest thing was that the resident ghost at the hotel was supposed to be this badass Cold Stone killer Outlaw from the 1800s apparently he wasn't that badass or maybe he just never had an experience with a woman like that before so James is a true delight and I told another story that's not Hotel related but worth sharing is it okay if I sneak in a quick little store oh heck yeah yeah we make our own James tells a story it says I was go I was doing an investigation in an old historic Elementary School in Austin Texas one of the quote-unquote known spirits in the building was a mischievous six-year-old boy who tried to climb out of a window and then fell to his death he was known to haunt the boy's bathroom leaving the faucets running and randomly flushing toilets while trying to get an interaction we offered this boy some chocolate M Ms I got video of him actually moving some of the candy this was in the cafeteria room on the same floor as the boy's bathroom separately at the same time there were a group of three college girls that were investigating the boys bathroom suddenly they start yelling we when we ran out to see what was going on one of the girls had a camera and the lens was streaked with what looked like brown smudges they were convinced that the boy had wiped their lens with feces one of the people in my group asked to see the camera they sniffed it yeah and then tasted the stuff on the lens the girls recoiled in horror turns out on the lens was a chocolate M MH smeared chocolate m m oh way better than feces way better but um the person who licked it did not know that well are we sure that species let's oh oh chocolate

little sad baby boy ghosts I know but he wants his chocolate that sounds mischievous oh totally mischievous I love it okay that's that's it for St James and but stories by James love it oh my gosh I thought you were gonna say the wife had to get up in the middle of night I'm like oh that's a different kind of fire drill 2AM but oh from the spicy enchiladas I uh I've never considered If ghosts can smell me neither and we don't know if the ghost actually smelled it or if they said good God because a woman ripped a ghost super loud but yeah

James did say that the smell was pretty potent so yeah ghost repellent bottle that [ __ ] bottle it it smells like a fart just spraying farts all over your room yeah what's that I got a ghost problem why is your house smell like [ __ ] oh just trying to keep the ghosts away that would keep me away as a ghost yeah work that would work that'll keep me away as a human too that's just a great repellent for all you know what all human and ghosts alike repellent yeah bottled [ __ ] spray well great story I love it love it um I have a story about a haunted hotel as well and this is from the Wheats and um they actually bought a haunted hotel so this story dates back to the late 90s I a male 15 around the time was living in Born mouth UK with my family this story dates back to the late 90s I a male 15 around the time was living in Bournemouth UK with my family my parents purchased a Victorian Hotel nine guest bedrooms and we moved into the hotel owners accommodation my parents had their room on the ground floor and my brother and I had a room each in the basement oh the hotel doesn't sound terrifying the hotel was a nice place it had a happy feel to it except in certain areas there was one room seven on the top floor that had a strange Vibe went inside it whilst cleaning this room there was a closeness as if all the air around was closing in on you and a ring in your ears that only really became apparent when you left the room itself I always kept the door open when I worked in this room and was happy when I got to leave we will come back to this room later within the first few months living in the hotel it was apparent to the whole family that things were happening that could not be explained by everyday Logic the large old doors around the hotel were heavy and had been fitted with auto closers for fire safety of reasons this made it generally difficult to open them at times particularly when carrying trays and hotel supplies however often we would be walking through parts of the hotel and a door would swing open we would expect someone to walk out of the connecting room but there would be no one there another occurrence experience by that my entire family at some point or another was the feeling of being hit by a sun and gust of wind even when in a room with all doors and windows closed we are not talking about a little breeze this was like someone held a large rotary fan up to our face and put it on maximum power then after the wind stopped there would be a strong smell of a gingery aftershave wow the first major incident we had involved room seven a couple and their ten-year-old daughter were staying in the room after dinner the parents went to the bar for some drinks but the daughter was bored so wanted to go and watch TV in their room so she did all was fine until another guest entered the bar area and asked if anyone was staying in room seven as they could hear someone screaming in that room my parents and the girl's parents ran upstairs and went into the room and found the daughter sitting up in the bed in a flood of Tears when asked what was wrong she said she had fallen asleep and then woken up to see a man standing in the room my parents asked what the man looked like thinking it was one of the other guests in the hotel but the description she gave was of a tall man wearing a top hat and that he had his hair down the sides of his face but not a beard she effectively described a Victorian man with sideburns her parents asked where he went but she didn't know when she woke up he told her to stay in bed and go back to sleep that is when she said she started screaming and when she looked back up he was gone they searched the hotel but no one was found and none of the guests came close to matching the description they put it down to a bad dream but my family were sure there was more to it than that not that we ever talked to the guests about the supernatural occurrences we figured it would cause more issues if people actively knew it was a few months before the next sighting the ground floor layout of the hotel was quite basic there was a main lobby area and off from that were different rooms Lounge dining room kitchen Etc the bar was part of an old extension only accessible through the dining room this meant that if you were sat in a certain position in the bar you could see directly through the dining room and then into the main lobby and stairs area a guest was sat having a drink in that exact spot when she turned to my mom's standing behind the bar and excitedly said oh you're having a wedding party in mom was quite confused and asked what the guest was referring to the guest said that a man wearing a full top hat and tails had just walked down the stairs my mom moved around beside the bar and looked out of the window towards the entrance of the hotel at which point the guest said oh he didn't go that way he went down to the right side of the stairs what the guests didn't know was the right side of the stairs led to our private quarters mum and dad went to check but there was no one there and although there were ways out of the building they were locked and bolted from the inside so no one could have exited through them without it showing another common occurrence in the hotel was the sound of running when on the ground floor you would hear running upstairs this was not surprising when the hotel had guests in an old Victorian Hotel every sound Was Heard and magnified but over the Christmas break we would shut the upper floors of the hotel and just have family time but the running around would continue still it was so loud at one point that we were sure someone had broken in my brother dad and I even went upstairs clutching kitchen knives for safety but after unlocking and checking the rooms no one was up there a guest started staying long term at the hotel I don't recall what his job was but he had business some of the year in Bournemouth and certain other days he had to travel into London on London days he would need to be out of the hotel by 5 AM Mum would leave him out a continental breakfast he would help himself to it and be gone before we woke up returning later in the evening one day when returning from London he was chatting to my parents and he said something strange had happened when he left the hotel that morning he had come out of his room as usual and was surprised to see a boy stood on the half Landing leading up to the top floor of the hotel the man was not used to seeing someone up at 4 30 but being polite he said good morning to the boy he said the boy did not say anything instead he just turned and slowly walked up the top floor the man thought it was strange but carried on with his normal morning routine my parents were puzzled by this and asked him what the boy had looked like he said he was around eight to nine years old but could not recall what the boy was wearing the reason my parents were confused was because at the time we had no children staying in the hotel many months later while serving breakfast a guest came into the dining room and quite loudly asked my mom is this hotel haunted all the other guests stopped eating intrigued by the question and even more so by what the answer would be my mom played it cool simply saying what do you ask that lady replied that she had woken up in the night and there was a boy stood in her room she said hello to the boy and he vanished mom acted surprised and said it was the first she had heard of anything like that again playing it down in front of all the listening ears the final incident involved me I had been saving my money up to buy a watch a storm watch to be precise I had finally managed to get enough money together and had made my way town to town to pick it up it was my first expensive purchase if I recall around 90 pounds at the time when it was time to go to bed I took the watch off and went to put it on the bedside table however in each room there were internal phones next to the bed this was in case my parents needed our help or guests were checking in so we could be called to assist the bedside table in my room was so small the phone took up all the space for that reason I decided to lay the watch over the receiver of the phone and hope no one called me in the middle of the night my bed was one of those large metal bunk beds it had a single bed on the top and a sofa bed below that folded out into a small double I slept on the bottom partly because it was a double but realistically because the ceiling was so low you could not physically sleep up top anyway I remember being woken in the middle of the night to the loudest clanging metal sound as my whole bed shook it felt and sounded as though someone had taken a run and jump and landed on the middle ladder of the bed I was facing the wall at the time and remember the utter fear I felt I would say it is the only time in my life I have been frozen in fear no part of me would move I just lay there too scared to turn over and see what had caused the entire bed to shake I'm not sure I would have been able to call for my brother but he was away at pgl summer camp so could not have helped me anyway I lay there for hours just staring at the wall finally the light showed down Shone down the basement window and filled my room I plucked up the courage to turn and look and thankfully there was nothing there I sat up in bed and the first thing I noticed was the watch was gone from the top of the phone I searched around the floor thinking maybe it slid off then I thought about the noise my butt had made as if someone had jumped on it slowly peering up to the top bed there in the middle of the mattress was my watch no I guess the little boy had wanted to play with it too my mom went on to research the local history of the hotel she was able to find out a doctor had lived there when it was first built as a house and during this time there was a young boy that had died from an illness but I can't remember the details of exactly how we owned the hotel for many years before selling it it was later converted into flats and I often wonder if they still have any occurrences oh that's so good I love it um I made me remember that one uh story I told from the old-timey newspaper about the um haunted house with the rabbits yes yes and the the old woman I want I was that in Born Mouth 2 or born and then I'm like oh is this the same house I wonder wouldn't that be wild if it was the same house from like the 1800s and then this person owned it as a hotel like that's a different imagination different ghosts though yeah that would be that would be I know but when it first started off no the other ghost sounded way scarier this one doesn't sound quite as scary yeah that's so good it as a child I would have loved to lived in a hotel and like oh especially an old Victorian one that would have been a dream with secret passages yes I wanted nothing more than secret passages in my house growing up same so hard I even was like I would go into the like the linen closet and like knock on the back and be like knock down oh is there a secret passage behind this is like like no this house was built in 84 like yeah exactly mine too there was like no space for secret I don't know it would have been cool if there were though right I want to say my aunt and uncles they didn't have a secret Pat it was more like a kind of a long basement but it felt like a secret passage and that one was the closest we got so it was like oh our cobbling room maybe now I want to build a secret passage in my house my aunt built her house um her husband's a contractor and so they were able to like create it exactly how they want and in their office they have the secret bookshelf that opens up into another room and I'm like yes if I ever build a house it will have secret rooms and secret passageways just to fulfill fulfill that childhood dream I do know someone who has a secret room and but they built it because they were the victim of a home invasion when they were younger it was really traumatizing and so that's why they have it's a Panic Room I see them on Tick Tock and stuff people have Panic rooms I'm like why are you showing me this this should be a secret just it's the same as like hey everybody who's listeners I'm going to be building a secret room in my house and a secret yeah yeah that's defeats the purpose but I think I ended up seeing it because um Sandra Bullock you know the actress apparently she had a home invasion like 10 years ago or something a dude was in her house there's a 9-1-1 recording and she's they're like where are you she's like I'm in I'm in my closet I'm in a panic room in my closet like they had a secret room oh like she could like lock that and that's what she did she ran in there and she's like it was a one night that my son wasn't with me he's always with me but it was this night that I was working late the nanny is like you know what just let me take him home and she's like if I if he had been home I would have run to his room and it would have been completely different outcome for us but yeah I mean it's a horrible like intense like she's obviously panicked because some [ __ ] psycho stalker broke into her house imagining that they were husband and wife and that she was supporting him and oh my God so I'm not building a Panic Room no no oh oh big big week big week no never Panic Room nope nope nope I mean logically a Panic Room makes more sense mine will probably be a secret Library yes yes and there'll be like some twinkle lights and like a soft chair to read in yes yep and then I'm gonna have one that's just like a secret tunnel between two rooms so you can like crawl through this little tunnel for like you are in the market for a new house pretty soon huh oh yeah maybe that can be one of my requirements for the new realtor is going to love you

here's what I need

a panic room but also the secret Library room and then a tunnel yeah secret passages required oh she's like I quit I quit I quit I don't know you got some Preppers down in those parts you never know what you might find it's true but it's going to be on if it exists it's going to be on Redfin and everyone is going to know about the secret room I don't the secret room is not secret if you tell everyone and show everyone anyway do you have another story my friend I do okay this one comes from Brittany Shane I met Brittany Shane golly how long ago was that um 10 years ago I want to say she is a Austin musician and she was looking for some design work and had asked me to help with some posters and stuff and then we totally hit it off she's a badass chick she knows about the podcast and um emailed me and was like hey my brother has a story yay yeah I love it is that the flyer that you did for her recently with like a guitar and some flowers and stuff yes I remember it was very pretty oh cool okay okay she is the bee's knees so her brother wrote her he was in town in Austin for South by Southwest with his wife Jade and they were staying in a an iconic hotel called Hotel San Jose that is right off right on South Congress have you heard of South Congress in Austin it's famous it's like touristy now but so this Boutique Hotel is newly renovated super cute um I ended up staying in this hotel a few years ago with friend of the podcast Kendall we had a girl staycation day where we like stayed in this Boutique Hotel swam in the pool and then went and saw some like live music later um I did not realize apparently this hotel is n't it so Dustin tells Brittany that he and his wife are getting ready in their hotel room with the closet door open they saw some movement by the closet and they both turned to look they see a child slowly crawl out of the closet on all fours then it grabs the edge of the Closet open closet door and pulls it closed shut crawls back into the closet close as they close the door so they both look at each other and Dustin says did you just see that Jade said yes and they both nope the hell right out of that room goodbye so he was so creeped out by this experience that he immediately had to text his sister to tell them and then she immediately emailed me about it as one should and I um yeah very excited about this story because it's creepy as that is that's the creepiest thing the kid could do how do they know it wasn't a real kid though I don't know regardless of whether it was a ghost or a real child no and then I'm picturing it to be the ring girl you know like the creepiest like dirty like her hands are like doing a weird clod like closing oh God that's very creepy they both saw it yeah yeah so I researched the hotel a little bit because I wanted to know like have has anybody else had a haunted experience I have not found anything online um I did message um also a friend of the podcast Monica Ballard who is the ghost tour guide in Austin um and so I'll let you know if she um has any information that I was not able to find apparently the hotel was built in the 1930s as a Motor Inn and then in the 1950s the roadside Motel and South Austin at that time fell into disrepair the motel acted as a low rent lodging for many vagrants addicts and people just down on their luck the hotel was purchased by Lisa Lampert in 94 who bought it for something like five hundred thousand dollars this is ludicrous to think about now but it was pretty run down at the time and she had plans to renovate but then Financial setbacks and eventually she was able to start the renovations in the early 2000s so she ended up making a documentary about those years from 94 to the 2000s where it still ran as like a low rent lodging um for people down on their luck um called the last days of San Jose and it's just her daily interactions with the residents who had nowhere else to go and then when they started Renovations they were just like sorry like goodbye and it you know totally totally gentrified now South Congress it's like super touristy lots of boutiques and like higher end cafes and stuff um but yeah for a really long time it was kind of like a rundown place for you know down on their like people who are going through bad times and in dire circumstances so like it makes me wonder though if if this is like a ghost child like in a closet if that has something to do with that weird trauma of the hotel yeah like it almost makes it like uh when I think of like really shitty budgety hotels I think of like uh trafficking that's kind of one thing I think of and then if someone didn't even think about it yeah sorry bring that down uh I was thinking like maybe a single mom who has to work nights and can't afford child care so their child has to like stay in the hotel room and sleep in the closet I don't know right or is it real kid that just didn't have anywhere else to go and oh my God just went back and lived in the closet like and I was like I just could close the door they won't see me I'm just gonna call them right here I'm invisible and they just ran away they didn't even investigate I don't know what I would do I think I would probably nope out depending no yeah I know I don't know oh actually I'm looking at pictures in this it looks quite lovely that's oh it's what it is yeah it's super trendy I don't know if hipster is like yeah it's very like up and coming there's like cactuses everywhere and colorful blankets and you can get like the expensive sparkling water and that kind of thing

and it's sparkling water there the water Sparkles it's got bubbles in it and no this I was picturing more of like a they call them Ramblers here just a like a one level long like motor in but this is like a couple stories it's got a kind of Southwestern vibe to it um the clay tile roof um but yeah I mean I understand it's what you're saying that at some point it was just real quick I wanted a picture of the closet show me the closet but if there's a little kid in the clock I wonder if they don't notice oh oh there's like a photo and they are just some like fingers or like toes sticking out right underneath the crack oh I love it I hate it now I want to stay here because this looks warm Brit it looks really warm down there oh and there's like a pole you can Lounge by I miss the Sun so much sorry we were just talking about that before we started recording how much Britt is missing the sunshine and warmth and warmth um so in honor of Brittany Shane sharing this story with us we're going to end the podcast playing one of her songs called over your shoulder which is a little spooky song for us I actually don't know if it's spooky themed but it's really good song I love that idea oh and over your shoulder I mean that's what I'm always doing yeah exactly maybe this will inspire other musicians who want their song played at the end of an episode to write in some stories uh maybe stuff they heard from a friend sibling neighbor yes that's a good idea Britt look at you um genius if anybody does happen to have a story to share we have an email that you can write into our HotBox heck yeah we do it skeletalspodcast gmail.com we also have a hotline you can call 302-689 dead

302-689-3323 and that is where you just leave a voicemail and sometimes we just like to receive voicemails that are just for funsies like hey think you're great or hey that last Story scared the [ __ ] out of me or hey I stayed in a haunted hotel one time anything we love to hear all of them yes um we are also on all the social medias you can find us on Facebook our Facebook community skeletals community Instagram um we'd love for you to write us a review it has been a long minute since we've gotten a review I can't believe I forgot to tell you we have hit the charts again oh Alissa yay okay are you ready for this one I'm ready we're in the top 100 podcasts under the society culture in the Philippines oh my goodness really top 100. have we told any stories about the Philippines anything sat in the Philippines a couple like maybe onesie's but nothing oh well maybe we'll have to I know perhaps I actually have one right away I think off the top of my brain that I I know that there's a pretty scary spot there that uh a haunted spot a famous haunted spot so maybe we'll do one in the Philippines oh my gosh well thank you and hello to our Filipino listeners yes hello yes we also have a merch shop filled with fun goodies and even some haunted objects that is over at Etsy at skeletalspodcast.etsy.com also we just started a YouTube I think we were starting to load our stuff up on YouTube so go over there and subscribe as well please um even if you don't listen over there you know we're we're posting some fun videos that you uh that you might like to watch over there yeah anything else Brit have we hit it off there's one last one okay you can become a patreon member for Scala tales and help promote this show that way for as little as one dollar a month that is on patreon.com without looking

that is that's patreon.com skeletals podcast I think that is everything that is everything ever that we even want to talk about right I think so I think so just yeah leave a review tell a friend ask for stories we want to hear them all we love to freak each other out I think that's it oh wait no no no no no no there's one more thing I want to tell you but what hunt you later I want y'all later good night good night [Music] [Applause] all right

[Music] in the afternoon [Music] foreign

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oh so much

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thank you

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