It was good to be back into the field as we toured Cathedral Canyon and Chief Tecopa Cemetery. As of now twice a month I will be hosting outings to various ghost towns, mines, and paranormal hotspots until we relocate out to central California. We have a new investigator and will be signing on quite a few more which Ill be meeting with at a club after Friday's radio show so state tuned as we build up a special team of paranormal enthusiast in the Las Vegas Area.
It had been months since I been out was feeling pretty good all around and so we headed out of town to a fairly desolate area full of history and legends. When you live in the city you are almost willing to do anything just to get away from all the lights and bustling noise. Its amazing how when you visit such places you can hear a pin drop.
This is an area I been wanting to work with for at least about a year it was nice to actually be here. So many wrote me saying maybe next time or it sounds fun. Some of these places we go are one time shots the funny thing about what we do is you never know what might happen at any given time. Its that element of surprise when you are out investigating haunting's.
V and I we stopped at a gas station to fill on up she has a very nice truck so we can hold up to almost 8 people just for others who are interested in coming out for future investigations. We have plans in a few weeks to visit a ghost town in death Valley so state tuned for that.
After we stopped for gas we went to Walmart for drinks, food and snacks. Its just a tradition we have V already was stocked up with cans of soda....I bought some blueberry drink it tasted like goddamn wine minus the alcohol grrrr lol. Of course I bought myself a giant nesquick you cant forget that lol.
But anyway's we headed on off down the lonely highway out to our turn off to Cathedral Canyon a one popular tourist attraction now in deplorable condition and forgotten of what once was.
During our ride we discussed other locations in the area when you drive in the desert at night the only thing you see are shadows of mountains. The moon was not out last night so it was very dark and I could only imagine how the canyon would be once we arrived here.
Finally when we reached our turn off we went down this road for about 5 miles coming up to an area called stump springs which I got out to read the history on. To our right was a very worn down road full of cracks, pot holes, and rocks. I had a hunch this was the road to Cathedral Canyon as at the entrance use to be a sign which was no longer there. So by chance we took the road it seemed like a long two mile drive almost till we noticed to our left an open area and then in front of us a steep drop off.
We parked and I had gotten out of the truck gathering up all the gear, drinks, food and items for our hike. I knew we would be here for a couple hours as I wanted to take my time working with the location and so our adventure begins here.
Cathedral Canyon
I heard this place is very haunted from various sources especially at night most would not dare to go into the canyon. I was more then happy to take that position and go right down into the canyon. I noticed right where we parked was where the suspension bridge use to be it was cut or missing except for this steel like doorway frame. I could only imagine how suspenseful it would be to cross the bridge spanning over the canyon years ago.
We watched across the desert a series of lights dancing around which were white, yellow and red. I had assumed they were vehicles maybe a mining operation. But found it strange when all of them aligned in a formation then when I used my flashlight to signal them the formation dispersed. I did not access the lights as being paranormal as later after the hike they still were there so it could be some ranch or something.
We noticed allot of the safety fence was down surrounding the canyon so a few times I stood right on the edge of the canyon figuring an easy way down into it. There was a few areas that extended out over the canyon and V walked on one of them but you had to be real careful their was allot of loose rock and gravel. If you moved to the left or the right it would be sliding and over the edge for you equaling probably a nice fall to your death. When I stood on the edge next to V I did hear something ghostly in the canyon. It was a voice of some kind making a long groan sort of sound. It was very close by and right below us at the bottom of darkness. When I shined my light down into the canyon you could see a crumbling statue of Christ no head or arm on it surrounded by brush.
We followed the edge of the canyon for about a quarter of a mile and I found some areas to climb down into it and a set of wrought iron gates. The gates reminded me of a cemetery entrance and their was a fairly nice road going into them. I figured you could drive down into the canyon so we followed it and sure enough found a road which led us right into the canyons entrance. We spent a good amount of time at the gates I tried to reach my hands to the top of them to give everybody an idea how high they stood.
The road into the canyon was overgrown with allot of brush some of it dead some of it green still with life. It would be possible for anything at anytime to hide here and jump out at us at anytime. I felt it was rather peaceful here as I whistled. Little did I know that later down the road we would often here something whistling back at us perhaps a sign from the other side who knows.
The canyon was littered with beer bottles, old firework debris, and paper. I even found an old computer monitor, electrical line, and piles of concrete. At one time supposedly 200 statues graced the canyons now all we could find was the vandalized statue of Christ surrounded by brush off in the distance.
The canyon was dark some of the walls in it were collapsing and areas that looked like it had caves were just deep dead end holes in the canyons walls. We followed a trail off to our right side which led us to two doors in the canyons wall. Each door led to a room one had allot of wasp nest in it and fencing while the other had still a wood door attached with more debris. V went into the room I wasn't to keen on getting wasp nest in my hair as she is much shorter then I am.
I started to work on taking EVPs around this area and would do a couple hours of recordings besides blasting the canyon with photos. The entire canyon was crumbling to nothing as you could see stairwells covered in dust and rocks....while some encasing's where statues once stood. Other times their was old speakers hanging from the canyons walls where music once played or even old spotlights bolted into the rock just hanging.
I climbed up some of the steep inclines along the canyon walls to check for other rooms or even caves. It always end up just an odd rock formation where I could see V way down below. Eventually as we made our way up to the center of the canyon we seen the heart of Cathedral Canyon which has Christ Of The Andes now just a crumbling statue. I found a white rose gave it to V it was half dead but she is gothic so she took it home her along with a really awesome walking stick I found hidden behind some rock.
I of course got a little more daring and I climbed onto the base of the statue and stood next to it. V had snapped a couple photos of me for size comparison along with one of the encasements I climbed on into....a Lord Rick statue lol.
We moved down deeper into the canyon we could feel watched it was not a comfortable time for us. One of the paths led to a dead end in the canyon while another led to this giant area you could tell people did rituals at, lit bon fires and parties often. At the end of the canyon the real end this time their was a scene etched into the rocks which read Sermon Of The Mount. I thought it was serpent as it was hard to read.
V felt this was an area of interest also lots of energy here lots of vandalism also. We both felt the ghost here were very curious of us but not angry just at the fact that they do not get many visitors at night. I am almost sure if anybody comes out here at night they do it in a much larger group. You could see many encasements where statues once were and allot of metal bars perhaps that held the sculptures in place.
After we investigated we went back to the Christ Of The Andes statue and I took off all my gear. This would be our break time as I left one of our lights on as it dimly lit the canyon up. I sat for almost an hour looking at the stars and during that time their was about 4 meteors that traversed the night sky. I did make a wish but I will never tell:)
During our quiet time of talking and listening their was movement in the canyon. We were not alone you could hear shuffling on the concrete....allot of movement in the brush near us.....we heard whistling...thought I heard a voice off in the distance. V felt the shuffling and footsteps were residual from all the past tourist who use to hike around and visit here. Afterall this was not only the site of an outlaw but also of spiritualism.
After about an hour of sitting the activity died it was peaceful here I could have taken a nap in the canyon at that point. I was happy as I finally toked one under the night sky its been awhile since I did that and I was ready for our ascension out of this place. V was very pleased with this location as this is a place many years ago she visited but back then their actually was some statues remaining.
When we arrived back at the truck we both discussed our experiences a bit there is always that sigh of relief once your back safe. I didn't feel the area was to haunted although V told me she did feel watched in certain areas. I cannot explain the whistling noises I did notice the canyon had no animal life nor crickets in it which was very odd. But it did seem like an area that was struggling. Its almost as if death valley is starting to spread as we were just outside of it.
After we left the area we headed to one last place called Chief Tecopa Cemetery.
Chief Tecopa Cemetery
When we pulled up in front of the area it was near a casino so we parked there. Pahrump is like a ghost town no cars out no people. The casino had a couple bikers they were outside bsing. We decided to take the truck and park behind the public library lol.
We made our way to the entrance where a giant boulder had Chief Tecopa Cemetery written on it. The cemetery I thought would be small but it turned out to be rather large.
Desert cemeteries have a certain level of creepiness perhaps because all the graves are piles of rocks, dirt mounds or weathered wooden crosses. Only a portion of this cemetery had grass it was softer then my carpet where I live.
My first goal was to go to the back of the cemetery which strangely enough one of the first graves we visited was Chief Tecopa. It actually looked rather kept up and well visited. It appeared that a majority of the cemeteries interments were native American here.
There was different stones with labels like one said Indian Section, West Lawn, East Lawn etc etc Most of the older stones were way in back of the cemetery. I came across quite a few graves that were fenced off by wood or wrought iron. Some of them were just crosses while others had angel statues or saints.
The cemetery was rather calm one section had its sprinklers going off the grass seemed to be newly laid out. There were a few cold spots but ghost here did not seem very active let alone haunting this place. Sometimes with newer cemeteries the EVPs are great so we shall see what I found out about this location.
The cemetery was about as dead as the town I mean in the distance you could here an occasional car or something but really everything was fairly quiet.
The drive home was quite long its always cool when you arrive back into the Vegas Valley you just see millions of lights from a few thousand feet above as you slowly make your way back into the city. It was nice to just chill out and veg away as we made our way back into town.
V wants to go out again and this time we might be bringing a group of 4 to 12 people it depends. I am going to spend the next 3 weeks meeting various people and signing up for some of our more intense trips coming up. Some of these excursions will be the last ones we do in Southern Nevada and hopefully we can finish off the year with some good paranormal finds.
When your away from something long enough it almost feels like home when you get back on out and do it again. I felt pretty good about the investigation we covered allot of area in Cathedral Canyon and we seen almost every inch of Chief Tecopa's cemetery.
Sometimes when I visit locations I try to envision what they looked like a century ago. Its really ashamed that Cathedral Canyon took so much abuse. However the cemetery was very well maintained and many of the graves had fresh flowers on them.
Lord Rick
Founder
www.paranormalghostsociety.org
