One Reddit user asked:
Reddit, what is the scariest place you've ever been?
So we'll be honest, we were expecting a bunch of stories about haunted houses. What we got was a whole lot of terrifying, yet mundane places. As it turns out, sometimes it's the circumstances and not the location that make something truly terrifying.
Be warned, this article talks about child abandonment, slow death, arson, abuse, and more.
Some places are scary because humanity can be scary.
Lemon Drop
Probably a cave, wriggling through a "lemon drop" as they called it, where you go feet first down a skinny tunnel and have to wriggle down about 12' before you drop into a chamber below.
About halfway my shoulders got stuck and it took like five excruciating minutes to get loose.
I don't know why I went spelunking, I'm claustrophobic.
Edit: to answer a few common questions:
- I got out through the exit at the bottom of the cave, the entrance was uphill so you had to turn back or go through the lemon drop to get out.
- I had kinda forgotten I'm claustrophobic. Or I guess it's better to say my claustrophobia improved and I didn't really feel the walls closing in until they were literally squeezing me from all sides.
- I don't know why I went in there, it was a free event and I was probably pretty high and bored at the time.
Last Messages
Reconstructed subway which was destroyed by arson years ago in Daegu, Korea. They memorialized the site: scorched walls, melted people's items, burnt phone booths and all.
But the scariest was the scorched walls with writings and handprints from loved ones of the people that were trapped during the fire. This subway is one of the busiest stations even today due to being the city's downtown area.
They're the last text messages that the victims sent to their families as they were dying. The trains locked and trapped people inside. They burned, succumbed to smoke inhalation, etc. It was slow. They had time for final conversations. If you search "Daegu subway fire texts" you can find translations, they're chilling.
- ciongyik
That's Not Fruit
Bay Area Forest GIF by ChrisGiphyWe were on our way to Flagstaff, AZ for the Overland Expo and planned to camp near there the night before it started since we were on a longer overland trip.
It was this place in the woods that was recommended by other who were there before. It all seemed fine and we set up camp.
At night when we brushed our teeth we noticed there were animal skulls hanging in the trees all around us, it was super scary.
We packed up and spend the night in a Hotel. We hope it was just some stupid "funny" hunters or something, but you never know, there might be a crazy guy...
- natkolbi
Still Waters Run Deep
The Strid is what happens when a fast-flowing river basically turns on its side, putting a vast amount of water through a very slim, very deep, very dark groove in the ground. It looks calm on the surface, but if you fall in, you are royally fcked.
There's a claim that it might be the most dangerous stretch of water in the world, and I can readily believe it.
It's not too far from where I used to live, so I decided to go there once. It's the most unassuming thing you can imagine, but knowing how dangerous it is just makes it seem ominous, especially when you consider how many people it may have killed and how few people ever wash up.
I didn't go within ten feet of the thing.
Freezing
Got stuck in my car in a freezing steppe during a really bad snow storm at -45 degrees Celsius. The snow was real deep and my car was stuck so badly it would take a truck to pull it out. Cellphone didn't work, maps didn't work.
For those who don't know, once the engine dies you have about 12 hours before you freeze to death. The worst thing is that the snow was so deep and the storm was so bad they probably wouldn't have found me until spring. I have been in a bunch of life threatening situations in my lifetime, but fuck, nothing is as scary as freezing to death in the middle of nowhere.
Thankfully, another guy saw me. He happened to be driving a real pumped up Land Cruiser, all geared up and shit. He gave me a real confused look once he realized I was driving a Jaguar XE, probably the last fcking car you want to drive there.
It would have been ok if I stayed on the road, I guess, but I couldn't see because of the storm and wandered about 50 meters off road. He pulled me out and led me for two hours at 40 km an hour, given he could easily do 120 thanks to his car.
A Leopard In The Darkness
leopard GIFGiphyThe most scared I've felt was standing in the dark at a camp in the middle of nowhere in northern Botswana. The path was between the tent and the reception/dining area and all there was separating this path and the camp from the wilderness was a flimsy fence. There were no lamps.
I had stopped to admire the stars which blanketed the sky; then I lowered my gaze to stare out at the inky blackness beyond. It was so dark i could not even see my hand. The thought that ran through my head was that a lion or leopard could be watching me that very moment, could be mere metres away, and I would never know it until too late.
I stood there for a few minutes, savouring this fear, reminding myself that this was what it was like for humans only a few hundred years ago, and thousands before that. Humbling experience.
Statistically, the most dangerous place I've been to is a shantytown/township/informal settlement in Cape Town. Informal areas like these are among the most dangerous areas in South Africa, but funnily enough I didn't feel unsafe as I was there for only a couple of hours in daylight and the people around me were friendly.
Abandoned And Unable To Speak The Language
I got abandoned in a care home at 11 years old in a foreign country. That sht was scary!
My dad abducted me and took me to Switzerland. I was under the impression we were moving, but little did I know he was keeping me from my family, after 3 years his relationship with his girlfriend imploded and he decided he would leave me in a care home.
It took me a year but yeah I eventually learned to speak German.
I actually only found out that it was a case of child abduction recently (1 month ago) after my grandparents gave me a document containing all the information. After getting that document from my grandparents I really have no interest in a relationship with him anymore.
Nearly 10 years have passed since I left the care home. He had plenty of time to tell me the truth and explain himself - but honestly he hasn't changed at all. He just drinks all day. I plan to confront him, but after that I'm done with him.
I'm getting married next year so I feel it's time to forget about him and move on with my life I guess.
Trafficking
An Airbnb in Barcelona. I've spent quite a while in Spain, speak Spanish, and have visited Barcelona multiple times. I've also used Airbnb multiple times, and know what to check for. Two friends and I (all 20sF) picked an Airbnb with several favorable ratings, in a good neighborhood. One of the ones that's a room in someone's apartment.
Show up, and the two guys look nothing like the picture, but are very hospitable, so we went inside. They showed us around, and the apartment looked like the photos. Then they showed us the room and let us be. We open the door to the room and it's nothing like the photos. It's essentially a closet, 3 dirty twin mattresses on the floor with no pillows and blankets covered in old food. Furthermore, the door to the room has no interior lock on it—but it DID have an exterior lock. It's at this point that we also realize they never gave us a key to the apartment.
We took pictures of everything and waited until we heard them leave the apartment, and watched them from the window until they were out of sight. We gathered our packs and SPRINTED out of there, with no plans on where to go, just calling random hostels until we found one that had room. But it was on the other side of the city, and the metro had closed for the night. So we walked an hour and a half. Thankfully the hostel was lovely, and Airbnb refunded us and removed the listing, but we're convinced it was a human trafficking setup.
Nearer My God To Thee
My experience was more about the circumstances than the place. I went to a university that offered volunteer opportunities that included cheap international trips. I was on a trip with 20 other clueless midwestern teens traveling to a school in the mountains of Bolivia.
The road was a sheer cliff face on one side and a step drop off on the other. And of course, there were crosses along the roadside marking where vehicles had gone over the side. This was just nerve wracking until the driver stopped the bus for what we thought was just taking a break. Then he scooted under the front wheels of the bus, came out, rooted around in a box and found a wire coat hanger. Scooted back under the bus with the coat hanger and came out without it.
Then, Vamanos! Our nervousness turns to concern.
At the next stop a woman gets on as we are leaving and drapes her arm over the driver's shoulder and they proceed to semi make-out while he is driving. Several of us were white knuckled at this point. When it gets dark the driver and his girl light up and we smell weed.
Good thing it was a Christian college and we all knew the words to "Nearer My God to Thee".
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Reddit user PatrickBateman asked:
What's the creepiest/downright scariest thing to happen to you or someone else in your hometown/city?
What follows are some of the scariest and most horrific responses we could find and confirm. Honestly, it's stuff like this that terrifies people. Warning: The responses you're about to read through include mentions of murder, suicide, harm to children, racism, unexplained death and more. We've even got werewolves and Slenderman in here.
Proceed with caution.
Sister's Jog
"My sister found a teen who had just committed suicide when she was running once. She heard the gun and was just rounding a turn and thought someone was shooting at her. He shot himself in the head."
Minor Mysteries
"This isn't exactly the scariest thing but it's an unsolved mystery and it creeped me and my dad out then."
"We just came home to see all the lights in the house were on. The TV was on the Netflix profile select, and the glass on the fireplace was on the opposite side of the room. Nothing was taken, nothing else was out of place."
"In my room, the computer was on and logged into my password-protected account. And I turned it off before. Also, most of my printer paper was gone and the TV in there was on the Netflix select too."
"I still don't know what happened."
- MP8_YT
Werewolf Murders
Giphy"Some 22 year old guy who claimed to be an immortal werewolf, was "dating" a tween. The two of them came up with a plan to kill her whole family, and did. Both parents and her younger brother were murdered in their sleep."
A Lot Of People Assume I'm Racist
"My town is known for a hate crime that happened in 1998, I was only three years old at the time but three white supremacist chained a black man to the back of a truck and drug him down the street. It was pretty horrible stuff and got brought back into the news this year because the last guy was finally executed. A lot of people assume that I'm racist when I tell them where I am from which is pretty awkward considering I work in social services."
- liza5335
"That Guy"
"Sat next to a kid in high school who killed his mom by stabbing her over 100 times. It was a Microsoft class so we were on computers talking all day and became buddies. He would show me pictures of bombs he made from 2 liters, home-made flamethrowers from squirt bottles, etc. I never thought he was "that guy" though."
"He was sentenced to 35 years because he admitted guilt and refused to plea insanity even though the judge advised him to. In trial he didn't try to defend himself. Walked in, said "I'm guilty and deserve prison" - seriously. Judge asked why he did it and he told her that his mom was verbally and physically abusive to him and he just lost mental stability for a bit. Told the judge that despite that, she didn't deserve death and he deserved prison. I don't think he opened up too much about what type of abuse she did because he wasn't trying to defend himself saying he was in the okay."
"Please note this was many years ago before the time you'd make teachers aware of these types of things."
To Hide The Evidence
"A guy I went to school and hung out with and his precious two year old daughter where found dead in his car after it had caught on fire. I am not sure if it was ruled a homicide, but I know tons of people who believe they were murdered and then their bodies where burned to hide the evidence. I cannot imagine the pain the mother is going through. She lost her precious little girl and boyfriend."
- Aubs71993
Blame The Aboriginals
"A little boy was bashed to death by his mother and stepfather in front of his younger siblings. After the little boy died in hospital, the "parents" were questioned by the police and claimed that he'd been attacked and beaten by a group of young Aboriginal boys in a nearby park."
"My brothers in law, who are Aboriginal, were about 12 & 13 at the time. They were pulled aside on the street by police and interrogated aggressively/accused of killing the little boy. There was excessive police force involved. My younger brother in law up to this point had been a very happy, trusting boy...he has never been the same since."
- Trin20k
Just Started Stabbing
"Two girls were randomly stabbed at one of the high schools here. The guy who did it didn't go there, didn't know them. Just walked in an started stabbing. A video of it ended up online... it's all our town was talking about for weeks."
"One girl lived, but the second unfortunately died in the hospital. She was my aunt's neighbor and we had gone trick or treating together as kids. Less than a year after it happened there was a publication ban put on the name of the girl who died. Her family was furious. The killer was getting all of this attention and she, the victim, was just some nameless teenager."
- Ta5hak5
Gutted
"When I was in high school a girl I knew worked at a gas station in town, which I went to everyday after school. She was murdered."
"She went missing and they found her at conservation site naked on the edge of the river. They didn't find her murderer until he tried to kill another girl I knew, luckily she survived him gutting her like a deer."
"Apparently, he and the first girl got into an argument and he proceeded to hit her with the hatchet he had. The first blow didn't kill her so he "decided to put her out of her misery" (his words) and hit her again. To cover his tracks he opted to undress her and hide her in the tall grass along the river."
"The second girl's boyfriend was "friends" with the guy. I believe he showed up when the boyfriend wasn't there or had just left (I'm not totally sure what the situation was this was probably nine years ago) but he got in an argument with the second girl and he gutted her."
"She was able to get herself to a neighbor, survived, and was able to I.D him. When they arrested him he confessed to the first girls murder. It was crazy because I knew both girls, I knew the guy and went to school with his younger sister. I also lived about a minute away from where he attempted to murder the second girl."
"I felt so bad for his sister because she continued to tell everyone what a great guy he was. She had to deal with all the people at school who hated her brother because the first girl was well loved in our small community."
Free Baby Clothes
Giphy"A pregnant Colorado woman responded to a Craigslist ad for free baby clothes. When she arrived the woman that lived there stabbed her and cut out her baby. She left her there to die but she was still some how able to call 911. They ended up finding the crazy lady at the hospital with the baby and she had told the doctors she had a miscarriage. The baby unfortunately did not make it but the woman was able to recover after surgery."
"The lady just recently was sentenced to 100 years. Apparently this has happened several times in several different places."
How'd He Get There?
"A young man went missing in the city I went to university in. He was a first year student and vanished walking back home from a night out in town. This is a long walk (about three miles from the pubs and clubs in the centre to the campus) and it was January, so very cold. General theory was that he had passed out drunk and frozen to death, but no body was found in any of the nearby areas."
"Our campus is surrounded by mountains, forests, trails, cliffs... there's a big lake in the middle of it. Lots of places for a drunk person to get into trouble, but still nothing showed up."
"Not even any clues, like some of his belongings or something. Abduction was briefly considered, but again no evidence. It kind of faded out of the forefront of everyone's minds, though the search was never called off."
"Finally the body was found. It was in a remote area of forest, and I believe it was spotted either from the air, or from someone walking at some distance and seeing bright clothing in the snow/frost. The body itself was in an area inaccessible by foot or road, far past the distance he could have walked without succumbing to hypothermia (he was only in jeans and T-shirt). Nobody knows how he managed to get up there, or survive long enough to get anywhere near it, but an autopsy showed nothing suspicious. I know there's probably a rational explanation, but it was incredibly unnerving. It was a long walk, too, and not a single person saw him while he was making it."
D And His Dad
"A kid that I went to school with started doing meth with his dad and one day, in a paranoid state, they kidnapped a woman and her daughters. They kept them in a house just a few streets up from me, had them tied up and beat them to get some kind of "revenge."
"One of the girls escaped and ran to a neighbor to call 911. The kid (we'll call D) and his dad took off, ended up in a city about 20 minutes away. They stole an older man's work truck and kidnapped the man as well. They then drove to nearby Wyoming where they stopped in a secluded wooded area, beat the old man to death and abandoned the truck."
"They were caught about a week later. D ended up receiving a life sentence and his dad killed himself in his cell before trial."
Scared Of You
"So I work as a nursing assistant. I approached a new patient introducing myself but she looked terrified and said "I don't know why but I'm scared of you". After we laughed about it."
Anyway, the next day I checked her blood pressure etc and everything was fine. She asked to go to the toilet so I helped her across. 5 minutes later I go to check on her and she's lying on the floor, no pulse, no breathing but her eyes are wide open staring at me as I begin chest compressions and I snap her ribs within the first few. Never forget the feeling of her bones moving under the skin and looking at her eyes. That's why she was scared of me. I genuinely think she had a premonition."
""Unfortunately after the crash team came and an extensive effort of resuscitation the decision was made to stop. It was about 6 years ago but I still remember her name. Autopsy said she died from a blood clot in the lung - sudden and not something I could have picked up when I checked her before walking."
The Star Athlete
"Star athlete at my high school executed his girlfriend with a single gunshot to the back of her head. His case garnered national attention for some time because he was about to join the US Olympic team, until he got locked up. He was released several years later after he was exonerated. But those of us in his class know beyond all doubt that he did it."
- AJNSD619
Creepypasta
Giphy"I live in the city in Wisconsin where the Slenderman stabbing happened. For those unfamiliar, two middle schoolers lured their friend into the woods at a sleepover, they then stabbed her multiple times and left her there to die because "Slenderman told them to." Slenderman is, essentially, a creepy meme. The girl was found the next morning by a man riding on a bike trail and she somehow survived."
"Not just multiple. 34 times. They stabbed their friend 34 times as a sacrifice to a creepypasta."
Bruce
"I used to live across the street from Bruce McArthur."
"He's a serial killer that killed at least eight LGBTQ+ men who were in Toronto. He also preyed on LGBTQ+ men who were homeless."
"He buried victims' body parts on his property and apparently in a nearby ravine that I used to play in with my friends."
They Still Don't Know
"In my village, there's a railway that goes along a forest and a road. On that railway, there's a bridge for cars to cross. One day someone found a puddle of blood with traces of dragging. Thinking it was an attempt at suicide or a boar that got hit by a train, the person that found it called the mayor and the mayor called the cops. The police also assumed it was a suicide, so they came with a forensic team to get samples, etc."
"The "creepy" part is that no one really cared. My grandmother even said "good riddance". I was like 12 at the time, I didn't understand anything."
"I asked my mom about it when I was 17 and she explained that it was a 27 year old drunk guy that played around on the bridge and tipped over it. He got badly injured, dragged himself in the forest and died there from blood loss."
"He was not really liked in the village, he was known to vandalize houses, break signs, let his dog chase teens, burn hay inside barns, shoot at cats with his paintball gun, etc. People knew because he would always brag about it, but they wouldn't complain to his parents because they were nice people."
"They found the body about one week after the accident. Everyone went to his funeral but the parents were the only one to cry. To this day they still don't know that there son was hated by everyone."
Distracted With Toys
"So I was best friends with this girl that lived with her wonderful grandma across the street. My friend's estranged mother just went up to the house one day, and, distracting my friend (who I think was about 8 or 9 at the time) with toys, she walked up to my friend's grandma and shot her twice, and when she was still alive, buried an axe in her head.
"My dad went across when he heard the gun shots and described brain matter and blood all over the china cabinets, the walls, everything.""
"The killer is in jail now. And my old friend... I don't even know. I heard she's tried to attempt suicide numerous times, but I haven't seen her in almost 10 or so years. I wish I could see them both again. It makes me tear up when I think about it."
The School Pretended It Never Happened
""The high school near mine had a student commit suicide over the summer the same year I graduated. The school made it worse my not commemorating him, banning any articles of clothing that were dedicated to his memory, and didn't even give him an empty seat during when he was supposed to graduate."
Info also later came out that the student went to the counselors before he died and asked for help, but they basically told him to eff off. It's scary how mental health is downgraded where I live."
Small towns can have huge problems.
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
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