Wednesday, October 28, 2015

SAMHAIN


 
October 31st is the Celtic Sabbath of Samhain



 Welcome to the Divination Nation blog!

 We are Pleasant Gehman and Crystal Ravenwolf, a duo of divination divas, “spiritual sisters from another mister”. We’re life-long Tarotistas, obsessed with all things esoteric and paranormal. We’ve created this blog to share our knowledge and to connect with the vibrant worldwide metaphysical  and paranormal community.

We hope this blog is as fun for you to read as it is for us to write…Enjoy!

 As we draw closer to Halloween, the anticipation grows. Nights are getting longer, there’s a spooky charge in the air and all sorts of  mischief is a-foot. Though kids have been planning their costumes and trick or treat routes for weeks, October 31st is no longer just a holiday for children. Thanks to voluptuous horror hostess Elvira- and the generation who grew up mesmerized by her- Halloween is now routinely celebrated by adults too. But for witches and Wiccans and all over the world, this time of the year is so much more than haunted houses, practical jokes, crazy parties and dressing up.
 What the average citizen calls Halloween, neo-pagans celebrate as Samhain- correctly pronounced “saah-win” or “saa-ween” – which is a Celtic Sabbath. The way most pagans see it, the veil between the world of the living and the realm of the dead has grown thinner, and on this most sacred of days, we honor our ancestors, those that have crossed the river before us.
 Like the Mexican Dia De Los Muertos or Day Of The Dead, we visit the grave sites of loved ones, cleaning and tending to their burial places, often setting up ancestral altars honoring the lives of our departed. Amidst the flowers are photographs, mementos and offerings left with love for deceased family members, dear friends and well-loved loved fur babies. Many also leave  random offerings outside for any lost or wandering spirits, and our dinner tables are carefully and respectfully set with a place ( or places) for the dead.
Samhain also marks the beginning of the New Year, so it is a time of reflection. The long evenings of winter are soon upon us, and we welcome the darkness and  silence by spending time with our shadow selves, remembering the lessons we have learned. We offer  prayers of gratitude for all the blessings we’ve received in the past year.
Now is an optimal time to look back at your life- perusing any journals you’ve kept, photos you’ve taken or taken, adventures you’ve experienced.  Consider what you’ve achieved, and also what you wish to accomplish.

Because the veil is lifting, Samain is also a wonderful time to seek guidance for the New Year by reading Tarot or Lenormand cards, through Runes, scrying or any other form of divination you choose.

We love this sacred time of year… and as we prepare our offerings to the loved ones now residing beyond the veil, we wish you a happy-and safe- Halloween, and a fabulous New Year full of bright hope, may your lives be blessed and bountiful!
#
 We’d LOVE to connect with you!
Visit our website to book  workshops,  Tarot readings, or have us come out for a paranormal investigation:  www.thedivinationnation.com
 
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheDivinationNation?fref=ts
 
Connect with us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TarotAlimah
 
To find out more about Pleasant or request a  Tarot reading or healing session,  click here: http://www.pleasantgehman.com/
 
For more on Crystal’s background, or request a  Tarot  reading or healing session, click here: http://crystalravenwolf.com


Crystal and Pleasant: Photo by Maharet Hughes

Friday, October 23, 2015

GRAVEYARD STOMP: 31 OF THE MOST ROCKIN' HALLOWEEN SONGS


 
Nothing says "Halloween" like The Cramps!


Welcome to the Divination Nation blog!

 We are Pleasant Gehman and Crystal Ravenwolf, a duo of divination divas, “spiritual sisters from another mister”. We’re life-long Tarotistas, obsessed with all things esoteric and paranormal. We’ve created this blog to share our knowledge and to connect with the vibrant worldwide metaphysical  and paranormal community.
We hope this blog is as fun for you to read as it is for us to write…Enjoy!

 Sick of those tired old sound effects mixes and want some truly cool ’n’ creepy songs to rock out to at your Halloween party?   Never fear- the Glamour Ghouls of Divination made a play list featuring 31 of our favorite spooky songs for The High Holidays… or, as they called it in the olden days, All Hallows Eve.  If you’re into punk, funk, classic rock, psychobilly, British Invasion, metal, country or psychedelic stuff, we gotcha covered! The first three songs are kinda obvious, but after that, you might be surprised!

 We also have All Access Passes to Hell, complete with bottle service and VIP Hearse Parking included- but you’d have to sell us your soul to pry them out of our cold, dead hands…. Mwah-ha-ha-haaaaaa!


1) Theme From Halloween- John Carpenter

2) Halloween- Siouxsie And The Banshees

3) Monster Mash- Bobby Boris Picket

4) Spooky – (recorded by The Classics IV, Dusty Springfield, Atlantic Rhythm Section & Lydia Lunch)

5) Season Of The Witch- Donavon

6) What’s Behind The Mask - The Cramps**

7) Highway To Hell- AC/DC

8) Jack The Ripper- Screaming Lord Sutch

 9) Welcome To My Nightmare- Alice Cooper**

10) Don’t Fear The Reaper- Blue Oyster Cult

11) Runnin’ With The Devil- Van Halen

12) Supernatural Thing- Ben E. King

13) Corpse Grinder- The Meteors

14) Werewolves Of London- Warren Zevon

15) Would You Be So Hot (If You Weren’t Dead) – The Damned

16) Ghost Song –The Doors

17) It’s A Monster’s Holiday- Buck Owens

18)  Dead Souls -Joy Division

19)  Dead Meat- Judas Priest

 20) Boris The Spider- The Who

21) Supernatural Thing- Ben E. King

22) Living Dead Girl- Rob Zombie

23) Long Black Veil- Johnny Cash

24) I Put A Spell On You- Screamin’ Jay Hawkins

25) Black Magic Woman- Santana

 26) Pet Sematary- The Ramones

27) Witchy Woman- The Eagles

28) Scary Monsters- David Bowie

 29) Dark Lady- Cher

31) Mr. Crowley- Ozzy Osbourne



** On the off-chance you’re not familiar with them, The Cramps and Alice Cooper (both included on this playlist, of course-!) each have enough sick-o songs to make their own full-length party mixes!    

Here’s just a few of Alice Cooper’s titles: Halo Of Flies, Sick Things, and can’t Sleep, Clowns Will Eat Me

 And the Cramps took it even one step farther with I Was A Teenage Werewolf, The Surfin’ Dead, Rockin’ Bones, Creature From The Black Leather Lagoon, and many, many more.

 Happy Haunting!

 Xoxo Pleasant & Crystal
#

 
Pleasant and Crystal want your blood!

 We’d LOVE to connect with you!
Visit our website to book  workshops,  Tarot readings, or have us come out for a paranormal investigation:  www.thedivinationnation.com
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheDivinationNation?fref=ts
Connect with us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TarotAlimah
To find out more about Pleasant  or request a reading or healing session,  click here: http://www.pleasantgehman.com/
For more on Crystal’s background, or request a  reading or healing session, click here: http://crystalravenwolf.com

Monday, October 19, 2015

SEERS AND SAGES: AN INTERVIEW WITH SHAHEEN MIRO

Multi-talented Shaheen Miro: divination star, intuitive consultant, artist and writer


 Welcome to The Divination Nation blog!

 We are Pleasant Gehman and Crystal Ravenwolf, a duo of divination divas, “spiritual sisters from another mister”. We’re life-long Tarotistas, obsessed with all things esoteric and paranormal, and practice many forms of healing, magick and divination. We’ve created this blog to share our knowledge and to connect with the vibrant worldwide metaphysical and paranormal community.

 We hope this blog is as fun for you to read as it is for us to write…Enjoy!


 Shaheen Miro has lived a truly magical life.  Well-versed in metaphysical and divination practices since he was a child, he’s an intuitive consultant, energy worker, divination expert and also an incredible artist, creator of the Tattered Nomad Oracle Deck.  

We first encountered Shaheen at TarotCon in Denver this past June… and loved his giving spirit and sense of humor.  Each day during the festival, he held a Gypsy Tea Party, a workshop on the ancient art of tasseography, or tea leaf reading. A talented and very giving instructor, his class was as fun as it was informational… and, true to the artist that he is, his incredible-looking class handouts were magnificent. 
 
In addition to his consultations and workshops, Shaheen has developed a line of products to the clear negative energy and heighten intuition, and runs a program for psychic development in children. He‘s also a prolific writer with a blog that’s jam-packed with information, and h does articles for a number of on-line metaphysical publications, such as Numerologist.com.  We are honored to feature this interview with such a shining light! 

 
Shaheen teaching tasseography at TarotCon Denver, June 2015


 Divination Nation:  For such an old soul, you’re very young! Tell us a little about how you started on your path- who was your mentors or teachers, and what or who influenced you?

 Shaheen Miro: I’ve always been a little gypsy living between worlds. As a child I saw spirits, had prophetic dreams, and I would step into bubbles of the past and see things that were just a memory of what was there. It was all very fascinating, and at times very frightening. Thankfully my mother and grandmother coached me, supported me, and validated the things I saw.

Around age five or six, my mother began laying cards out and asking me what I saw. We would spend hours telling stories, creating worlds and fairytales. This was her way of training my psychic abilities. Rather than being completely crippled by visions, and insights I learned to use them in a constructive way.

One thing I have always said is I have a mother everywhere I go! So my mentors, and teachers have always come in the form of some beautiful woman in my life. Obviously my mother and grandmother have been teachers. I had an art teacher in middle school that was a big influence. She would give me objects from her life and have me hold them and tell her everything I saw. She also taught me a lot about meditation, telepathy, and channeling.

Those are just a few of the many teachers in my life! Along side of those powerful women I have had many “distance” teachers, people I have connected with online, through TV, and books. I have to admit that Sylvia Browne was a big inspiration for me. She gave me a feeling of validation that I could take this into the real world and do something with it. She also influenced me to write as much as possible! I even met her once!

Oh, and I cannot forget to mention that Stevie Nicks is my spirit guide. She has taught me so much about self-expression, and going into the inner world to pull out information and creativity. I met her once as well! What a powerful lady.

Divination Nation: Tell us about your first ever “ official” divination gig- were you a kid?

 Shaheen Miro: I guess my first official big gig was at age thirteen. I read at a huge event called The Victory of Light Festival. It is held twice a year here in Ohio, and it draws people from all over the Midwest, and beyond to speak, read, vend and connect with curious individuals. I attended the event for the first time when I was nine, and got my first pendulum. But the fist time I read there I was thirteen. I still have clients from that weekend. It was a strange and exciting time. I was even interviewed by a few newscasters. . Clients and other readers threw me a few curve balls. And interestingly enough a few fellow readers challenged me because of my age… though I held my own!

Thankfully I had the opportunity to do the event. It began with me reading for the owner of the event. Days later he called me in a flurry telling me that I HAD TO DO THE EVENT! The rest is history… and I am still going strong.

Divination Nation:  How do you prepare for your work?

 Shaheen Miro: There is a certain headspace I have to move into to do a reading. I like to begin with a cup of tea, a few deep breaths, and a squirt of my Aura Elixir. All of which create sacred space for me so that we can really go into the deep places, and connect with energy. But in some ways I think I am always on… I just step further into the there realm when I’m doing a reading.

I step into every reading with the mindset that I am going to connect with the person being read, pull out what they need to know, empower them and give them lost of love and encouragement. A reading with me is much like a conversation with an old friend (though I don’t even know you), so I like to prepare myself to be open, and to listen really well. You really have to leave yourself at the door when you do a reading.

Divination Nation: Tell us about your PSYCHIC KIDS program- it sounds amazing!

 Shaheen Miro: The Psychic Kids series was a project between me and another reader friend, Melissa Leath. She and I had a discussion a year or so ago about psychic children, how they are coming into the world more and more, and how we need to give them, and their parents something to guide them.

Both of us drew from our many years of experience as readers, and writers to bring answers to common, and even more unusual questions. One of the beautiful things about the series is that it is bigger than just psychic kids! If you as an adult want to learn more about your psychic self then check it out. There is so much great information in the series.

Not only do I write about the psychic kids, I also write about a variety of psychic, spiritual and energetic topics! So visit my website ShaheenMiroINsights.com to find out more. My goal as a teacher is to give people practical tools for living a mystical life.

Divination Nation: You wear “many hats” - how do you divide your attention between everything you do?

Well on one hand, I have to do many things to stay sane. As much as I love doing readings, as much as I love writing, as much as I love designing… I can’t just focus on one! I need the variety to help me stay inspired, and in the flow. Over the years I have learned that my life follows a rhythm. One area will pick up when another slows down. I will finish one project and another will come into my awareness. As long as I stay in synch with that rhythm then I am usually okay. But believe me I fall out of step all the time. So I give myself a big kiss, and jump right back in!

Divination Nation: Are you working on any up-coming projects, events or products? 

 Shaheen Miro: Ahh, the magic question! Well I am working on a couple of things. One project is a new version of my deck Shaheen’s Tattered Nomad Oracle. This new version is going to really blow people away. I am not sure when it is going to roll out… hopefully at the beginning of the year.
A selection of cards from Shaheen's Tattered Nomad Oracle Deck

I am also working on more products to add to the mix along with The Gypsy’s Aura Elixir! My writing, and practice focus a lot on spiritual cleansing. So I created the Aura Elixir as a way to clear the vibes in an area, and really lift the energy in the atmosphere. Look for a few more sprays, oils and baths in the future!!
Lots of writing coming, always writing.  More classes coming in the future. The Gypsy Tea Party may be traveling further and wider around the country. Lets keep our fingers crossed. I have some ideas for a few online classes. And maybe a book or two. Throw some good mojo my way!!

Divination Nation: How do you prepare mentally, emotionally and physically for your work? Anything specific that you do?

 Shaheen Miro: I try to live in a way that prepares me for my work. So that means eating pretty well, listening to my body, doing some yoga. I also spend time tapping into my mental and emotional state. I journal a lot, I do affirmations and I work with a coach to help me get things out of my head and heart and into the real world.

As an intuitive I think having a spiritual practice is important. So I pray often. I do affirmations and intention setting every morning, and I use all of the spiritual cleansing techniques I talk about on my website.  I also use altars as a way for spiritual focus, sustenance and manifestation. Altars are a good focal point for your spiritual and creative energy, and they ground you spirit into the real world.

Divination Nation: Please share some of your favorite tips and advice for our readers…

Shaheen Miro:  Here are three tips I think will help you to open up intuitively:

 1) You are always telling an energetic story. This is your thoughts, ideas, beliefs and feelings about how you fit into the world, and how the world responds to you.  Look at your life right now and see how things are going… are you happy? Disappointed? Feeling fulfilled? If not then you can begin to change this. Ask yourself: Am I feeding my spirit?

2) The Universe is always speaking to you! Look at the world through your intuitive senses, your imagination, and the right side of the brain. When we look at the cup in a tealeaf reading we search for different shapes, symbols and signs… like looking at the clouds in the sky. We call them out and then make up a story. Just make it up! Then we start to decode it. Life is the same way. Notice what you notice, pull at the thread, and then ask for more.

3) Spiritual cleansing will help you release the web of negative energy and unintentional vibration, and put you in alignment with your highest good. When you are working from your highest good you begin to work as an artist with the Universe. Try this affirmation: “Infinite miracles come into my life in infinite ways everyone moment. I am open to the Universe. I feed my spirit, and I fulfill my highest good.”

Okay! Do it up lovelies…there is a big, wild, and beautiful world out there waiting for you to take it by storm.

#


Shaheen's  Gypsy Tea Party workshop featured beautiful handouts and a vintage tea cup  for each participant

 Visit Shaheen’s website for a wealth of  his  informational writing, to find out about  upcoming events, to book a private consultation, or to purchase his  Aura Elixir  products…and his gorgeous Tattered Nomad Oracle deck !

Say hi to Shaheen on social media:


Instagram: @shaheenthedream  Twitter: @shaheenmiro

 
Pleasant and  Crystal, Glamour Ghouls  : )

 We’d LOVE to connect with you!
Visit our website to book workshops,  Tarot readings, or have us come out for a paranormal investigation and/or house cleansing:  www.thedivinationnation.com
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheDivinationNation?fref=ts
Connect with us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TarotAlimah
To find out more about Pleasant  or request a reading or healing session,  click here: http://www.pleasantgehman.com/
For more on Crystal’s background, or request a  reading or healing session, click here: http://crystalravenwolf.com





Wednesday, October 14, 2015

SERIOUSLY SPOOKY: A PARANORMAL INVESTIGATION AT HOBBS GROVE- A TRULY HAUNTED HALLOWEEN ATTRACTION




Glamour Ghouls: Pleasant and Crystal posing on a hearse before investigating Hobbs Grove

Welcome to The Divination Nation blog!

 We are Pleasant Gehman and Crystal Ravenwolf, a duo of divination divas, “spiritual sisters from another mister”. We’re life-long Tarotistas, obsessed with all things esoteric and paranormal. We’ve been doing paranormal investigations together since 2009, exploring public and private sites that are reputed to be haunted. 
We hope this blog is as fun for you to read as it is for us to write…Enjoy!


 Unless you’ve been under a rock- or tombstone, as the case may be - you know that Halloween is big business. In California alone, there are more than twenty-five large scale haunted houses and Halloween attractions…  and that’s not even counting the corporate giants like Disneyland, Universal Studios and Knott’s Scary Farm. So when we were contacted about doing a paranormal investigation at Hobbs Grove, one of the top Halloween attractions on the West Coast, we jumped at the chance.

 Located in the heart of California’s San Joaquin Valley in the rural hamlet of Sanger, for the past fifteen years the former walnut plantation has thrown it’s creaky doors open as a Halloween theme park every October. Social media director and “spokes ghoul” Maverick Cadaverick reached out to us because the hundred or so actors and seasonal workers have experienced true paranormal phenomena for years. Since 2014, when several vintage stretchers and an autopsy table, were acquired from Wolfe Manor in nearby Clovis, the paranormal activity had escalated.  A tuberculosis sanitarium in the 1930’s, for decades, rumors of gross negligence and patient abuse circulated. Extremely haunted, Wolfe Manor was a beacon for psychics and paranormal investigators, featured on television shows Ghost Hunters and Ghost Adventures. Maverick was concerned that the medical items were filled with residual negative energy... not to mention the recently acquired coffin that had been used to transport a body from Mexico to the USA.
A Hobbs "resident"

He also sent us several pages worth of  the employee’s reports of paranormal phenomena, including apparition sightings, odd sounds, cold spots, disembodied speaking and singing voices and general anomalies, like objects disappearing.
Hobbs Grove features three distinct attractions: The Haunted Forest, a Haunted Hayride and a Haunted House built into a large barn. We wanted to explore all of it, especially after reading the worker’s reports, which were chilling.

On the first night of his job in the forest, one actor was so entranced by the hologram he saw- a legless half-man floating in the air wearing a 1930’s suit- that at the end of his shift, he marveled over the holographic technology to his co-workers.  After some uncomfortable glances exchanged by the rest of the crew, someone finally pointed out that Hobbs Grove didn’t have any holograms!  
One of the many sights in the Haunted Forest

Then there  was the time an employee on the Hayride went to one of the park’s trailers to get firewood, and was met with an ominous low growl, even though there were no dogs, coyotes- or even humans- in sight.  Another worker reported seeing set disembodied of legs and feet running across the rafters in barn- and actually heard the apparition’s footsteps.  Still a third noticed a uniformed security guard enter the room where he was working.  The guard, who’d appeared to be  human at first, turned transparent and disappeared through a solid wall.  And there was the legendary evening when Hobbs was at full capacity and ground to a  complete halt because of "legit" supernatural activity.  Several veteran performers in the Haunted Forest witnessed a large cable spool rolling through the woods by itself. The actors-many of who had been working there for years- were so freaked out they immediately evacuated their posts en masse.  The entire park full of hundreds of customers had to be shut down while the actors- who all steadfastly refused to return to the forest-were reassigned and a new crew was sent in.

 We set our ghost hunt for the nights of Friday, August 8th and Saturday August 9th, 2015.  The first night, we invited veteran paranormal investigators Jan Acosta and Keri Foss- Jastztremski along to hunt with us. Highly respected in the paranormal community, the mother and daughter team are known for their knowledge, site research, no-nonsense investigative style and meticulous evidence collection.  Jan is affectionately known as “Mom”, because she’s mentored several ghost hunters over the past couple of decades. On the Saturday, we (The Divination Nation) taught Paranormal Investigation 101 at The Cosmic Corral in Hanford, and brought the students to Hobbs that evening for fieldwork.   On each night, we brought an arsenal of paranormal equipment, from low-tech (divining rods) to state of the art high tech devices. We were armed with   EVP (electronic voice phenomena) recorders, EMF detectors, which show changes in the electromagnetic field by lighting up; and a REM pod, a device which emanates it’s own electromagnetic field through a miniature antenna.  When the instrument’s field is entered by objects- or an energy source, such as an entity- the Rem Pod lights up.  Mom also brought an Ovilus, a machine that has a dictionary-like database of words programmed into it with thousands of different verbs, adjectives, nouns, adverbs, for spirits to use to communicate. The way it works is that during an investigation, an intelligent spirit will make itself known in a way that modifies the environment, and can convert these alterations into the words contained in the machine.  We also had a camera person film each night of investigating.
 
 Hobbs Grove residents in the Doll Room
Both nights were nothing short of insane; in all our years of ghost hunting, it’s hard to think of a place that’s more active… we all agreed that Hobbs Grove probably topped even The Queen Mary!

 The first place we were drawn to was the barn, a large structure that includes the green room for the Grove’s performers, and is also the location where  many of the employees heard footsteps coming from the loft.  As soon as we went inside, we heard odd noises and felt the temperature drop. The sounds were so constant that we turned on our equipment right away, while Maverick texted the employees who were onsite, threatening to fire them if they were playing practical jokes.  They weren’t.

Originally a little skeptical that a Halloween attraction could actually be legitimately haunted, once all our devices were going off the charts, Keri quickly changed her mind. She recalls:

“ I thought to myself,  ‘We’re investigating a Halloween Haunt to see if it’s haunted? This ought to be interesting… Who would believe this one?’ Well, I do now! Upon our arrival, I felt many spirits lurking, trying to check us out. A gentleman by the name of Robert was the first to join us for the evening, openly chatting with us, somehow knowing he could be heard as he joked with us and even flirted!”  
Lens flares...or orbs? Judge for yourself!

 Our Rem pod was lit up like a Christmas tree, and Keri’s diving rods swung to and fro, answering    yes/no questions, which were confirmed by what “Robert”, was saying into the Ovilus.   While Maverick and another employee named Chris watched in amazement, we carried on a conversation for about ten minutes. Then Robert stopped talking; the room was cold though, the rem pod was still shining, and we could sense he was still there. We tried for a while to cajole him back into the conversation, but he was silent, so we started packing to move to another location. Keri put her rods away, Pleasant turned the rem pod off and put it back into the bag, but then it lit up again.

Mom  chided,

 “You need to turn that off!”

 Pleasant held up the Rem pod, showing that the switch was indeed off; Mom raised an eyebrow and said it must be defective.   The batteries were then removed, but the lights on the device stayed on… and didn’t finally shut off until hours later, after we  returned home.  Since we could all feel that Robert was still with us- and the cold spots and rem pod seemed to confirm it, Crystal resorted to a  fun and silly  last ditch effort to get him to speak again.

 Tossing back her hair and arching her back, she joked in a seductive voice,

‘”What’s the matter, don’t you wanna talk to a couple of hot chicks?”

The Ovilus immediately sprang into action, it’s robotic voice declaring,

 “MOM’S HOTTER!”

  After a moment of disbelief, we all laughed so hard we were literally crying.  It soon became apparent that Robert’s comedic tour de force was his last communication, so we decided to investigate the Haunted House.

  Constructed with a maze-like interior, the Haunted House features all sorts of gory scenes, and a giant room packed from floor to ceiling with legions of dirty, uber-creepy baby dolls; many missing glassy eyes, hair or limbs. It’s pretty widely acknowledged that dolls make a terrific hiding place for spirits- for some reason, entities are attracted to them. Though the doll room was heavy with energy, we didn’t get as many hits as we expected, but there was so much activity around the stretchers from Wolfe Manor that Mom urged Maverick to “get rid of those things now!”

Moving outside, we encountered with an extremely negative entity that was hanging around a cottage near the barn.  Keri recalls,

“Over the years, I’ve found that if human spirits were hateful, spiteful, rude, abusive drunks or…any other “expletives” while they were alive, they’re the same in death. Meet George, a chauvinist pig spirit, who tried to give Crystal attitude. He showed his true colors, belittling and cussing at her. Crystal told him off and had quite an interesting argument with him for a while. Only after standing her ground to leave her and us alone did he back off!”

 After our encounter with George, well after midnight, we called it a night because we had to be up early to teach our Paranormal Investigation 101 workshop.  At the conclusion of class, we reminded the group that often, during the course of a ghost hunt, there’s a whole lot of “hurry up and wait”, and sometimes, the spirits just don’t want to come out and play…but thankfully, we were wrong.

Our Paranormal Investigation 101 workshop attendees pre-ghost hunt on Saturday night- that's "spokes ghoul" Maverick Cadaverick on the left, holding the lantern

Even with a large group, things got insane almost from the moment we set foot on the property. Hobbs had hired a professional videographer to come along and document our entire hunt.  Initially, he claimed in an offhand way that he didn’t believe in ghosts, and though he was acting very professionally, it was apparent he thought the whole thing was a bit childish and silly.  

As the sunset, we trudged into the forest, with Maverick in the lead, holding an antique glass gas lantern.   Our first stop was the  “Redneck Camp” on the Haunted Hayride route, a collection of five hideously trashed vintage trailers. It was the location where an employee had reported the growling sounds, and we figured it was a great place to start our investigation.  The students all got out their equipment, and all of us started getting hit immediately. Pleasant set up the rem pod, and it lit up right away.  As various investigational devices were activated and crystal got out her divining rods, Pleasant asked,

“How do you guys like being here, in the middle of a Halloween Haunt?”

 Right away, an Ovilus answered,  “It’s perfect!”

Many of the students had Spirit Boxes, and all of them were talking simultaneously. Crystal turned to find the photographer, to make sure he was getting all the activity on film, and he was no where to be found… until he was spotted far away down the path, actually running away!  When she caught up, he was white as a sheet, telling her breathlessly that he’d felt as though someone had dumped a bucket of ice water down his back.

 “I’m outta here,” he cried in a panic, his camera slung over his back, sprinting towards the parking lot,  “I can’t do this!”
 Investigating at the "Redneck Camp" on the Hobbs Grove Haunted Hayride route
 We went on to investigate the Haunted Forest, where we stopped several times, to set up for EVPS and Ovilus sessions, all of which were documented by our photographer, who fortunately hadn’t flipped out from all the paranormal activity. Crystal and a few others spotted a large black Shadow Person darting behind a tree, and where everyone got many more hits at the various sites, which were a maze of spooky cottages and junked automobiles, all covered with vines and wild over-growth.

  One of the many spirits we encountered and communicated with was a little girl, and later, Maverick confirmed that many employees had reported seeing a small female child dressed in 1930’s clothes roaming the property, or had heard children laughing when none were present.

  All in all, both evenings of paranormal investigations at Hobbs Grove were so active, and so full of evidence, that we are still going through our EVP recordings and the film footage, because there are so many hours worth of documentation.

 As Jan “Mom” Acosta says:

“The creep factor was overwhelming at Hobbs… I would love to go back there. I don't think a Hollywood script could have written that scenario!”

#





 If you’re in Central California  during the Halloween seaon, check out the faux (and real!) spooks at Hobbs Grove:




 We’d LOVE to connect with you!
Visit our website to book workshops, Tarot readings, or have us come out for a paranormal investigation: www.thedivinationnation.com
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheDivinationNation?fref=ts
Connect with us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TarotAlimah
To find out more about Pleasant or request a reading or healing session, click here: http://www.pleasantgehman.com/
For more on Crystal’s background, or request a reading or healing session, click here: http://crystalravenwolf.com