Megan West via Flickr

“So, how do we know who’s human? If I was an imitation, a perfect imitation, how would you know it was really me?”
Keith David in The Thing

As if possessed by some dark malevolence, hordes of otherwise well-adjusted young citizens, danced around the blazing infernos in a blind orgy of debauchery, their ghoulish grins fanning the flames ever higher.  A full moon glowed a dull white, a hollow skull in a smoked filled sky, witness to a 125 year-old secret…

By the time the Riot of 2011 was over, while the carcasses of burned out automobiles still lay smoldering, many wondered how revelry so soon turned into mayhem.  Very few people were aware of the fact that exactly 125 years earlier, in June of 1886, also under a full moon, the newly created town of Vancouver was torched to the ground by a similarly unholy fire, destroying hundreds of settlements, and taking several dozen people’s lives in the process.  Coincidence, or something more….sinister?

Santiago Alvarez via Flickr

In the paranormal research community, it is known as an “anniversary haunting”, ghostly or supernatural phenomena that occur around the anniversaries of important events.  Was over-consumption of alcohol and unbridled adolescence the reason for the riot, or is it possible, just maybe, that 125 years to the day, a full moon Vancouver was once again the victim of malevolent forces, forces that once again engulfed the city in flames, and possessed its young to engage in wicked acts of maniacal terror?

Meh, it’s a theory.

To find out more about anniversary hauntings and the ‘Curse of Vancouver’, as well as over 20 other spine-tinglingly good ghost stories through Vancouver’s haunted past, you should take the Ghostly Gastown Tour.  On it, my tour partner and I will regale you with frightful tales of fiendish behaviour and other spooky occurrences.

Aaaaaaand…..

….For the upcoming Halloween season, Ghostly Gastown Tours is teaming up with Universal Pictures to give away free passes to an advanced private screening (October 12th) of “The Thing”, a prequel to the 1982 cult-classic horror film.

This opportunity is only available to the first 15 people who book a tour on either on Saturday, October 8th.

So, not only will you be spell-bound by tales of terror told along a two hour tour though historic Gastown, but you will also be one of the first people in Canada to see what promises to be the hit horror movie of the year.

Check out the trailer below!

http://www.universalpictures.ca/en/thething/trailer

Don’t delay!  Email ghostlygastown@shaw.ca telling us how many people are in your group for the October 8th tour, and a contact phone number.  Preference will be given to those who mention The Potentiality in their email.