Wanderlust · 8 min read · October 13, 2026

Spooky places to add to your Halloween bucket list

Don't be frightened! Or do actually because these are our top picks for the ookiest, most spookiest places you can (or can't!) actually visit on Earth.

Short on time? Let us summarise this guide for you.

This Halloween travel guide highlights the spookiest destinations around the world, from England's reputedly haunted village of Pluckley and the eerie underground Mary King's Close in Edinburgh to the Catacombs of Paris and the Winchester Mystery House in California. Each location comes with a spooky backstory, whether it's ghost sightings, mass burials or mysterious underground tunnels like Bavaria's "goblin holes". The list also includes the real-life ghost town Centralia in Pennsylvania, famous for the underground fire that has burned beneath it since 1962, and bone-decorated churches like the Sedlec Ossuary in the Czech Republic. It's a mix of myth, history and macabre perfect for Halloween thrill-seekers.

Pluckley | Kent

This idyllic little village in the 'Garden of England' hides a dark secret. It's long been billed as the most haunted village in England, with somewhere between 10 and 17 ghosts said to frequent various areas of this harrowing hamlet. The title dates back to 1950 and got a boost from a mention in the 1989 Guinness Book of Records, although it was never an official award.

The best known of them all is the Watercress Lady, who legend says set herself alight when her pipe and her tipple met, and who is said to haunt the bridge where she once sold her watercress. The story is rooted in a real woman, Sarah Sharp, who died in a fire in 1911.

Pluckley is just a short drive from the Holiday Extras campus so we sent some brave members of the team over there in search of ghostly activity. And while we didn't find anything spooky, what we did discover was a gorgeous little village with traditional country pubs, stunning views over the Kentish countryside and an idyllic churchyard.

Mary King's Close | Edinburgh

Mary King's Close is an old street that now lies beneath Edinburgh's Old Town. It was buried in the 1750s when the Royal Exchange (now the City Chambers) was built on top of it, partially demolishing the street and leaving its lower levels hidden away from the public for many years. Perfect conditions for a haunting really.

That, and the fact that the narrow spaces and sewage-soaked cobbles provided ideal conditions for plague to spread during an outbreak in the 17th century. The story goes that the street was bricked up and those living there, infected or not, were left to die in the dark. This isn't actually true though. Residents were quarantined and looked after by doctors, and it was the later building work, not a plague wall, that buried the street.

In the hundreds of years since, there have been many reported sightings of paranormal persons lurking in the area, including a plague doctor and Annie, a little ghost girl who lost her doll. Some have blamed noxious fumes from the old Nor Loch for these sightings, but that doesn't explain how they continued after the loch was filled in. Today the close can only be explored on a guided tour.

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The Tower of London

While not quite as obviously spooky as everywhere else on this list, the Tower of London has just enough to creep you out if you dive into its dark and disturbing history of torture, imprisonment and execution.

Legend has it that the ghosts come out at Halloween, and you may bump into some of the Tower's most famous prisoners, such as Anne Boleyn, who was famously beheaded there, or Guy Fawkes, who was held and interrogated there, and tortured, before his execution in 1606.

Head to Tower Green, where a select few high-ranking prisoners were privately beheaded. Keep an eye out for the ghosts of two of Henry VIII's wives, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, as well as Lady Jane Grey, who was queen for just nine days.

Then there's the Bloody Tower, where child princes Edward V and Richard disappeared in 1483. Two skeletons found beneath a staircase in the White Tower in 1674 were presumed to be theirs, but they have never been definitively identified. It's thought the boys were murdered because of their strong claims to the throne at the time, but who did it and what really happened will probably be lost to history forever.

Erdställe | Bavaria

Erdställe translates from German as places under the earth. But for the sake of spookiness we prefer their local nickname, 'Schrazelloch', which means goblin holes. These aren't one vast network but hundreds of separate, mostly tiny tunnel systems, with at least 700 known in Bavaria alone and around 2,000 across Europe, and they are completely shrouded in mystery.

Who built them and why is still unknown, with theories ranging from hiding places during times of unrest to sites for honouring the dead. There are no historical records of their construction, which leaves plenty of room for speculation, and has led some to believe they were never intended to be used by human beings at all.

The varying sizes of the passages, many of which are extremely low and narrow, with the tightest squeezes barely 40cm across, have inspired legends of goblins and elves scurrying through the tunnels in secret and using them to get around unseen.

The Catacombs | Paris

For something more straight-up, no-nonsense spooky, pay a visit to the catacombs of Paris, a creepy underground chamber where the remains of an estimated six million people are laid out. In the late 18th century Parisian cemeteries became dangerously overcrowded, so from 1786 bones from the more traditional burial grounds were moved to old limestone quarries beneath the city's streets.

The bones were organised in an artistic way creating endless ornamental passages and chambers lined with skulls, femurs, scapulas, humeruses, clavicles and all the other types of bones we don't know the names of.

The catacombs first opened to visitors in 1809 and are still one of the city's most popular attractions. Follow the marked route of around 1.5km through the creepy chambers and don't stray from the path, as the wider network of quarry tunnels is off limits. The best-known cautionary tale is that of Philibert Aspairt, who got lost down there in 1793 and wasn't found for 11 years.

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Transylvania | Romania

Few places on earth can claim such creepy credentials as Transylvania, yet this historic and frankly rather pretty region of modern-day Romania is perhaps the least creepy of all the places to go for Halloween on our list. Full of hardwood forests and wildflower meadows, it's been described as one of the last truly medieval landscapes in Europe. Its remoteness does, however, give the area an other-worldly feel that you won't find anywhere else.

If you're determined to pursue the spookier side of Transylvania this Halloween, you can follow in the footsteps of Vlad the Impaler, the 15th-century ruler who inspired Bram Stoker's Count Dracula. Visit Sighișoara, where Vlad was born, and Bran Castle near Brașov, which is marketed as Dracula's castle even though historians say its ties to Vlad are slight. His real fortress, Poenari Castle, sits further south on the Transfăgărășan road.

While Transylvania is certainly remote, it's not hard to access, making it a great option for a quick Halloween getaway. Many visitors fly to Bucharest, before hiring a car and continuing their journey by road.

Winchester Mystery House | San Jose, California

If you want to find the best haunted house in the world this Halloween, look no further than the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California. The mansion was built by Sarah Winchester, the widow of William Wirt Winchester, whose family made the Winchester rifle. Legend has it she was convinced the house was haunted by the ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles.

To keep one step ahead of these ghoulish apparitions, the story goes that she insisted on false doors and staircases that lead to nowhere being fitted, as well as other questionable design choices, making sure the ghosts were just as confused as unsuspecting guests!

Anyone looking to visit the Winchester Mystery House will be pleased to know that it's open to the public, with special evening events around Halloween, making it one of the best places to go for Halloween in the USA.

Sedlec Ossuary | Czech Republic

We think Prague is one the best city break destinations in Europe, with plenty of boutique shopping choices, stunning historic architecture and some of the world's best beer. But travel just an hour outside of the city by train and you'll find a much creepier setting, and one of the best places to go for Halloween, the Sedlec Ossuary.

Also known as the bone church, the Sedlec Ossuary is decorated with the bones of an estimated 40,000 to 70,000 people, which have been shaped into chandeliers, a coat of arms and even sinister garlands! We can thank the 13th-century abbot who returned from the Holy Land in 1278 with soil from Golgotha, the site of the crucifixion, and scattered it across the Sedlec cemetery. This made it a pretty attractive place to shack up for eternal rest and before long the cemetery was completely overflowing.

To make room for the new residents, the old bones were exhumed and stacked up in the chapel. Then in 1870 a local woodcarver, František Rint, was hired by the Schwarzenberg family to turn thousands of them into sculptures, furniture and decorations. Makes sense really.

Centralia | Pennsylvania

Unlike everywhere else on this list, Centralia isn't set up for visitors and we wouldn't recommend going. The ground is unstable, toxic gases vent from it, and the people who still live there deserve their privacy. But we included it anyway because it's our list, it's as ooky spooky as they come, and no list of very scary destinations would be complete without an actual real-life ghost town in it.

Centralia was once a thriving coal-mining town, with a population that peaked at 2,761 in 1890. Then in 1962, due to a questionable decision to burn rubbish in a disused mine pit, the coal beneath the town was set ablaze. And it's been burning ever since.

It took two decades, a life-threatening sink-hole and a hearty cloud of toxic fumes before residents were offered buyouts to relocate to a neighbourhood that wasn't being cooked from underneath, and in 1992 the state condemned the whole borough. Not everyone opted to leave though, and as of the 2020 census there are still five whole residents living in the town. Must be quiet.

The eerie, empty scenery and the gases that vent from the cracked ground have led some to, a bit dramatically, claim the town is hell on Earth. It's no surprise then that Centralia has inspired horror tales, including Dean Koontz's novella Strange Highways, and it partly inspired the 2006 film Silent Hill, based on the classic 1999 survival horror game that some of us still haven't recovered from.