Haunted Hotels: Where Some Guests Stay for Eternity

It's 2007. Post-Katrina travel to New Orleans is just too cheap to pass up, so I jump on the discounted opportunity to cross Mardi Gras off my travel to-do list. I hop on a flight from Dallas to the Big Easy with a few friends, and stay at the historic Hotel Monteleone in the French Quarter. Supposedly, the hotel is haunted. But it's fabulous and affordable, so I take my chances. This is where the story gets a little weird.

We spend the evening sucking down Hurricanes at Pat O'Brien's and getting to know the locals and tourists before we go back to the supposedly haunted hotel for some shut eye. The powerful libations send me into a restful slumber, but I awake suddenly to a deep voice in the room.

Hovering above me is a figure that I do not recognize. I try to focus. Who is that man? And, is he wearing my pajamas?! I do a quick check of my attire and realize that I am wearing my pajamas. What's going on? I try to speak but can't. The figment hovering above me dissolves. Could it have been a man named William Wildemere, who died inside the hotel? As for Billy Ghost's attire, well, that may have been the Pat O'Brien's Hurricanes playing a dirty trick on my imagination.

Obviously, Hotel Monteleone is my number one pick for haunted hotels. Here are a few others to get your spook on this Halloween:

Hotel Monteleone, New Orleans

This hotel is so haunted that it scared the International Society of Paranormal Research in 2003 when they encountered more than a dozen "earthbound entities" at the hotel. Among them were several former employees, Wildemere and a 10-year-old boy.

San Remo, San Francisco

This historic hotel dates back to 1906 just after most of San Francisco was burned to the ground and was once run as a brothel. Originally owned by a Madame, this painted lady still haunts Room 33, knocking on the door, but disappearing when someone answers.

Hotel del Coronado, San Diego

Even a luxury hotel can be haunted. Especially when one of its guests commits the unthinkable. In 1892, a woman named Kate Morgan, now the hotel's ghostly resident, checked into the hotel over Thanksgiving weekend, stayed a few nights and killed herself on the steps of the hotel leading to the ocean.

The Equinox, Manchester, Vermont

Built in 1769, the family of Abraham Lincoln often stayed at the hotel, and history tells us they were there the night Abe was assassinated. Employees at the hotel report seeing images on the third floor of a woman and a child that look much like Mrs. Lincoln and one of her sons.

Inn by the Sea, Portland, Maine

A graveyard adjacent to the inn is the only reminder of an 1807 shipwreck just off the shore of Cape Elizabeth that took 16 lives, including soon-to-be-married Lydia Carver. However, hotel guests report strange happenings that are believed to be the mischievous behaviors of Lydia.

The Driskill Hotel, Austin, Texas

Believed to be one of the most haunted hotels in the country, this beautiful hotel has a lengthy history and a few guests that refuse to leave. The spirit of a senator's daughter who took a fatal tumble down the stairs still plays in the lobby.

Queen Anne Hotel, San Francisco

Most of the paranormal activity in this hotel happens on the third floor, but a ghost by the name of Miss Mary Lake, who served as headmaster of the school that formerly occupied the building, roams the fourth level.