THE SILVER LADY
It’s not just bizarre creatures who lurk out there on the campgrounds; ghosts have been encountered, too. London tells us about her experience, which took place when she was 15 years old during her family’s annual Christmas holiday in 2003 at a beachfront caravan park near Killala Beach, New South Wales, Australia. This is no isolated wilderness spot, but an ordinary family camping ground with all the amenities: general store, pool, restaurant and kids club. And at the front is a row of 20 or so luxury villas suitable for a family with 1-3 children. “I hate camping,” London says. “I hate it with a passion, so my family – dad, mum and younger brother and sister – stayed in one of these villas. Our villa was facing the sea, but we couldn't immediately see the beach as there was a row of pine trees blocking the view.”
This being Australia, kangaroos freely hopped around the caravan park in search of food. On the third or fourth night of their stay, London says she went out into the front deck of their villa to hang her bikini on the railing to dry in the warm night air. It was about 10 p.m. The rest of the family was asleep, but she was doing her usual pre-bedtime cleanup.
“I flicked the deck light on because I heard what I thought was a kangaroo,” she says. “I turned my head to the pine trees and almost died of shock because of the lady standing there. She was standing there, staring at me. She glowed silver and was very illuminated. She had flowing clothing that was waving in the wind. She looked beautiful, but I was frozen in fear. I stood glued to the spot for a few seconds... then she was gone.”
The next morning, London ventured outside to the tree where the woman had been standing. There in the bark of the white ash was a burn mark in the shape of an L that was crossed on the top. She doesn’t know if this has anything to do with the apparition she saw or not, and if it’s a symbol, she doesn’t know what it might mean. About the ghost she says, “I never saw her again, and I never want to.”
GHOST OR PREMONITION?
David was one of those people who never believed in ghosts... until he met one face to face. It was September, 2001 when David and his girlfriend were camping along an unpaved forest road in the Manzano Mountains in northern New Mexico. “It was a place I had hiked before and was told that there were homesteaders there in the old days who were unsuccessful in their attempts to survive,” David says.
On this night, the sky was clear with just a bit of light from the moon. At about 2 a.m., David was awakened by a single, distant coyote howl. He listened to it for awhile and thought it was strange there was only one coyote howling. Suddenly, wild barking howling erupted from what sounded like just ten feet outside his tent.
“I turned over to see if my girlfriend was listening, and I thought I saw her leaning up from her sleeping bag on one elbow with her head tilted upward, looking toward the roof of the tent,” David says. “She had a terrified expression on her face. I was about to laugh and ask her why she was so afraid of a coyote when I realized it was not her, but some sort of strange, dark figure with a distorted, translucent face. The figure was right above my girlfriend's body.”
David sensed that it was a spirit of some kind, but felt strangely calm. Since he didn't have his glasses on, he leaned forward to get a better look at the entity. As he drew closer, the spirit's eyes became very vivid and clear, and he sensed that it was female. “It seemed that she had reddish hair and was wearing a black cloak with a hood,” David remembers. “In my mind I wondered: Why are you so scared? I tried to get the spirit to look in my eyes, but it looked past me into the distance. I couldn't make eye contact. Soon the figure dissolved into thin air and I could then see the top of my girlfriend's head as she was lying in her sleeping bag. The howling coyote was gone as well.”
At first, David didn’t tell his girlfriend about the apparition, and perhaps he should have stuck with that instinct. When he did tell her, she freaked out, wondering why the ghost had been floating over her body. “Our relationship crumbled soon afterward,” he says. “I had a strong feeling that I had to move back home to Illinois from New Mexico. Within a few months after seeing the ghost, my sister called and told me that my mom was diagnosed with a deadly form of lymphoma and she had a 50/50 chance to survive. I often wondered if the ghost had been a premonition. I moved back into my parent's home to help take care of my mother. She passed away a year after I moved back. I found it interesting that I had met my future wife during this time, who has red hair. Also, my mother had red highlights in her hair when she was younger. It made me think about the ghost I had seen.”
