Williamsburg Ghost Tours
Are you ready to experience the most authentic ghost tour in Williamsburg, Virginia?

1. You don’t believe in ghosts.

Did you know scientists at Princeton University may have proven the existence of ghosts? Researchers at Princeton University have been studying paranormal phenomena in a scientific context for almost 30 years, through a department called “PEAR”. It stands for “Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research”. PEAR is a scientific study of consciousness-related physical phenomena.

What does this have to do with ghosts in Williamsburg, Virginia? Everything. Here’s an explanation, a quote from the PEAR website,

“Nearly three decades of intense experimentation leave little doubt that the anomalous physical phenomena appearing in the PEAR studies are valid, and are significantly correlated with such subjective variables as intention, meaning, resonance, and uncertainty… The primary importance of operator intention and emotional resonance with the task at hand, along with the operator-specific structure evident in the data, the absence of traditional learning patterns, and the lack of explicit space and time dependence clearly predicate that no direct application or minor alteration of existing physical or psychological frameworks will suffice. ”

You read that right. Accredited researchers from an Ivy League university have verified, using the scientific method, that human consciousness can affect the material world without any physical medium known to modern science.

You see, the question of haunting has always been a question of human consciousness. More specifically, the question of haunting has always been about an issue central to human consciousness: meaning. When a soul is wronged, or tortured, or betrayed, or even hopeful, it seems it can leave a lasting mark on the world behind it.

It so happens that Williamsburg, Virginia is home to a legion of haunting tales of just how dramatic these marks can be. Indian burial grounds, witches, stories of murder, tragedies of war, and bitter betrayal across more than 300 years of history. Join us to see, hear and feel these hauntings for yourself!

2. You don’t like guided tours.

Have you ever had a terrible tour guide? Someone who wasn’t very likable, wasn’t very knowledgeable, didn’t have a good command of the group, was boring, unengaging, and just left you feeling like you had wasted your money?

Our tour guides are the polar opposite. They will make a believer out of you. Not just in ghosts, but in how awesome a properly guided tour can be. Our guides take their role seriously - they are guiding you through 300 years of history, in places that have been evidently haunted, almost weekly, since they were discovered.

Colonial Ghosts guides define the standard for professional walking tours, and our company has consistently been rated the top ghost tour attraction in Williamsburg, Virginia for years because of our fantastic guides.

That’s saying something because the competition is stiff here (this place is severely haunted)! In fact, our guides do such a good job that Colonial Ghosts remains competitive on lists for doing anything in Williamsburg, Virginia, including sailing, food tasting, wine tasting, beer tasting… even zip-lining!

Colonial Ghosts only employs guides that pass a series of benchmarks, including story telling ability, friendliness, tact, historical knowledge, command presence, organization and time management, rapport building, and most importantly, responsibility! No matter how big your group, where you’re from, how old you are, or what language you speak, our guides will deliver a terrifyingly fun, spooky and memorable experience. You will look back on your tour fondly and reminisce for years about the experience!

But hey, don’t take our word for it. Check out what our guests have said.

3. You want to learn (and remember!) the hidden secrets of Williamsburg, Virginia!

Have you ever heard of a “memory palace”? It’s a technique used by memory athletes to remember fantastic amounts of information with perfect recall, in a short period of time. What you do is, you associate different imagery and stories with different features of locations you’re familiar with (like different rooms in your house). As it turns out, you will automatically be building a memory palace, filled with the chilling tales of the ghosts of Williamsburg, as you walk the Colonial Ghost tours.

See, the way the human brain is wired to remember is based on imagery and territory. It’s why we recognize landmarks when we’ve driven somewhere new, even if we forget the name of the roads we were on. It makes sense. Throughout human history, even before reading and writing, it was critical we knew how to navigate our homes or the places near our homes. Remembering the features of different terrain has been critical to our survival.

What does this have to do with ghosts? The answer may surprise you. You see, it’s not just that ghosts haunt specific locations. But as you find yourself walking along the streets of Williamsburg with our guides, through graveyards, churches and old prisons, you may begin to picture the stories you’re hearing.

As you walk past the maze in the gardens in front of the Governor's Palace, you may be able to picture the ghosts of the young couple who snuck onto the grounds one night after the palace was rebuilt, hoping for an adventurous and romantic stroll… only to meet the horrifying fate that awaited them. And as you picture what happened in your mind’s eye, you will find you can remember the dark secrets of Williamsburg any time you need them. To impress your friends (or a date). To amuse your family. Or maybe just to reminisce with the people who walked the grounds with you. There are over three centuries of dark secrets looming over the streets of Williamsburg, and we will reveal the most haunting to you, in vivid detail! Having explored these places yourself, you will be sure to remember these stories until it’s your turn to cross over!

4. You’ve only got a couple days in town, and you’re not sure what to do.

If you’ve only got a couple days in town, maybe you’re with your significant other, or maybe you’re with your friends, or even your whole family, and you’re spending your precious paid time off here in Williamsburg, so that every move you make counts... then you simply must come visit us.

If you could only count on one thing to do in Williamsburg, Virginia that guaranteed you’d have a great time and memories that last forever, then a Colonial Ghosts walking tour is your safest bet.

Here’s why: Our tours cover about one mile of walking. They’re approximately 90 minutes long, unless you decide to go for the extended tour. Then you can add about 30-45 minutes to that for a total of 110-125 minutes. Even so, they’re no more time consuming than your typical movie at the theater. Long enough to cover a lot of ground, but not too long.

Colonial Ghost tours are also handicap accessible, and we will accommodate any special needs you or your party may have. Not everyone is in shape to do some of the more adventurous activities in Williamsburg. But our tours can be as much adventure as you can handle, without being physically demanding.

Also, the value you get per ticket blows the competition out of the water. Just taking the family to see a movie, when you throw in the 10x marked up pop-corn, candy and drinks can be nearly a hundred dollars these days! We won’t price gouge you with snacks, but we will reveal the secrets of one of the most historic and haunted locations in the continental United States to you. Our guests regularly witness hauntings and capture chilling photos and video they can’t explain. If you feel the nerve, our guides will show you how you can experience these hauntings for yourself!

But even if you finish your ghost tour unsure of how to make sense of what you have seen and heard, nearly everyone tells us they’ve enjoyed learning the history stories of what happened here in Williamsburg.

When is the last time you got to walk-through your favorite stories and visit the places all the characters actually lived? To smell the old wood from the church pews and hear the creaking of the floors, or the echoes of the old stone? Come join us for a truly memorable experience you’ll love sharing with your friends and family.

5. You’re on a date.

Did you know the hormones our bodies release when we’re thrilled have an influence on attraction? It’s why roller-coasters make such a great first date. This has been studied over and over, but it’s worth repeating here. If you’re taking someone on a date, and you’re looking to have a lot of fun together, or to increase attraction for each other, it’s a good idea to find something that gets the blood pumping. The best activities are even a little scary, like a roller coaster. Or a haunted old church.

Colonial Ghost tours fit the bill perfectly. You will learn a lot of new history together, you will be exercising and getting your blood pumping together as you stroll a gentle mile through historic Williamsburg, and we promise your imaginations will be stimulated enough to give you a little scare. It’s good for bonding. ;)

6. You want to do something you and your family will have so much fun with, and have even more fun remembering

What is it worth to take a trip with your family that actually brings everyone together, even if it’s just for an hour or two? Family vacations can be stressful, and sometimes it can be a real pain to get everyone to get into the spirit doing the same thing, without whining or eyes rolling. And how many memories do we really get to have fun reminiscing over as the years pass?

Well, Colonial Ghosts has got you covered. Walking and listening to spellbinding stories is easy enough for anyone to do, and yet, the experience of walking through haunted America is enough to get everyone’s attention. We have heard more stories of families having good times together, and remembering this for years, than we have room to print here. In fact, we guarantee it. If you’re not thrilled with the experience, if you don’t feel like you got to do something really special walking through haunted historic Williamsburg with us, we will refund your money on the spot. We know you’re going to have a great time, and we can’t wait to see you.

7. You want a REAL ghost tour.

Colonial Ghost tours are the real deal. One of the first things you’ll notice, that makes us different than the other ghost tours in town, is we don’t walk the traditional paths. And we don’t use silly costumes or lanterns. Why? Because we only walk the paths of the stories we have fact-checked and verified. We explore real haunted sites across Williamsburg.

This isn’t a Disney tour. Not that we have anything against Disney. We love Disney. But Colonial Ghosts, while family friendly, is here to explore the factual history of haunted ghost sites. This includes stories of betrayal, war and tragedy. If you’re looking for real hauntings, and the sites where truly gruesome events happen that inspired the hauntings, you’re at the right place with Colonial Ghosts.

Have you ever had that funny feeling someone is watching you, like you can feel a pair of eyes on you? And then you turn to see you were right? Or have you ever surprised yourself, that you just ‘knew’ something, without being able to tell anyone why or how? Those hair raising experiences are just the tip of the iceberg… we will take you to places where it is possible to see, hear and feel the presence of the ghosts of Williamsburg. Lovers betrayed. Brothers slain in battle. Wounded soldiers exploited by madmen. Ceremonial Native American burial grounds. It’s all here. If you want to make contact with the other side, this is your chance.

8. You have a tight schedule.

Colonial Ghost tours are easy to fit into most schedules, because we run late in the evening. We have different start times in the evening to choose from, including with ghost tours starting at 8pm and 9pm, and the Ultimate tour at 10pm. Finally, at 90-125 minutes long, you can almost always find a tour that fits your schedule.

9. You believe modern science has debunked ghosts.

This is our favorite. Not long ago, a pop-science article was published that claimed the Large Hadron Collider at CERN had debunked ghosts. In reality, a scientist named Brian Cox mused that if there were a medium that could preserve a person (something like a ‘soul’), he believes he would have seen evidence of it in his particle physics work.

There have been sensational and materialistic anecdotes like these since the beginning of time. Long before science was as developed as it is, people doubted ghost stories. The funny thing is, upon closer inspection of what Cox actually said, it’s obvious the Large Hadron Collider has not proven anything about ghosts.

In reality, the problem of ghosts, and even human consciousness, is one of information. As the celebrated evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins wrote, “What lies at the heart of every living thing is not a fire, warm breath, nor a ‘spark of life’. It is information, words, instructions… Think of a billion discrete digital characters… If you want to understand life think about digital technology.”

In modern science, information is categorized in two fundamental ways. Syntactic and semantic. Syntactic information is information we can quantify mathematically. Like how many letters are in this sentence. Syntactic measurements allow us to quantify communication, and to build systems of communication, like telephones and computers.

Semantic information, on the other hand, is information with meaning. As of this writing, modern science has no way of quantifying semantic information. Meaning baffles our mathematics. Partly because meaning is fluid and changes with context. For example, if you find a piece of paper with the word “no” written on it, the communication is incomplete. You don’t know if that was the answer to a question or the beginning of a statement.

But more importantly, meaning implies a person, or persons, communicating. And so with meaning we must enter the realm of human consciousness. The realm of souls and that which animates our biological machinery. Which is still a great semantic mystery.

There are places in the world where souls have left such a strong impression on the environment, that their marks can be seen long after they’ve died. Come join us as we explore some of these most haunted places in America, and meet the ghosts of those who died there!