Costume-kitted guide Kitty Nasarow offers a Vampire Tour of San Francisco (www.sfvampiretour.com) not far from Union Square. Her twisted take on the city's history includes unexplained phenomena at the swanky Fairmont Hotel.

Guests staying in the penthouse suite have reported seeing a spectral woman-in-red lying on a four-poster bed of the type that was removed years before. The seventh floor of the same hotel — once occupied by troops off to war — has been mysteriously flooded, without a single leaky pipe being discovered.

When fire engulfed the home of socialite Delphine Lalaurie, rescuers broke down the doors to discover the gruesome sight of slaves chained and tortured. Some had eyes gouged and fingernails removed, while others had body parts severed and sewn on to their stomach. Many of the servants are still said to haunt the mansion.

New Orleans is also home to the nation's second most visited grave — voodoo priestess Marie Laveau. Tales persist of bizarre rituals in St Louis Cemetery Number One, where Laveau's tomb is found.

Hollywood star Jim Carrey, who stayed in the hotel while filming Dumb and Dumber, supposedly left his room after two hours and asked to be moved to a different wing. The hotel offers a ghost tour (www.stanleyhotel.com/tours), offering some eerie explanations for these apparitions. It includes a visit to their most haunted room — number 217 — where author King stayed.

A Catholic priest sent to bless the house was said to have been told to "get out" by a male voice in a bedroom. The family said soon after that they saw green slime going down the walls and a plague of flies coming from the same room despite the fact it was the middle of winter. After just 28 days, they moved out.

Despite the validity of their claims being questioned, the success of the book, The Amityville Horror, and resulting films has meant tourists flock to Amityville at Halloween. Now that's creepy.

Yet it was not until the mansion was sold and refurbished that paranormal activities were reported. Workers reported tools vanishing, and said they felt as if they were being watched. Now a restaurant and inn (www.lempmansion.com), staff and patrons claim to have seen glasses lift off the bar and fly, doors lock and unlock by themselves, and a bar-room piano playing itself. It is believed that an illegitimate son of William J Lemp Jr, who was kept locked up until he died, haunts the mansion.

Refusing to enter a plea to protect his children's inheritance, Corey was covered with boards on which heavy stones were placed. Moments before he was crushed to death, Corey told overseeing Sheriff George Corwin: "Damn you Sheriff, I curse you and Salem!"

Corwin died of a heart attack soon after, and it is claimed that every sheriff since has been afflicted by a heart or blood ailment. What's more, each time a major tragedy has been inflicted on Salem, it follows a claimed sighting of Corey's ghost.