[Closed] Spooky/strange encounters.

I once had a nightmare that someone was picking up my wife while she was lying in bed next to me.

It was a very realistic dream and I held her down on the bed shouting her name (while asleep) apparently.

She tells me my eyes were open and everything, i can even remember the vague outline of someone stood next to the bed. While she lifted into the air (although she was happily fast asleep at the time and lying in bed normally).

Lake District ... 3 night stay in a friend's remote cottage* ... middle of the second night ... wailing banshee close to window ... dog goes into hiding ... middle of the third night ... same wailing banshee immediately above one's face ... dog even more ballistic ... chest of drawers turned over ... time to leave.

You can fill in the gaps.

* Turns out the owner never uses that room herself!

You need to fill in the gaps spacemonkey! You'd be crap round the campfire. 🙂
keep them coming

stuff that spacemonkey. id be right outa there too !

Out riding up on the moors. Pitch Black and foggy too. I'm climbing up this long, wide track and reach a gate. This is absolutely in the middle of nowhere, can't even see any house or road lights anywhere. I have't seen a soul for miles. I go through the gate and it makes a distinctive aluminium clatter as it swings shut.

I ride for another 50 metres or so.....

Then the gate clatters shut again.......

Ride fast after that, much!

Stayed in a cottage in mid Wales near Borth.. Bikes, mates, OH's.. No electricity just gas so we crashed early 1st night, que lots of whaling, crying, whimpering and sobbing. This was 3 in the morning, we stayed up the rest of the night trying to find out where the noise was coming from but couldn't make it out. 2nd night same noises, 3rd night and we'd had enough and left.. Got,back and called the owner to find out that the cottage was near a farm that bread Basset Hounds about 1/4 of a mile away down the track.
That's it. We felt stupid.

I may have told this one before.

20 years ago. December, cold and dark outside. At mum and dads. Fell asleep in my old room in the attic, woke up about half 5 with my mum calling me down for dinner.

Went down the stairs, was about to turn left into the kitchen, glanced left, there's my dad standing in the living room doorway,facing away from me, staring into the room. Something odd about the way he was standing made me pause for a minute and stare. Couldn't place it somehow, like he was looking at something terrible on the TV.

Turned and went into the kitchen, there's dad eating his dinner- turned around- no figure in the living room doorway any more.
A little shocked, I mention it to mum and dad- dad looks surprised- mum doesn't. Claims she's been seeing a male figure around the house for years (not my dad).

18 months later and we're waiting for the undertakers to set up my brother's coffin in the living room after his death 2 days before in a motorbike accident. They leave, closing the living room door discreetly and leaving us to it.

We're all in the kitchen, and dad takes the first step. He walks to the living room door, opens it, but stands there, unable to continue. I'm a few steps behind, and walk past him. As I do so, crapping my pants, I think- where and when did I seen him standing like that before?

I've just shuddered at that one cody

A mate of mine was working on a farm near Chepstow, strange set up with an old house on the lane between her gaff and the parlour. The house was empty, I dont know why but it put the fear of God into me. Just walking past made my skin crawl. This farm used to milk 3 times a day and as we were walking back past the house after last milking we both walked as far away from it as possible. I asked her why she did that and she just said the house gave her the creeps. Never had a feeling like that before or since.

Had a couple of episodes of sleep paralysis a few years back. Deeply unsettling feeling like someone sitting on my chest and pressure in my skull. Horrible!

I was out on a late night ride a while back and as I passed through the car park in our local woods, I was startled to hear the sound of moaning coming from somewhere nearby. I peered through the wood and saw a ghostly light coming from the carpark and the shadows cast by strange phantom figures. A car appeared to have been demonically possessed as it was rocking from side to side with some vigour and the moans were coming from the general vicinity.

As the moaning appeared to increase in tempo, I reasoned that I didn't want to hang around too long so I turned around and followed the loop one more time. Presently, I eventually returned to my original route and found myself nearby the carpark again. The ghostly apparition and the possessed car had now gone.

I reckon the place had been visited by a poltergeist, as women's underwear was strewn all about the place in a very haphazard manner. Further investigation confirmed that it was definitely a poltergeist as there seemed to be traces of ectoplasm on the ground near where the possessed car had been parked.

Not wanting to hang around any longer I jumped back on my bike and sped off, properly spooked by the experience.

Cody- I've nothing to say, just a few tears.

Told this before but here it is again.

10 or so years ago I was a student and worked the holidays labouring for Dads building company. He had brought some empty barns to convert right at the back of an empty farm. We were aware squatters had been using the site. First task in the dead of winter was to gut the barns skipping the piles of junk and debris. Someone uncovered a newly bricked up wall, not cemented in, just bricks stacked to form a complete divide. Intrested we took the bricks to reclaim and I noticed a white object on the rear wall. Getting torches we peered inside to see it was an animal skull surrounded by candles. I thought it was some of the lads playing a practical joke but everyone seemed unnerved. There was loads if burned paper and ribbons on the floor. Dad not being one for anything like that, a level headed hard man, said squatters found a sheep carcass and were messing around. We all cracked on. One of the labourers a huge ex army hulk claimed he could hear children crying when he was in that room, I saw another man burst into tears and the room always felt cold.
The job was completed and that area became a walk in wardrobe.

The barn then rented out,, it was not mentioned about the hidden room. he contacted Dad about some electrical problems. Lights going off in the walk in wardrobe. Electricians inspected it and found no fault. A few weeks later there was another call he wanted to end tenancy early as his fiancée was having nightmares of the occult and had taken to sleeping at her mums. She didn't feel safe, also next doors children were noisy crying all night but he never saw them. Investigating further next door didn't have, nor ever had staying any children.

Dad sold the barns.

Stayed at a mates farm house he was renting in France.
Had a really bad dream one night that some guy in a white shirt and waistcoat was bent over me whilst I slept, awoke to see what I was dreaming about, then woke again to nothing and the lights on!
Next day we explored the loft which was full of really old boxes. Amongst them was lots of photos, many of which had photos of the guy I'd seen in my dream, other boxes were full of human teeth! We left the next day...

Yeah, cody's story gave me the shivers

Lol at PJM!

Years back me and a few mates were walking back from a winter surf along the coast path and its raining and getting dark.. The really weird thing is we can hear bagpipes (i live in west wales not scotland). We come round a corner and standing there perched on a ledge looking out to sea is a man in full scottish uniform (kilt, tall hat thing, sporren etc).

Just so surreal to see someone playing the bagpipes, perched on a coastpath, in the rain and its getting dark?? Just a real WTF moment.
The guy didnt look round or didnt even seem to see us and just carried on playing as if it were normal (maybe it was for him??)

My mum told me loads of stories of when she used to work in the hospital, some that gave me the shivers.

One where she was working as a midwife and had just delivered a baby and te family were standing round the mother. My mum came to check on the mother and smelled tobacco smoke from a pipe and queried the family if they had been smoking in the hospital, they calmly answered no we don't smoke, that will be grandad. My mum asked where he was and was told he died 2 years ago.

Another where she was walking down a corridor with an enclosed locked courtyard with windows and discovered a man in the courtyard who she described as wearing overalls and rigger boots, he chapped on the window and asked if he could see his baby, my mum freaked an went to get security but when they returned the man was gone. She found out later that the father othe baby she had just delivered was killed on an oil rig accident weeks earlier.

As a kid of about 6, I was laid in bed trying to sleep on my front. I felt fingers run up and down my spine and freaked out as no-one was in the room. I told my mum and her reasoning was that laying on my front would make my nerves tingle like someone running their fingers up and down like that. I have tried it many times since (I'm 45 now and still try) and have never been able to recreate the feeling and remain slightly convinced it was some kind of 'experience'.

[img] [/img]

Load of old bollocks, the lot of it.

If ghosts existed, I'd be wading thigh deep in the bloody things, having to push them out of the way to get into work, and shaking them out of my jeans to get dressed to go home.

Stayed in this bothy once. It was supposed to be haunted by the ghost of some girl murdered there. It was a helluva creepy place in the pitch black. There was always this sense of "something" there that made your hairs stand up. I took this picture as we were leaving. The others didnt even want to look back at the place. I swear i could see something in the window. Even the picture creeps me out...
[img] [/img]

I saw Lush once, they were quite good.

About this time 12 months ago, I was in an old pub in Manchester when i saw a ghostly apparition (looked a bit like hora) getting a round in 😯 I've told countless people since but unsurprisingly, nobody believes me!

Not as creepy as the others but music woke me up in the night.
Went downstairs and my tuner and amp are on as well as living room light. No way I would have gone to sleep and left them on.
My friend lived there before I did and him and his girlfriend assumed it was each other leaving the pot plant on the stairs.

Tuesday 29th January 2008.
I woke up at 330am to the phone ringing, I picked it up, said "hello?" and it was my mum, she just said "Right Neil".
This was something she'd say to me as a youngster when I was being naughty, "right Neil, thats enough".
I woke up, the above had been a dream, but as I was lying in bed I could hear the dog howling in the kitchen, just once.
I didn't get to sleep again, went to work that day knackered. My wife phoned me later to tell me the doctor had phoned, mum had a pretty bad chest infection.
My mum died on the Thursday.

Still a load of old bollocks.

Got a couple of spooky tales.
All tales whilst living with the rents.
For my sisters 18 th birthday she and her mates went in a white limo up to tall trees night club in Middlesbrough, on returning the same weekend, my sister found a white toy limo on her shelf in her bedroom no could explain where it had come from.

Dad off work ill whilst myself and sister were at school, my dad was in bed heard a bang so got up to see what the bang was, he checked all the rooms and landing between bedrooms etc, thought nothing of this bang so went back to bed, 5 mins passed another bang so he got up again, this time in front of the mirror on the landing all my sisters make up and brushes were in front of the mirror like someone had just got ready and left.

During my school years I did a part time job helping a local milk man, so was pretty tired often, on one day after school I fell asleep on the sofa, my mum had been sewing the night before and left sewing machine out on dining room table, so I was fast asleep and my mum cane home from work and the sewing machine was going, the peddle wasn't passed against anything and the plug wasn't plugged in... Go figure..

the family seem to think its someone looking over us as when nothing else happened after we both turned 18.

Sometimes, when I'm getting ready for bed late at night, I glance in the bathroom mirror to find my late father looking back at me.

Getting old sucks.

I lived in a listed 200 -250 yr flat (old building but not mind) so the story goes like this ...

1. My sister came for a visit and on one early morning at around 6pm she went to the kitchen to make some breakfast. Few days later while on the phone to my mother she told me that my sister saw 6 "figures/shadows" sitting around my kitchen dinning table. My sister did not freak out.

2. About two months ago while I was alone in my flat typing away on my computer I heard someone used my toilet by flashing the toilet, then opened the toilet door then slammed it close, then entering the room next to mine. I got up to check but nobody was around ...

3. Sometimes while asleep in my room ... I could smell someone smoking pipe or cigarettes ...

4. Or someone suddenly called my name from afar or simply shouted at me ... this already happened many times. Shouting usually very close to my ears. Sometimes when I was very sleepy I simply ignore them.

eerrmmm ... Okay ... I nearly overslept many times when the "voice" shouted at me. Perhaps to get me up to work. Okay ... me bad.

I am not bothered about "them" hanging around so long as they look after the place (plenty of burglars around my area) and perhaps help me win some jackpots. Anyway, they can stay if they respect me. If not I shall ask them to leave.

Oh ya ... someone in the building once asked me if someone was living in the 3rd floor (it's an attic) as they talked very loudly ... hmmm ...

Sometimes while asleep in my room ... I could smell someone smoking pipe or cigarettes ...

That is well spooky - I can't smell anything when I'm asleep.

How come no-one ever sees Cavemen ghosts?

Haven't finished the thread yet but I have to pause to say 'hat' to PJM1974
LOL

Our old caravan, that had an old lady in it. Not scary, just a feeling. Used to see orbs of light dancing around inside it in the dark. Whilst turning in one night, when our eldest was very young he was getting unsettled & we heard someone shushing him, & he went back off to sleep. Just before we sold it, I popped in one night to grab something, & I was sat on the seat feeling in the drawers for a book, only light was from the door. And sat next to me was an old lady. Not scary, a very calm feeling in fact, but I didn't tell the wife till we had sold it. Often wonder who she was.

Keep them coming folks.

ernie_lynch - Member

That is well spooky - I can't smell anything when I'm asleep.

You will when it's very obvious but that depends on how sensitive your sense of smell is.

Get this my pet Doberman died one summer long time ago while I was very far away, and one night I was woken up to smell of roses all over my room like someone spraying perfume all over (no rose outside my windows but grass only). I told my parents and was told that my father sprayed rose perfume on our pet before he buried her. The perfume spraying was to find out if our pet came back for a last visit. She did.

hmm...

EDIT: [url= http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/the-after-life#post-3297131 ]Aha![/url]

Squidlord - Member

hmm...

EDIT: Aha!

Yeap! That's the one and until today I still miss her. Bloody vet murdered her ... I just hope the vet doesn't meet in my home town or else ...

As for the suggested technique(s), try them if you do not believe me but try not to be spooked if it's true. 😀

Loads of people die in hospitals. Literally every side room/cubicle will have probably had hundreds of people die in it. Every bed in a hospital some bodies died on, in intensive care in my hospital we probably have on average a death a day. Yet nobody ever reports seeing a ghost, or a feeling or anything. Weird eh. 😉

Saw a UFO once. 3 of us looking at the night sky sharing a tab near Slapton Sands. Watched it for 10 minutes or so, reasonably bright light (like a bright star) with swift angular movements. None of us could work out what it was. Strange, but I won't be losing any sleep over it.

The old owner of our house died and lay in the kitchen overnight. For two years for roughly a couple of weeks each May the bin lid used to rattle at night. A 5lt bottle of water ontop sorted that when it woke me up.

I would NOT buy my Dads old place. Creepy as owt, plus the fact that he lay there undiscovered for three days.

Im on the fence/unsure if its 'true' however at our office myself and one other often thing someone is stood next to us in a certain part of the building.

It's all a load of crap IMO. However, when me and a mate were 17 and just passed our tests we used to drive a ways for no apparent reason. Total waste of fuel in hindsight but anyway one day we drove down to Beachy Head in my mates Mini. We had no idea it was a popular suicide spot but reckoned it was a famous landmark to aim for. It was pissing down, dark and pretty grim on the narrow lanes up to the cliff carpark when we saw this dude in what looked like one of those light blue or green things you wear when you stay overnight in the hospital. He was shaved headed, pale, gaunt, piss wet, and standing on the corner dividing two roads. He just stared at us as we went passed and we instantly shat our pants. When we got to the carpark it was empty apart from a police car that we couldn't tell if anyone was in it so we parked up rather than looking shady by bolting out of the carpark straightaway. My mate was convinced it was an escaped nutter by the road and wanted to tell the cops. Just as he was about to go over to the cop car we could just make out this figure (it was steamed up with condensation in the Mini and still pissing down) walk over and get in the cop car but the interior or headlights don't go on, even after a few minutes. So we start to drive out of the carpark and pull in front of the cop car and my mate says "sod it" jumps out and taps on the cop car window but nothing happens, by this point I'm shi**ing it again so I say to my mate "man let's just go" but he opens the door gets on the floor, everybody walk the dinosaur....

Well I got carried away a bit but upto the carpark it's all perfectly true.

I saw an apparition in my garage one night. I was out there working when this bloke appeared. I stood transfixed, frozen to the spot with fear. He proceeded to nick all my spare inner tubes & left as quickly as he'd appeared. I've also noticed that all our food keeps vanishing only to be replaced by piles of dirty dishes 😆

Weird 🙂

haydenW you had me with the picture for a minute, assume everyone else spotted it?

haydenW you had me with the picture for a minute, assume everyone else spotted it?

Spotted what ?

A friend of mine lived in a rented flat for a while many years ago in Wellington, where there had been a famous murder (google Rufus Marsh and Dianne Miller if you are interested).

Anyways it was creepy as hell. They showed me the "bloodstains" on the bedroom floor. I'm not that stupid but it was still creepy. The landlord hadn't told them but the story came out in a magazine in 1987.

I couldn't go upstairs in my own, and once when we were sitting downstairs we heard somebody walking about in the murder bedroom. There was definitely nobody home. She moved out pretty soon after that.

I am sure it was all mostly just suggestion in the heads of stupid young girls, but I wasn't waiting around to find out.

organic355 - Member
haydenW you had me with the picture for a minute, assume everyone else spotted it?

Can't claim it as my own - saw it on another forum and thought it was good!

Can't claim it as my own - saw it on another forum and thought it was good!

Enlighten me please.

Keep looking at the white window after reading the story.

Zoom in and you'll see it.

My old Staffy used to see stuff when we went for walks at Caerleon amphitheater. He would sit and watch stuff for ages, ears up and twisting his head to the side. One day I decided to see how long he would sit and watch for, after 20 minutes I got bored he was still watching what ever he could see intently. All I could see was grass and old stones 😀

Zoom in and you'll see it.

[IMG] [/IMG]

Confused.com 🙁

My mum used to live in an old converted house near Darlington about 15 years. I remember a couple of incidents which scared the crap out of me and we still talk about today. I only visit at weekends but always felt there was a strange atmosphere in the place.

Me, my mum and sister went to bed one Saturday evening (separately I might add) and I was woken by music being played downstairs in the living room. My room was a loft above my mums bedroom and I went down to say it must be my sister and I would tell her to turn it down. I passed her room on the landing and the door was shut. I could see a light was on downstairs so I went down and a lamp was turned on in the living room and the hi-if was blaring out a cd. I turned it off, s**t myself and ran back upstairs. Earlier that weekend we had been sat watching tv when the Hi-fi had turned itself on, the cd deck came out, rotated then turned itself off in front our our eyes.

There were loads of incident like that but I wasn't actually there for the most unreal one which my mum has sworn to me definitely happened. I still ask her when I see her to see if she will relent and say they made it up.. Mum and sister watching tv one evening when a subtitle type text appeared on he screen. It apparently said the words "there is a ghost". It was apparently there for about 30 seconds before it disappeared..

Confused.com

Look at the original post not the image here,, keep watching the window.

I don't get them on my phone, but is it one of those stupid jumpy things?

I think it depends on your screen, if you look at the right angle you can see a figure of a woman standing in the window.

Remember the early morning earthquake from a few years ago? I woke with bed shaking a fair bit...I thought hmm poltergeist and fell asleep again!

I woke dreaming I was on a train that night.

Not me but my old Border Terrier, on our evening walk if we went down a certain street he would start shaking like a leaf, panicking and pulling on the lead, just as we passed the door to the Chinese takeaway.

Never bought anything from that one.

I had an odd one when I was maybe 14/15, on holiday with my parents in Portugal. We'd gone to a sort of castle type place which had been made into a museum.

I was wandering about the old dungeon like 'yea, whatever, bored' in the classic teenage style. Suddenly I felt what can only described as the most unimaginable feeling of dread. For no apparent reason I was utterly shitting myself, it felt like I was about to die.

I legged it out of there at record pace. As soon as I was outside the feeling went away, though I was a bit shaken up.

Not had anything similar happen since. It doesn't sound like much, but it was such a strong feeling, and completely inexplicable.

There was this old empty barn....
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There was nothing in it!

The end.

years ago (10?) - i was in abbeydale snooker hall, sheffield.

there were 4 of us in the 'back' room, 2 of my friends, me, and the barmaid.

i was sitting on a bench with a wall to my back.

and then someone/thing throws a piece of cue-chalk over my shoulder into the middle of the room, it made a fair bit of noise.

My 2 friends told me to stop messing around, the barmaid said nothing, but told me later that she'd seen lots of odd things happen in there...

hels - Member

I think it depends on your screen, if you look at the right angle you can see a figure of a woman standing in the window.

Ya, the oriental girl from "The Ring" ... good effect that.

No creepy stories, but has anyone seen that sort of childs tent on the hiking trail up at the top of Glentress black? Creepy sort of vibe to that when you're there on your own on a winter's evening. It's made of white gauze material and is really small, in that section where the pine trees are really tight in rows, so it's always a bit dark. No idea what it would have been used for.

Been a couple of years since I saw it, might not be there anymore.

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/p>

you b*stard!!!! my cousin made me watch this when he was about 16 i was 12! took me years to get over it!!

thats me ****ed tonight when i go to bed!!!

anyway my story , years ago my uncle built a new huge bungalow in a small local village. they had a dog monty and there was one room in ,a bedroom in the back corner monty never ever went into this room, if they tried to push or drag him in there he would go fekin mental.

it used ot be the spare/play room and it had a piano in there, my cousin used to play.

my auntie used to swear she used to hear it playing by itself only when she was in the house.

the room was always cold even though the rad in the room was scalding hot to the touch.

i used to stay in this room on holidays when they used to look after me when mum and dad went away, always used to have nightmares and was always ill, sickness etc.

still with me...sorry ....

anyway uncle and auntie moved about 10 years ago.... my cousin started casually doing the family tree it turns out 'apparenlty' 😉 part of the bungalow was built on a very, very old part of the church grounds!! you never would have guessed because the wall of the actual church is about 100m away!

makes you wonder.....

About 20 years ago, me and 3 mates were walking back along the road between Kingussie and Newtonmore after drinking at the Duke of Gordon. It was a dark, clear night and only the odd car passed us during the walk. Suddenly, there was a prolonged, steady flash of light, for maybe 4-5 seconds which completely lit up the surrounding area, as far as the eye could see. It was like daylight, but we could not see any source. Then darkness again.

If it was sheet lightning, there was no thunder or accompanying noise, rain or significant cloud cover or any other indication that you would associate with a thunderstorm. Freaked us the hell out. To this day I have no idea what could have caused it.

Many moons ago i did a bike tour including a stop at Loch Lomond Hostel. Balmy, still, perfect summers evening.
Talking to another lad in the hostel, we decide to get a pint in at Duck bay. Both of us need a piss first so head from the dorm through an open door to the loo.
Utterly baltic wind comes from behind us as we step through the doorway, hair standing up on end, we both yelp and run like big girls blouses.
Much " what the **** was that ?, Jebus Christus" etc.
Can't provide any reasonable explanation for it. No wind, roasting hot outside and no air-con in the building.
There was a dorm there that was closed up as people always fell out of the top bunks.

self inflicted this one. years ago, i'd been out to a club and taken some acid, had a great night, etc, blah blah, morning comes, went home and got in bed. anyway, just dropping off to sleep, still quite high, and i heard a noise like a metallic grating, i thought it was a robot growling under the bed. i swear, all my hair stood up, never been so scared in all my life. had a look, no robots,(obviously) settled back down to sleep. well, just dropping off, and it happens again. jumped up, hair really scared this time, on the verge of pulling the floor boards up, but persuaded myself to calm down, and reasoned with myself to ignore it if it happened again. so, it happens again a couple of times, but i ignored it and eventually went to sleep.
anyway, years later, i was having an afternoon nap on the sofa, and just as i'm dropping off, i made this funny snoring sound at the back of my throat....
stay away from drugs, kids.

When I was younger I lived in a house that had an old hanging tree at the end of the garden, the tree was locally known as the Devils Tree. The house was only around 30 yrs old at the time but both my sister and I have spoken many times about its "strange" feeling.

Anyway, one night while in bed I had a terrifying feeling of being lifted - more like an out of body feeling than anything else. It was probably a dream and sleep paralysis but I could not move, speak or shout. In the corner of the room there was a dark figure - not an outline, an actual figure. The experience ended with me "crashing" back to my body / bed. At the time it scared the crap out of me but I put it down to a nightmare. A few nights later I was out with some mates. One of them brought up the subject and explained her experience on the same night, complete with a figure in the corner of the room. This scared me a bit, but the spookiest was to come.

I chatted to my parents about the dream and it turned out that the grandfather of girl who'd experienced the same dream had been the last apprentice my grandfather had trained. They both had built the house we now lived in (with Devils tree in the garden and all). The house was also the last one my grandfather had built before falling ill and passing away (many years before I was born). The "apprentice" had died not long afterwards of a heart attack.

Not saying it was anything other than a series of coincidences, but it spooked the hell out of me at the time.

Suddenly I felt what can only described as the most unimaginable feeling of dread. For no apparent reason I was utterly shitting myself, it felt like I was about to die.

Whats the drug they give you to get your heart back to a regular rhythm that has exactly this effect.

Adenosine

I was staying in rented accomodation in Liverpool, woke up beefore the alarm in the morning and felt body roll to the right with the weight of somebody sitting on the edge of the bed. I froze and stayed that way for quite some time....

We can hear something running around upstairs in our house. I've been in the loo and can hear someone calling me. I've been in bed before now on my own and someone has tapped me obesity the shoulder. We both think it's a little girl in the house. All the doors have bolts on the outside like the previous owners were trying to keep people in the rooms.

Suddenly I felt what can only described as the most unimaginable feeling of dread. For no apparent reason I was utterly shitting myself, it felt like I was about to die.

Wonder if it could have been [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrasound#Infrasonic_17_Hz_tone_experiment ]this[/url]

Strange that this thread should pop up now. Just back from a week in the Tuscan town of Cortona where I was shooting a wedding. My wife was keen to come along and before I knew it, the in-laws had booked us all a house just inside the ancient Etruscan city walls.

Our room was an amazing, airy space with a small balcony affording spectacular views over the plain beneath the hilltop town. There was an unused and windowless spare room between us and the bathroom - it was the oldest part of the house, which had been changed many times over the centuries.

So one night, my back was giving me grief and after a few hours of not sleeping I decided to take my book to the bathroom to read, so as not to wake my heavily pregnant wife. I got as far as the door to the spare room and was groping about in the pitch black trying to find the lightswitch. Suddenly, in my left ear, and with enough pressure to move my hair, someone / thing inhaled then exhaled heavily and noisily. I scrabbled desperately for the switch in the spare room, found it and dashed into the bathroom which I reached just in time to hear my wife scream.

On running back through, she was sitting up in bed pointing to the spot where I'd felt the breath in my ear, and was unable to tell me why she was so terrified. I haven't told her my side of things (don't want a premature birth!) and realise all this sounds like nonsense but the hair is actually rising on my neck as I type.

vorlich that reminds me of a house we'd viewed a few years back. Still/warm day, wierd acting Estate Agent and a rushing/strong windy air in the attic. Turns out there had been a father/multiple family murder there.

Infrasound was reported on the BBCs website a few years ago as having been shown to induce these feelings of dread. The research they were reporting on showed that a lot of locations associated with spooky stories and reports of ghostly hauntings are also natural sources of infrasound. Church organs also apparently produce it.

The effects of adenosine (thanks Benjamin) are fascinating. That a chemical can induce that emotional experience shows that there is a physiological mechanism responsible for it. If it can be stimulated artificially it's reasonable to presume that there are other mechanisms that could do the same thing eg infrasound. Which gives us a rationale explanation for the stories above.

But the stories are still fun to read.

Can anyone explain what's going on with adenosine then that makes it have this effect?

Here's my efforts then.
As a kid I was in bed fast asleep. I woke to a find a figure at the bottom of my bed stood upright as if looking at me.
It was tall very tall had a black cloak on and a skeletal body that you could see through his open cloak but his head had horns almost like a minotaur but it's features were slightly more human.
So as you do as a kid you protect yourself by throwing the covers over your head. After a few seconds I peeped out of the covers and this giant horned face was looking at me absolutely craping myself I again turned over and hid under the covers eventually dropping off to sleep and no more episodes with the evil intruder.
When I lumbered out of bed the following morning I told my Mum this story. Her response was that our next door neighbor had had a massive heart attack in the night and had been rushed into hospital.
Did the reaper come to the wrong house? Who knows but if so it bought our neighbor enough time to survive.
Maybe just my over excitable imagination as I can give myself the willies while riding down the railway tracks in the dark but I hope I never find it standing at the bottom of my bed again.

Several years ago when my son was a toddler (he's 15 now) we lived in a rented bungalow for a while. I was in the kitchen one day listening to him playing and chattering away to himself when I heard him say what sounded like "Hello Jessie". Went in to ask him why he was talking to my parents dog who wasn't there and he said "No not Jessie, that lady". He then proceeded to play with "that lady" for a while, giggling a lot and this happened many times. Imaginary friend, I thought, how cute.

Then I mentioned this to the elderly neighbours sometime later - and they told me the old lady who lived there previously and died in the living room was called Bessie........

Erm, geetee, I didn't have any feelings of dread. Someone breathed into my ear quite hard in a darkened room, in the middle of the night. I was completely fine, right up until that point! Your infrasound explanation might help you sleep better at night, knowing that your logical explanation has covered all eventualities, but I'm inclined to keep an open mind.