Alton Towers (Alton Towers Hotel) Hotel

Alton Towers Resort, Alton, Staffordshire, ST10 4DB

4-star (themed resort hotel within historic estate)

Alton Towers is reputedly haunted by fifteen different ghosts spread across the ruined mansion, its grounds, and the surrounding woodland. The most frequently witnessed is the Lady in Black, a woman in a long black dress who walks the corridors of the tower accompanied by a strong smell of perfume. Staff members have mistaken her for a guest and asked her to leave, only to watch her slowly fade from view. The ruins themselves are the epicentre of activity. The gift shop that once occupied the mansion entrance was plagued by poltergeist phenomena for years: stone duck figurines repositioned overnight, hundreds of plastic soldiers arranged into battlefield formations, watches inside locked glass cabinets twisted and shredded with no signs of forced entry, and dolls removed from packaging and posed at restaurant chairs holding books. The Chained Oak legend adds a layer of supernatural menace to the estate. An old woman cursed the Earl of Shrewsbury after he refused her a coin, declaring that for every branch that fell from the ancient oak, a member of his family would die. The Earl chained every branch together, and those iron chains remain visible on the roughly 700-year-old tree to this day. Victorian ghost children in period clothing have been seen near the Hex ride, accompanied by crying sounds and reports of visitors being struck by thrown stones. A medieval figure encountered repeatedly by head gardener George Noakes never aged across years of sightings. In the 1930s, an estate worker met an elegantly dressed gentleman with a silver-topped cane on the Step Walk who vanished after being greeted.

Spirits: The Lady in Black, The Chained Oak Witch...