Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Mumsnet classics

Relive the funniest, most unforgettable threads. For a daily dose of Mumsnet’s best bits, sign up for Mumsnet's daily newsletter.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

Places you have visited with a strange vibe

963 replies

RevolvingPivot · 02/06/2021 21:59

Hi. I'm off to Saltburn (near Whitby) tomorrow and I feel sick. I visited last March. The weekend before the lockdown.

The place was so eerie. I was actually freaked out on the pier and had to run off it. I actually managed to sleep at night but I honestly didn't think I would.

The cottage was surrounded by cliffs and there was a Victorian lift and a small morgue by the beach. I'm not sure whether these have anything to do with it.

Has anyone else had this feeling from a place they have visited?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
29
looptheloopinahulahoop · 04/06/2021 21:33

@BreakingtheIce

The Jersey underground hospital always comes up in these threads. I don’t know what went on there!
It was the hospital for the German occupying troops during WW2. It was built by slave labour. Ditto Guernsey (which has been left much more as was and feels more eerie than the one in Jersey which has been turned into more of a museum).

Actually the atmosphere was completely ruined last time I was there by them playing Radio 1 in the cafe, completely out of keeping.

nobodysdaughter · 04/06/2021 21:31

@ratatat66 I went to Sarajevo and find it hard to describe to people who haven't been. Although the people were lovely, it felt so cut off and traumatised.

hcaePyzziF · 04/06/2021 21:30

As others have said, Auchwitz.

Also Lima, Peru. It felt sinister. The whole time I was there I kept looking over my shoulder in case anyone jumped out at me. I’ve never felt like that anywhere else (in Peru or elsewhere).

Lokdok · 04/06/2021 21:29

Dungeness!! And dymchurch. Just odd. Especially out of season!

cherish123 · 04/06/2021 21:29

As a student, I went to another town with a friend to visit her friend. The house they lived in belonged to the church. The house was filled with icons and there was a room that was a mini chapel. There was also a dining room with a huge table. Once a week the students who lived in the house had to dine there with dignitaries from the church. The whole place had a weird vibe.

tolerable · 04/06/2021 21:28

breadlebane. got out the car and felt -horrendous -like my soul was drained from me.

nobodysdaughter · 04/06/2021 21:27

I grew up in Lincolnshire on the edge of the fens. The farm was literally in the middle of nowhere. It was really oppressive, so much sky. All these years later I still have disturbing dreams of the surrounding lands.

Beardie03 · 04/06/2021 21:27

Can I add Lundy Island. Very beautiful but staying there was terrifying....

Beardie03 · 04/06/2021 21:25

@buildersteagirl

Lorna Doone Valley. Went to look at a property on a warm sunny day, I couldn't wait to leave. The whole area had a heavy, dark, depressing feeling about it. It made me feel physically ill and very distressed.
Interesting. I live very near Exmoor
Vicliz24 · 04/06/2021 21:20

@SmidgenofaPigeon

Having never suffered a day of what others describe as depression in my life, I was awful in Berlin. I honestly felt like I had the weight of the world on my shoulders, I kept bursting into tears and was crying in a bloody restaurant which was embarrassing and very unlike me indeed. I couldn’t understand it. I felt like this black fog had attached itself to me, I felt so heavy and sad. Weird, because I think it’s an awesome city, but I could not get rid of that feeling.

Never felt like that before or since.

This ! I was exactly the same in Berlin . I found it overwhelming the sense of misery I had.
littlepeas · 04/06/2021 21:18

@CorvusPurpureus

A house I lived in with in the U.K. when the kids were small had a decidedly creepy vibe to one whole 'end' of it. Massive Victorian doer-upper money pit.

Dining room - spooky. Various efforts to get dc to use it for crafts etc completely failed...they'd just drift back out on any pretext.

Bathroom above it - also 'Nope'. It had an amazing roll top bath which we renovated around. No one ever soaked in that bath .

Bedroom next to the iffy bathroom - originally a study for me, because whilst it was a lovely, quirky room, which we thought then 5yo Ds would love, he was having none of it & demanded a box room at the other end of the house instead.

I used to work in there late at night. I'd generally be quite absorbed, but every so often I'd take a break & have a strong, & not entirely friendly, sense of Not Being Alone. I bolted out of there once or twice...

In the course of the renovations, dd1 took a fancy to the study & bagged it as her bedroom so she wouldn't have to share with dd2. She occupied it happily for a couple of years.

Chatting to dd2, now a teenager & several years after we moved out of that house, & apropos of nothing she informs me that 'oh yeah, that was when I had the haunted bedroom. I was mostly ok with it, it was the corridor outside I really didn't like. It was looking down towards that horrible bathroom.'

Me: 'what?! You're the least woo person I know!'

Dd1: 'yup, but that house didn't care that I wasn't woo. Right? You aren't either.'

Me: 'bollocks!'

Dd2: 'That bath, though.'

Me: 'well, ok...'

It genuinely was just creepy down that end of the house. We had people crash after parties in the dining room who really didn't sleep well & were quite sheepish about it.

No idea what the background was!

We lived in a house like that for a while - it was originally 2 cottages, but had been knocked together into 1, so there was a really obvious divide between the nice side and the creepy side. They were both really old (Tudor) and I'd sometimes find myself pondering things like how many people had died in our bedroom - despite these thoughts I was never afraid in that part of the house. When dh was away overnight I would shut all the doors that led to the creepy bit and just exist in the nice bit! I didn't see or experience anything I could describe, other than a different atmosphere in what was the two separate cottages.
buildersteagirl · 04/06/2021 21:16

Lorna Doone Valley. Went to look at a property on a warm sunny day, I couldn't wait to leave. The whole area had a heavy, dark, depressing feeling about it. It made me feel physically ill and very distressed.

NotACompleterFinis · 04/06/2021 21:15

A play park in central France about 15 years ago. Bouncy pillows, ride on bikes, miniature train, etc. But we were the only ones there. Middle of summer. Everything looked a bit tired, grass growing up through the paving etc. Kids had a great time mind 🤷

Beardie03 · 04/06/2021 21:12

Jersey. Went there for our honeymoon. Very depressing place imo

Glastonbury
Ilfracombe
Portland Bill

Eggedy · 04/06/2021 21:09

I’ve been to places I’ve found depressing but I’ve never had a creepy feeling from a town or village. I don’t have a spiritual bone in my body and am cynical and have never had any paranormal experience or got weird vibes. Think concentration camps, prisons etc are different as you know the history.

I actually really like some of the places mentioned. I live in East Grinstead (been here 10 years) and have never found it creepy. It definitely has a quirk but in a good way. I know there are Scientologists, Mormons etc around but I’ve never come across one.
We’re thinking of visiting Bodmin Jail this summer and after reading the comments I’m looking forward to it!

Silkal · 04/06/2021 21:08

Pericombobulations I know exactly where you mean in Trerice. I felt weird in that corridor. Also a holiday let that DH and I stayed in Llanidloes. I was in my own in there for a couple of hours and I was terrified.

janj2301 · 04/06/2021 21:03

Alcatraz, sucked the life out of every living thing, very interesting but coulnd't wait for the boat back

Scotland32 · 04/06/2021 20:57

The village of Oradour Sur Glane in France. Give it a google. So creepy and heartbreaking.

Tootingbec · 04/06/2021 20:57

@Moomala

..
Jeeeeeessuuussss!!!!
olidora63 · 04/06/2021 20:55

Hargate forest and Hurst woods in Tunbridge Wells...both really creepy!!

RattlesnakesUnfold · 04/06/2021 20:51

Arnside, near Morcambe Bay.

Creepy expanses of quicksand and a bore tide that rushes in so fast all the birds stop singing.

Lickedmylollyandneversaidsorry · 04/06/2021 20:48

I remember going to stay with relatives in Canterbury as a young girl (mid 90s) and finding it really weird and creepy there. Don't think the castle helped. Confused

gingermumi · 04/06/2021 20:48

I love Royal Victoria Country Park and have camped there so have been there at night too but I totally agree it has a 'feeling' to it. It is beautiful but always feels as if there is something else going on that we can't see.

Hungerford - went there a couple of years after the awful shooting - I felt like we were intruding. The locals were welcoming but I didn't feel right being there.

Thatched B and B in Charmouth - stayed there about 30 years ago with exH (he doesn't get the honour of being exDH). Very old, beautiful, quaint cottage but full of dark wood and panelling and heavy doors. No ensuite. Was completely petrified the whole time and couldn't sleep, felt if I did something would 'get me'. Couldn't bring myself to go to the loo in the night even though I was bursting. worse place I have ever slept (or not slept).

Glasto - agree it is an odd place and does attract some damaged individuals. I used to like to go there and enjoyed the cafes and slow pace but went 2 years ago and was really disappointed, the town had lost it's good vibe and felt tense and touristy. The Tor, which used to feel quite spiritual, was heaving and full of people being t**ts - including a naked woman and her vicious dog!

Agree re Salisbury - always feels odd and slightly out of kilter and also Arundel Castle - there is a room there with a arched window (probably lots to be honest) but one particular one made me feel uncomfortable - exH took a photo of me sat by it and I feel uncomfortable looking at the picture still - it's as if I am back there - I have the same feeling.

Local to me is George Staunton Country Park - have always felt a strange deja vu there and an odd feeling of sadness and, to an extent an incongruous anger, that the house that was there has been knocked down (in the 1960s I think). I feel connected to it but I have no idea why. I have asked my parents if we went there when I was little and we did but nothing special or odd happened.

I am not a 'woo' kind of person yet, like others, I seem to be aware of the differences some places have.

LaLaLandIsNoFun · 04/06/2021 20:47

Bethesda.

Any flooded quarry

Violinist64 · 04/06/2021 20:45

I found Carlisle very depressing. It was bad weather anyway and everywhere seemed dark and oppressive. It had a strange feeling altogether.

Swipe left for the next trending thread