The Last Hurrah. No beers, no liquor, no wines.

We didn't do much during the daylight of our last full day at the Stanley Hotel. After staying up too darned late the night before, we slept in, ate at the Egg and I ... again and tooled around downtown Estes Park. Including, a quick trip to the local Estes Park Brewery for a little tasting and some purchases.

We only made it to two sessions of the conference. The first one was EVPs 101 with Patrick Burns from Court TV's "Haunting Evidence." No offense to Mr. Burns, but it was kind of a dud. We actually snuck out early. The final session of the weekend was a panel discussion with Grant, Jason, John Zaffis, Chris "I'm too sexy" Fleming, Patrick Burns, Tiffany (the psychic, not the singer), and Rosemary Ellen Guilley. It was a good discussion. I got about an hour of it on film so we're going to try to put together a DVD to share with folks if you all are interested. We got to see a side of Jay and Grant that we don't usually see. They're super funny guys.

So, after the panel, we zipped back to our room and snagged all of our gear: a digital EMF meter, digital recorder, camcorder, headlamps, digital camera, a couple bottles of water and our wits (of course). We zipped down to the Concert Hall to meet up with the other 110 people at the conference we were investigating with. Fortunately they split us into two groups: no experience and pros. Since Vern and I have a little experience and a lot of common sense, we figured we were pros so we went with that group. And, while our equipment wasn't exactly fad-tastic (oh K2), we were able to collect what we needed and seemed at least as experienced as the other folks in our group. It turned out we were two of three people in our group who actually were affiliated with a paranormal organization, ahem WSPIR! "I'm too sexy" Fleming was impressed. (PS, Darren and Jill, you taught us well!)

Our first stop was with "I'm too sexy" Fleming in the Manor House's 1302. I had vivid dreams about this room all night the first night we were at the hotel, so, I was pretty excited to investigate there. Unfortunately, we were packed into the room like sardines and didn't get much action. Vern felt the presence of a few Native American spirits who "I'm too sexy" was trying to get to show their presence. They were "answering" him on his and the other 10 K2 meters in the room. My EMF didn't move once and the one time we heard something, it was the wind moving the flap on the vent in the bathroom. Pretty lame, but "I'm too sexy" seemed pretty satisfied with the blinking lights on his K2. Then, he got frustrated with a guy who kept praying to protect himself and asked him to leave the room because he was affecting the energy. Poor guy.

Next stop, room 217, with the all important Patrick Burns. We only stuck around long enough to hear him say that something was coming over him... Then we made for the tunnels in the basement. They weren't exactly what we expected but it was still pretty cool. There's a couple different passage ways that you almost have to crawl to get into and it's dark in there which makes it extra creepy and really dangerous. John Zaffis wacked his head on Friday night in the tunnels. I got a few phantom smells -- sour milk, cologne, and cigarette smoke -- all of which could be explained by drafts or the guy that was wandering around in the tunnels with me (not Vern) who decided to bathe in Axe before the investigation.

Then we moved up the fourth floor with John Zaffis in Room 401. For those of you who are fans of the show, that was the room that Jason slept in after the first investigation. The glass by his bed broke and his closet door opened and shut of it's own accord. So, needless to say, we were pretty stoked to check this place out. John got us going on an EVP session by letting us know that the spirit in the room was likely that of Lord Someguysnameicantremember who used to own the property before FO Stanely purchased the property to build the hotel. Apparently the spirit didn't like women and responded positively to men. It was kind of interesting. The spirit seemed to be focused on the Christian guy who got kicked out of the first session. He responded to his questions (using the K2) and didn't really seem to care too much about anyone else. We kept trying to get him to move the fan or close the closet door, but as John Zaffis said, "he's a stubborn bastard."

Our final stop was, fortunately, with Jason and Grant in the Concert Hall. We were greeted by Grant who was waiting behind the door. He popped up in the darkness of the window, lit from underneath his chin by Darren's flashlight ... scared the crap out of me. But, I got Darren's flashlight back, so, mission accomplished. Jay and Grant let us have free reign of the Concert Hall for the next hour. Vern and I spent quite a bit of time in the ladies bathroom. Wait ... that sounds wrong. Let me explain. The ladies bathroom had a lot of paranormal activity and was part of the investigation site. When we first opened the door, I was overwhelmed by a feeling to stay away. But, we persevered. The space was heavy with sadness. It's hard to explain. After a few minutes of taking EMF readings we went totally dark and started asking questions. It was pitch black in there. Then, suddenly a blue light danced across the wall of the bathroom and disappeared. Again, crap scared out of me. My first thought was "AWESOME." Then, being good investigators, we tried to debunk it. Sadly, the blue light had come from someone's camera light reflecting off of the tile outside and underneath the bathroom door. BUMMER.

After an hour of investigation, we said goodnight to our hosts with hugs and promises to see them again soon. Jay and Grant wanted to make sure that we passed on hellos to all of the WSPIR folks. So, "HI!" It was a great experience and we can't wait to review the evidence. It was totally worth getting screwed by the car rental company.

The Stanley Hotel: Day 2 - switching to hard alcohol.

Well. This is day two of our Stanley Hotel experience. The day was filled with interesting paranormal lectures and meeting interesting people! We got to hear from a demonologist, John Zaffis and a sensitive, Chris Fleming. John is frequently called in for cases involving inhuman haunts. Actually he was on a couple cases on "A Haunting." Chris Fleming is on that lame show on the Biography Channel called "Dead Famous." You know, the show where they never find anything because the premise is silly.

During John Zaffis' discussion, Grant Wilson came over and sat a couple seats down from us in our row. When the discussion was over, we introduced ourselves and told Grant that we were with WSPIR. He had great things to say about the work that TAPS got to do with them over the summer. Oh, and if Darren and Jill are reading this, Grant is giving us Darren's flash light so I'll have that at the next WSPIR meeting!

Then Vern and I wandered around the hotel for a little while. It was a beautiful day. We met a kid from Arizona named Jeremy. He showed us around the hotel for a little while. Like I said yesterday, we're staying in the Manor House so we haven't really had time to explore the main hotel. Jeremy showed us all the haunted places and told us about all the paranormal encounters he's had since he got here on Thursday.

After we wandered for a little while, we decided to go back to our room and get ready for dinner and the auction. We shared a table in the far corner with some folks from New Jersey, a woman from LA, some wealthy people that spent $650 on a ghost hunt with Grant and Kris (who, if I may say, is substantially taller than she looks on TV), a couple of super goth people who left early, and our buddies from Seattle, Jason and Clint. I don't know how much money they made from the auction but it was probably somewhere between $10 and $20k. The money went to restore the Rolling Hills Sanitorium and to the Shriner's Hospital.

We had some drinks after dinner with Jason and Clint in the bar. I should mention that Jason Hawes had to leave yesterday for a thing he was doing with Larry King. But, he didn't say if it was going to be on tonight or not. So, while we were in the bar, Larry King came on and we got to watch Jason with a whole bunch of psychics. He didn't really seem to fit in. And, they had Chris Fleming on live at the Stanley Hotel. It was kind of strange. He was saying that the spirits in hotel were curious about why all these people were here. Jason just kind of looked like he wasn't really interested. But, it was kind of fun to see them on TV.

Eventually we had finished our last "Estes Park Iced Tea" and decided to take some night shots of the Stanley and wander the hotel in the dark for a little bit. I took some pictures and we did a little EVP session in the Manor House. We got some a couple little anomolies that may be some sort of orb but I'm guessing its, you know, dust. Saturday night we get to do an investigation with each of the paranormal folks so it'll be fun. We've got all our stuff charging and ready to go. This is the first time we'll be able to check out the haunted hot spots.

Oh! I've posted more pictures on shutterfly so, check those out too. kandvstanley.shutterfly.com/action/?a=0IbNW7Vy5cMXIg

Day one at The Stanley ... Ghosts-0, Beers-4

Hello everyone! For those of you who don't know, Vern and I are on a paranormal retreat in Estes Park, Colorado. It's just amazingly beautiful up here. No snow to speak of but the air is cool and clean and the water is just like nothing I've ever tasted!

We didn't do much in the way of the paranormal today. We got to Denver at about 9 am Mountain Time. We promptly headed to the car rental place where we got screwed, with our pants on, and took a short hour drive up to picturesk Estes Park. It's really quite stunning. Totally unexpected. You don't even know you're there until you're there. I've got some great videos of it.

Even though we arrived 4 hours before our scheduled check in time, the gracious staff at The Stanley checked us in anyway and we made our way to the Manor House, next to the hotel. Now, the Manor House is just as haunted as the main hotel and the concert hall. The first time the Ghost Hunters were here, they had a table essentially lift up and drop. Pretty scary stuff.

Our room is just beautiful. High ceilings, two windows facing the hotel and the hills behind us. It's just darling. But, it's pretty darn small. As Vern says, "we're in a 12 x 12 cacoon." I just love it.

Now, since we got up at 3 am to get here, I was a little tired. Vern wanted to go get some stuff out of our over-priced rental SUV so I laid down on the bed and flipped on the tube. Channel 60. All, "The Shining," all the time. Both the Kubrick and the made-for-television versions.

I guess I should explain that The Stanely Hotel was the inspiration for Stephen King's "The Shining." He stayed here in the 70s at the end of the season, just before the hotel was closing down for the winter. During that time, the hotel had a caretaker during those long, snow-covered months when the hotel was closed. So, the hotel was pretty quiet and he was able to get drunk and wander around the hotel and come up with the idea for "The Shining."

So, here we are. We haven't seen anything paranormal yet but we have seen Jason and Grant and met some great people from Seattle of all places. The sky is blue, the sun is shining. It's just a grand place to be. We've spent the vast majority of our stay, so far, in the hotel bar drinking Estes Park Brewing Company's "Redrum Ale." VERY VERY tasty.

Check out our photo album at http://kandvstanley.shutterfly.com/action/. See you all soon ... I hope!