Personal encounters. Local legends. The stories that stay with us.
Oral folkloreBack in the ’70s, St. Elmo’s Convent sat prominently on its hill in Umzumbe along the old road to Port Shepstone. This abandoned monastery, built in stages from 1918 until 1939, once served as a Roman Catholic convent, a retreat for nuns of the Third Order of…
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Oral folkloreGallows Hill, currently the site of Cape Town’s Traffic Department, has a dark history. In the past, the area was a chalky rise about 20 feet high that earned its name from the gallows – which had been erected on the hill to warn potential trouble makers from…
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Oral folkloreThe Difference Between a Residual and Intelligent Haunting We all have heard of a haunting or ghost story, but did you know that there are different types? Looking at the most common ghost stories, it is normally an apparition of a human, animal, or vehicle.…
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Oral folkloreNear the top of Michell’s Pass, just before you reach Ceres in the Western Cape, stand an old toll house nuzzled between big oak trees and rumored to be the home to a mysterious ghost. The Michell’s Pass’s construction, as we know it today, started in 1840 by…
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Oral folkloreIt was a Catholic convent used as a retreat for nuns of the Third Order of St Dominic as well as a remedial school for children with learning disabilities. This location situated 10 kilometres from Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, is said to be any ghost hunter’s…
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Oral folkloreSeweweekspoort better known as Smuggler’s Route, is one of South Africa’s most spectacular mountain valleys. Once the main route for brandy smugglers, runaways, slaves, and outlaws, this majestic 15 km gorge connects the Little Karoo and the Great Karoo and…
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Personal accountThere has been lots of speculation about the origans of orbs caught on camara. I have investigated this phenomenon and came to the conclusion that many are meer dust particles, but then now and then this light balls appears to be more. After closer…
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Oral folkloreM TIL There isn’t a culture around the world that doesn’t mention a small, human-looking race of creatures in their legends and folklore. All around the world, there are records of goblin stories. A goblin is a type of fairy originally from European…
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Oral folkloreKimberley is the capital city of South Africa’s Northern Cape Province. Mostly known for it’s 19th-century diamond mines, like the deep, hand-dug Big Hole, this town is also infamous for it’s haunted history. One of these haunted places is said to be The…
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Oral folkloreL’Agulhas is the last little village situated at the southernmost tip of the African continent. Visitors are drawn to its beautiful surroundings of mountains, veld and ocean. But with the strong forces caused by the meeting of oceans at this tip of Africa,…
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Oral folklore1. If you are walking in the Botanical Gardens and you catch a whiff of perfume and a feel a cold draft, then you have come into contact with the apparition of Lady Jana Maria de los Dolores de Leon Smith. She was the wife of Sir Harry Smith and Ladysmith in…
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Oral folkloreMy first picture seen of a ghost. The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall, is a ghost that reportedly haunt Raynham Hall in Norfolk, England. It became one of the most famous hauntings in Great Btitain when published in Country Life magazine and even appeared in a…
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Personal accountHaunted history is sometimes found in things left behind. Item’s once the treasures of someone, loved an cherished, now nothing but random items found in a museum or yard sale.We went to Matjiesfontein, a very small and quirky town and even more so is the…
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Personal accountThis clock belonged to my friends grandmother. It worked 100%. When she died her son took out the batteries. Few days back her remaining Grandma’s clock broke, so they unpacked the old clock and put some batteries back in. The weirdest thing happened, the…
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Personal accountOne of my childhood haunts revisited.
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Oral folkloreSomerset Hospital in Cape Town has a long history which includes hauntings of past pasiënts and even nurses.
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Personal accountAfter receiving a fascinating photo taken inside the well-known Green Point stadium in 2016 of an interesting orb with a tiny face inside it, my interest was once again drawn to the Green Point area of Cape Town and its infamous history of a brutal justice…
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Oral folkloreCards that shuffle and stairs that squeak, an unmarked grave on a mountain and toll-keeper who demands his toll, these are the ghosts of the Cape Karoo. The Lord Milner Hotel in the picturesque Matjiesfontein is one of the most haunted hotels in SA. Kate was…
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Oral folkloreWith so many deaths ons the road, it is no wonder that some leaves their paranormal inprint on our living world.
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Oral folkloreBreytenbach Theater in Pretoria has long and haunted history. First build as a German club it was later changed to a production art studio, before it had to be used as a make-shift hospital during the 1918 flu epidemic. So many people died there, mostly the…
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Personal accountAfter hearing about the oldest operational vintage elevator at the Grand Daddy Hotel in Cape Town, we had to investigate. The Grand Daddy building was built in 1874 and its doors opened in 1895 as Hotel Metropole. Surely with so many souls moving up and down…
Read the storyRead these stories on Michelle’s original blog. Republication and photographs are awaiting approval.
Personal accountAtmospheric illustrationA stone brought home from a mountain pass. A personal account of what happened next.
Local legendAtmospheric illustrationA road, a late-night journey, and a ghost-car legend from the West Coast archive.
Paranormal investigationAtmospheric illustrationAn investigation from the original archive, exploring the accounts surrounding a West Coast hotel.