Places you have visited with a strange vibe

[RevolvingPivot]

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?

DH and I visited Blarney Castle in Ireland. We joined the queue to kiss the Blarney Stone, which went round some high battlements. I started to feel very uneasy and by the time I got to the Stone was in a state of panic. Kissing the stone involves leaning over backwards while they hold you. I was able to do it but could not wait to get back to ground level. Probably just vertigo, but possibly channelling someone who had been thrown over.

@Lightswitchesoffatnight

I like Saltburn.

For weird you want to try Wroxham in Norfolk. The entire place is dominated by one family, Roys of Wroxham.

Lol it’s fabulous. Roy used to wander through the town, my DH recalls him. We own a property around there.

@RevolvingPivot why are you going back then?
I went to Newcastle for a work trip years ago, that place is weird. Especially the Travelodge I stayed in, worst nightmare I have ever had that night! And a freaky museum experience for Hadriens Wall, South odd I rushed round and out and thought my life was in danger, just that gut feeling if I stayed a minute longer!!!

@OrangeBananaFish

It was probably the atmosphere, but the London Dungeons. Maybe I'm just super squeamish as it was the Dungeons, but I felt really really odd. Lightheaded. Was OK with York Dungeons.

I've been to Saltburn once and went on that tram. Didn't notice any strange feelings though. Apart from Boredom TBH. I've not been back. We tend to go to Redcar or Whitby.

Funny you should mention the London Dungeons. It does have a strange atmosphere. I went there many years ago and had a weird kind of blackout. I went completely blind for about a minute (felt like hours) but stayed conscious. I actually walked straight into a wall before BF grabbed me and sat me down on the floor. It could have been the contrast between the neon-lit signs and the general darkness elsewhere, but it's never happened since.

@NewModelArmyMayhem18

I agree with the Anne Frank house. There was definitely a hush and a feeling of desperate sadness, although it's kind of obvious why. I was going to say that's the only place I've felt unsettled.

I was going to mention Portmeirion. It should be idyllic but it's just not. I think there is a heaviness to that whole part of Wales though. Certainly very insular and despite being a tourist destination seems to be very anti non-locals.

The Anne Frank Museum definitely has a vibe, you can practically hear stories coming out of the walls. I found it very moving.

@EstuaryBird I felt a sense of doom in the Arena in Verona. I couldn't imagine how anyone could go and enjoy an opera or any other event there. It just felt like something horrendous had happened - especially in the holding pen areas. Like the fear from the past was seeping in to the present day. I couldn't wait to leave. My husband didn't feel a thing. I'd love to go to Rome but think I'll just look at the Colosseum from the outside.

A hotel in Switzerland - I saw children who weren't there in the middle of the night and my mum had a horrific nightmare about being trapped in the mountains around us. Recently looked it up - it looks like the setting for a horror film. No mention of any history - maybe deliberate?!

Bakersfield, California - in fact the whole central strip of California has a very uneasy feel to it. But Bakersfield was creepy.

San Francisco - not so much woo feelings, but it was desperately run-down and full of unfortunate people for whom the 60s either never really finished or never really got started. These people seemed to flock to me - it left me very uneasy and feeling very unsafe. We went about 20 years ago. I hear it is even worse now. Would not chose to visit again. NYC on the other hand was amazing - a place I could see myself living in.

We went to Salem in Massachusetts a few years ago. Obviously it's going to have a spooky vibe but we went about a week after Halloween and it was so quiet, pretty sure we were the only tourists walking around. Went to a witch museum and it was just me, DP and the guide.

It was a bleak day as well but it gave me the shivers in a good way (if you know what I mean)

Our car was playing up so we could get to the place we planned ( this was at least 15 years ago ) it was starting to get dark and we were just past Whitby. Came across a sign showing there was a farm B&B down a track.
Knocked on the door but the woman said they were full ,went to leave but she offered us a room she didn't usually rent out. We were taken up to the loft , which was made up as a bedroom but not really a proper bedroom , she said her dc from uni used it when they came home in during the holiday season. The bed was lumpy , but we slept ok. The bathroom we used had toothbrushes etc in so a normal family using it bathroom. Not scary, but the next morning when we left we felt as if we'd stayed in a really weird place.

Not weird, but Warkworth in Northumberland. Very pretty but unwelcoming and in one case downright rude locals.

Glencoe...but not in a bad way. I get an overwhelming sense of belonging and homecoming just driving up the glen

Yes Betws Y Coed is awful. Just so depressing. I don’t think I’ve ever been there when it’s not been pissing down with rain, which may have influenced my feelings. Its so gloomy though and has an odd feel to it. Lots of people seem to really like it but I definitely don’t. Lots of Snowdonia has that feel though, I think it’s because it’s surrounded by big hills and mountains and gets Misty and wet a lot. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the top of Snowdon because it’s covered by cloud and mist most of the time!

@Brainwashed

Glencoe...but not in a bad way. I get an overwhelming sense of belonging and homecoming just driving up the glen

Me too, although I’m not Scottish. I love to see the Glencoe waterfall, it’s like an old friend

This is a very specific place, but the Royal Berkshire Hotel in Ascot. We went there to look at it as a prospective wedding venue and I was really excited as the photos looked stunning.

When we got there we walked around outside first and the grounds were beautiful, but I wasn't quite feeling it. Then we went inside and I was overcome with this feeling of absolute dread and couldn't wait to get out. Even my DM asked it I was OK because I'd gone very, very quiet. I felt really overwhelmed and weepy. My then DP really liked it and in the end I just had to say that there was no way I was getting married there but I couldn't tell him why as I didn't understand it myself!

Worth pointing out that I'm not a "woo" person in the slightest, so it really freaked me out to feel like that!

Isle of Wight - love it. It can be a bit, 'the land that time forgot' in places, i.e. turn left into 1975. I get it that it can be atmospheric. To me, that's part of the charm.

Whitby - interesting. Didn't feel spooky at all. Not even the old Abbey which we walked around in the day. We even went on the ghost walk around Whitby in the evening. Very interesting. Earlier in the day, some people had dressed up as pirates just for the heck of it! It was the anniversary of Captain Cook setting sail for New Zealand. There was a replica boat in the harbour which for a fee you could look round. So we did. Very interesting. Captain Cook museum and Whitby museum were interesting too.

Apparently, Halloween is the time to go. The town goes mad for it.

We walked from 'Boggle Hole' to Robin Hood's Bay and back. Nice little village, albeit living there would be awkward. Bet there's all sorts of smuggling history !

My husband got a weird vibe from Kilmainham Gaol in Dublin. It's a museum now. I forget the names of the executed men but the yard where they were executed has a heavy atmosphere. Their names are on a wall plaque and it's as if the executions happened last week not over 100 years ago.
We stayed in a converted piggery miles inland from Whitby/Scarborough. Didn't go to Saltburn. Didn't like Scarborough and I usually like a kiss-me-quick holiday town on the coast.

Another vote for Glastonbury but it might be the people who gravitate there rather than the place. I went into one shop and there was honestly an evil radiating from the shopkeeper, I'm certain of it.

Osterley House

Such an oppressive vibe and as I stood at the top of the grand staircase I suddenly thought "I'm going to jump, I can't stay here" - which is weird for me.

[quote Lairymary]The Hellfire Caves in West Wycombe. The actual website won't tell you the extent of why it's so creepy but this link will, for anyone that's interested.... en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellfire_Caves[/quote]
Also these: creepy!

@everythingbackbutyou

On a previous similar thread, a couple of people mentioned Kamloops in BC as making them uneasy. In light of the recent discovery of the remains of 215 indigenous children buried there (on the land of the former residential school), it makes sense.

Fucking hell, just read about this 😳😳😳

I mentioned Kamloops, we were there in 2000. Had a weird vibe.

I love the Isle of Wight! I first went there about 15 years ago, and it felt like mainland UK in the 1970s. I wonder if it's that feeling of stepping back in time a bit which makes it seem 'off' to others?

I think of it as such a peaceful place - we always go to the Donkey Sanctuary which is just lovely. When we went last year one of the volunteers urged us to make lots of fuss of the donkeys as they'd not seen many people due to Covid restrictions and were missing human interaction, poor things!

Dachau.

Slebech Church. Wales.

You could go through a hole in the barbed wire to get closer but I felt quite unnerved by it.

Monrovia in Liberia. I didn't like it at all, i didn't feel relaxed the whole time I was there. It was shortly after the civil war and there had been a lot of suffering and there was a very tense and unpleasant vibe, it was quite threatening even though the people individually were lovely.

I had previously read on another forum about Kamloops having a strange vibe.

Those poor children and their families. To have it in law that your children should be removed purely due to your culture and race, and to know that many of the children would perish (death rates vastly higher than the norm in those schools).

Louise Erdrich (Native American heritage novelist - talks about the Catholic schools and the children taken for 're education') if anyone would like to understand more. Fiction but based in fact.

Anyone else feel this way about Cardiff or just me? I’m not sure if I’m imagining it but it feels unsettling.

Went to a place in Australia, can't remember the name of it, got off the train at the wrong stop, the tiniest station in the middle of nowhere and there was machine speaking on a loop basically just telling you to have a nice day, a bench and a shut up station with no timetable anywhere. Middle of nowhere. I felt like I was in an episode of Fargo or the like. Waited five hours for the next train (pre mobile phones so just sat there hoping nobody would come and simultaneously that someone would come!!)