Stories of drama, jealousy and murder echo down the empty streets of the Albuquerque Old Town area every night.
To hear them though, you must make a reservation for the Old Town Ghost Tour before 6 p.m.
The Old Town Ghost Tour takes visitors through 306 years of history in hopes of rediscovering the long-forgotten secrets that haunt the area surrounding Old Town Plaza.
Every night, a guide takes a group of 12 people on a 90-minute —sometimes longer —expedition through historic buildings and dark alleys.
Tour guide Craig Degenhardt said the Old Town area is home to 13 major ghosts. This is a technical term which means an apparition that has been seen by at least three people.
One of these ghosts is Scarlett.
This redheaded woman was a staff member of what Degenhardt described as a “house of negotiated affection”. According to legend, her beauty led her to be solicited quite often. Her beauty, or rather the jealousy of her beauty by the other women, ultimately led to her murder.
Degenhardt said an alleged Scarlett encounter occurred in 2005 when two skateboarders sat by a former back entrance of the brothel. He said they reported seeing an old woman asking for money. A few minutes later they saw a younger, prettier version of the woman, who asked them to follow her into the courtyard.
She went inside the building, but didn’t leave the doors open; When the men knocked they heard the woman’s voice say, “Just a minute, boys,” he said.
When the doors suddenly flew open, one man was hit on the head while the other said he suddenly felt cold air all around him.
Degenhardt said he himself has encountered several strange situations while working in the area. He said he was giving a tour two years ago, when he heard a horrible wail.
“I had the hair on my arms standing up,” he said.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Police officers investigated the scream while his group kept walking, he said. They found nothing.
Degenhardt said he thinks he the scream came from La Llorona or “The Weeping Woman.”
He said this southwest legend is based on a young mother who couldn’t take care of her children anymore, so she threw them into the river. Coming to her senses and realizing what she had done, she tried to rescue them, but it was too late. The children had drowned.
Legend says she never stopped wailing, not even when she was taken to a mental institution.
Degenhardt said his favorite part about giving tours is getting scared when something unexpected happens.
His second favorite thing is helping people have a good time, whether they believe in ghosts or not.
Farmington native Carrie Charley, a self-described ghost enthusiast, took the tour for her birthday on Oct. 16.
“I thought I felt something with the Hatchet Lady (one of the 13 ghosts),” she said. “And my husband found some orbs on his camera.”
Charley said she found the experience very enjoyable, to the delight of Degenhardt.
“I always hope guests get an enjoyment of things that happened in the afterlife,” he said. “And that they see that there is fun to be had by being a little bit scared, but nothing traumatizing.”
Isabel Gonzalez is a sports reporter for the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at sports@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @cisabelg.
