Ghost and Mystery Tours in San Francisco

From mysterious unsolved murders to fantastic vampire stories. This type of tour is designed to please the most demanding tastes. No matter how brave you are, this ghostly tour of San Francisco is sure to make your hair stand on end.

I highly recommend you book this tour if you don't want to miss out on* one of the best parts of getting to know the city. It's definitely one of the things to see and do in San Francisco at least once in your life. Come on, fear outside and meet the horror!

The most complete option

San Francisco Ghost Tour

A night-time tour to get to know the darker side of the city

Gold fever spirits, haunted houses and hotels. A past of gangs and smuggling fuelled by the effects of Prohibition that left a host of ghostly stories in its wake.

From £44 at Hellotickets

The tour takes place at dusk, so you'll get the chance to hear some of San Francisco' s spookiest stories. The guide is professional and has ghost hunting equipment to make the experience even more incredible.

The meeting point is at Union Square and from there you will start walking through the city centre, passing through Chinatown and other interesting places around downtown San Francisco.

Recommended if... You are a fan of ghost stories.

To book a ghost tour, I recommend you to look for the most complete option, the one that is not only cheap, but also has different places to visit and scare you. Once you have found your perfect option, you just have to book the tour online.

To do this kind of tours you have to book well in advance, taking into account that it requires a minimum participation, but at the same time it is a very demanded activity.

If you don't want to miss out on your ghostly tour of downtown San Francisco, it's best to make a reservation before you travel. The confirmation process is done at the time of booking to ensure that the tour will take place and that you are guaranteed a place on the tour.

On the other hand, another thing to be aware of is the cancellation policy. Cancellation is generally free, but you must cancel at least 24 hours in advance to receive the full amount of your deposit for the experience.

These tours are not too long, considering it 's at night and you don't want to spend four hours of the night being scared by ghost stories and fatal deaths. An hour and a half is enough for you to get to know the spookiest stories of the city.

However, this type of tour can last a little longer depending on the amount of time you spend at each of the sites to be visited. Sometimes it happens that the stories are so interesting or you make such interesting contacts that it is necessary to stay a little longer.

This is a very interesting tour basically because it offers you the chance to learn about the macabre stories that have been woven in this city since the beginning of its history. The narrator guide who will accompany you on this experience will take you to the most popular haunted sites in San Francisco, some of which are among the most terrifying in the world.

Your guide will not only tell you the typical paranormal stories of famous ghosts, but will also tell you gruesome tales of what life was like in the area during the Gold Rush, when San Francisco was a lawless town where people lost their lives very easily.

You will also see authentic equipment for recognising ghosts and paranormal activity at different sites. Of course, the handling of this device is in charge of the guide, who is obviously a qualified person to perform this task.

One of the things you are sure to like most is the night-time atmosphere during the tour, because during the day there are places that you would never imagine are haunted or have dark stories to tell.

But this tour is about much more than just seeing, the stories are what give life to the places you will visit during the ghost tour. That's why some of the legends you'll hear about are described below.

Stories of haunted cemeteries and forgotten tombs

Iconic sites that were built over ancient cemeteries now give way to the creepiest horror stories in all of San Francisco. For example, City Hall is one such site that was once an active cemetery.

Today, City Hall is one of the most haunted sites in all of San Francisco, along with other sites with similar stories. Presidio, the site of one of San Francisco's best museums, the one dedicated to the life and work of Walt Disney, is also very close to a pet cemetery.

Stories of this site centre on frequent sightings of animal spirits wandering around the area, as if waiting for their owners. Also nearby is a National Cemetery, near which the spectres of soldiers are rumoured to have been seen doing their official duties.

The latter is considered one of the most paranormally active sites in San Francisco. These narratives, which remain so interesting even today, can be heard in the voice of your guide on a night-time ghost tour.

Tales of the bubonic plague that hit the city in 1900

In 1900 the dreaded Black Death arrived in San Francisco, the first city in the United States to experience the epidemic. Politicians at the time did more to hide the problem than to solve it.

By this time it was already the third outbreak of Black Death in the world, and this time it had started in China and other Asian countries. It is believed to have arrived in San Francisco with the great immigration of Chinese who came to the Bay Area attracted by the gold rush.

Bubonic plague then settled in the Chinese ghetto and spread throughout the city. Inequality and racism in dealing with the disease were present throughout the outbreak, leaving chilling stories in its wake.

Deaths of prolific Hollywood performers

There are several stories of Hollywood actors and actresses who have lost their lives in tragic situations in San Francisco. In some cases, the deaths have occurred in the city's famous hotels.

Your tour guide is sure to tell you the most incredible stories of the strange deaths of artists in this city.

Sordid tales of the prohibition era

For 14 years the United States experienced a fierce era of alcohol prohibition, also known as the Prohibition or Prohibition period. The measure was neither successful nor accepted from the start, causing corruption to skyrocket across the country.

Mafias and corruption ran rampant, driving American society into a maelstrom of unbridled violence. This unrest was most acutely felt in San Francisco, where it provided the perfect breeding ground for reigning supreme.

This era of rampage and overkill left in its wake thousands of murders and other heinous crimes, and with it many stories of ghosts and wandering spirits.

There is no specific place to get your hands on Prohibition-era spirits, but if you want to visit a location, it would definitely be Chinatown or Jackson Square, the former site of the Barbary Coast district.

• I recommend you take this tour with friends, family or your partner, but never take children under the age of 10 on a ghost tour. The experience can be overwhelming for a child of that age.
• Dress in layers no matter what season it is, as the night in the city can get really cold.
• Comfortable, closed-toe shoes are important, as the tour is a walking tour through the city centre.
• The tour may be cancelled if the weather is bad, so I recommend you to confirm again before going to the meeting point.
• To get to the meeting point I recommend you to use public transport, to avoid parking problems in case you are travelling in a private vehicle.
• As the walk is outdoors, I recommend you bring extra protection such as a mackintosh in case it rains during the experience.
• Don't stop if you or any of the people going with you on the experience use a wheelchair, as the tour is also suitable for wheelchair users.

The dark tour of San Francisco can be priced from 35 euros per person and upwards. The price of this type of tour depends on the number of sites you stop at as well as the length of the tour.

Please note that tips are not included in the price of the tour. You need to consider tipping the tour guide, as tipping is more than an act of appreciation in the United States, it is almost a mandatory practice for all users.

Transportation costs are not included in the price, so to start the tour you have to get to the meeting point by your own means. In case you feel like having something to eat on the way, you have to bring your own provisions or money to buy on the way.

The experience will take you through ghostly and historic places in the city. In most cases history is responsible for keeping dark shells that later become paranormal legends.

That's why on this type of tour, the guide focuses more on the historical area of the city and how it has left some of the most chilling tales that today bring to life the worst fears of many locals and visitors alike.

Transamerica Pyramid

This place harbours its ghost stories and other darker tales, within the history of the tower's construction itself. From the mid-1800s until the 1950 s, the area where the Transamerica Pyramid stands was occupied by a low-rise commercial building.

Artists, writers, lawyers and other literary professionals met here. Towards the end of the 1950s and into the 1960s the site was used as a car park, until finally in the 1970s construction began on the building it is today.

During the construction work and to start the excavations, the workers began to notice that, given its proximity to the quay, the old building was built over buried ships and pieces of ships.

You can imagine all the terrifying stories you will hear about these excavations and why these tales remain true to this day.

Jackson Square

The gold rush of the 1800s changed the landscape of San Francisco, seemingly giving purpose to its inhabitants and bringing great economic growth to the region, but it also brought a stain of blood, terror and violence to the city.

It is enough to tell you that in Jackson Square there are still surviving buildings that belonged to the old central core of San Francisco for you to imagine the number of stories that can come out of it. In fact, this place began to be built in the mid-19th century.

This location was part of the old Barbary Coast red-light district, which was known for its many bars, jazz clubs and especially brothels. During those times Jackson Square and the whole of the red light district was completely lawless, with social unrest, violence and prostitution the order of the day.

Chinatown

What during the day is an excellent place to include among San Francisco's best food tours, by night becomes a truly haunted place, full of history and a dark, but very red past, with endless things to see and do in Chinatown.

During the 19th century, Chinatown was also part of the eerie Barbary Coast red-light district. This neighbourhood full of brothels and above all so much violence, was the scene of shocking murders, gruesome deaths and exploitation. All this happened during the so-called gold rush.

Of course, with such turbulent histories, this side of the city left behind many stories that are now included among the dark legends of San Francisco. Precisely in this part of the old district, there used to be multiple gang wars that ended up staining the city with blood.

This history repeated itself over and over again with multiple criminal groups that settled in this lawless place forgotten by the governments, until finally that dark past was left behind and the neighbourhoods known today as Chinatown, Jackson Square and North Beach were formed.

This tour is highly recommended not only because of the scary stories you will be told along the way, but also because it gives you a historical insight into what these parts of San Francisco were once like. Thinking about what the early 20th century was like in this place allows you to think about the great social progress that the nation, and especially San Francisco, has made.

It is also an activity that I recommend you to include among your options of things to do in San Francisco at night because I think it is an excellent way to start the night, and then go to enjoy the current nightlife, which if you think about it, has something to do with that San Francisco that is now in the past.

I like to recommend this tour because the extensive knowledge the guide shares with you is rarely found in other types of tour guides. It tends to be an interesting participatory experience, where you not only have to be there listening to the stories he has to tell you, but he is also open to listen to all your concerns and those of the rest of the group.

I don't recommend you go on a ghost tour on your own. Although if you are a ghost tour enthusiast and have done some research on San Francisco and its mysteries, go ahead, it will be a good experience.

But if you don't have any knowledge about this kind of paranormal matters, the ideal thing to do is to go on a guided tour, with a person who can also tell you exactly what happens in these places and all the secrets they hide.

Also, since it is an activity to do in San Francisco at night, it is best that you go with people who know the places at night. Think that by going on a guided tour you will have the chance to clear up all your doubts that you might not be able to clear up on a self-guided tour.