Ghosts & Gravestones
Prepare yourself for a Frightseeing Adventure like none other as your resident Ghost Host shares tales both true and truly unnerving of the city’s tumultuous past. Discover the secrets of the Tolomato Cemetery and the apparition seen playing on the sacred grounds after dark. Could it be the spirit of five-year-old James or is it the Ghost Bride, still waiting for her walk down the aisle. Be sure to keep a watchful eye while passing by the old City Gates. You might catch a glimpse of Elizabeth, a child victim of the yellow fever, waving to passersby.
Get ready for an up close and personal encounter of the town’s most haunted building, the Old Jail. Listed on the Florida and National Register of Haunted Places, it is the site of countless documented paranormal experiences. Unlock the secret of an (EVP) voice recording captured during a real paranormal investigation and its possible connection to the well-known hangings carried out on the site. Cameras or camera phones are recommended to take pictures through the building’s famous and ominous windows and potentially capture something unworldly!
Your final destination includes an exclusive nighttime experience inside of Potter’s Wax Museum’s Chamber of Horrors for a unique retelling of the famed pirate Andrew Ranson’s gruesome execution!
TIP: Plan to arrive at least 20 minutes early to make time to visit Cromwell’s Parlour of Paranormal Curiosities. It is located inside the Old Town Trolley Welcome Center at 27 San Marco Ave., the check-in and boarding location for the Ghosts & Gravestones tour. Cromwell’s Parlour is St. Augustine’s only collection of the paranormal and unexplained. All objects are authentic and are either historic or supernaturally significant. The collection was gathered in this room in hopes of achieving greater understanding of the unexplained and supernatural world.
St. Augustine Old Town Trolley Tours
Relive the story of the first settlement in North America as you visit Castillo de San Marcos, the Spanish fort built in the 17th century. Visit the world famous spring that Ponce de Leon deemed the Fountain of Youth, where you can actually sample the water. Explore the site of the first Mass in America at the Mission of Nombre de Dios. Experience early St. Augustine as you tour old St. Augustine Village, featuring houses from the 18th and 19th centuries.
Old Town Trolley Tours makes exclusive stops at the Old Jail, St. Augustine History Museum, Potter’s Wax Museum, the Spanish Military Hospital, and the Ximenez-Fatio House. You’ll also see the Gonzalez-Alvarez House, the oldest documented colonial house in Florida, lived in by British, Spanish and American colonists. Visit the San Sebastian Winery; Explore Flagler College, built by Henry Morrison Flagler, an industrialist, railroad pioneer and oil magnate, who originally used the building as a hotel then known as Ponce de Leon hotel.
There’s no better way to see all the St. Augustine attractions than with Old Town Trolley Tours. Look for the orange and green trolleys for the best sightseeing tour in town!
The Old Jail
Take a guided tour led by the “jailers” for a compelling look at the cells where imprisoned men and women once lived, the maximum security area reserved for the most nefarious criminals and a collection of weapons.
Visitors can also take a look at the cell blocks, gallows and sheriff’s quarters. See where the sheriff, his wife and children lived, right upstairs from the prisoners, and how they used their own kitchen to prepare meals for the inmates. A tour through this attraction will show visitors what life was like as an inmate and how the Old Jail helped shape St. Augustine’s history.
Oldest Store Museum Experience
Watch in amazement as our friendly clerks, butcher and snake oil salesman demonstrate the very latest inventions for turn-of-the-century living. Meet the proprietor, Mr. C.F. Hamblen. Step back in time and discover the latest and best time saving miracles from 1900!
St. Augustine History Museum
Henry Flagler was a powerhouse and catalyst for change in the real estate and transportation industries. His contributions to Florida are documented and displayed throughout the St. Augustine History Museum. As you tour through, you’ll also see authentic artifacts, unpublished photographs and learn about the evolution of St. Augustine and Florida under Spanish and British rule. More than 400 years of history is on display including toys and dolls from the early 19th and 20th centuries, a replica of a Spanish galleon and real gold, silver and jewelry found in lost treasures off the Florida coast. Housed on the Old Jail, the museum offers another level of insight into Florida’s past.
