11/08/2026
👻 We’ve taken ghost tours all over the East Coast. Somehow, Annapolis still managed to surprise us.
My wife and I have a slightly unusual way of getting to know a city. We take a ghost tour.
Salem, Boston, Williamsburg, Gettysburg, and plenty of places in between. We’ve walked through dark streets, listened to centuries-old legends, and discovered that sometimes the best way to learn about a place is through the stories people have been telling about it for generations.
We’ve even taken the Annapolis Ghost Tour a couple of times before.
So when Melissa from Annapolis Ghost Tours & Crawls invited us out Friday evening, we weren’t exactly newcomers. We knew what to expect.
Or at least we thought we did.
Our original plan was to bring our three-year-old, but he wasn’t feeling well. Instead, what was supposed to be a family outing turned into an unexpected date night.
And let me tell you, we needed that.
For nearly two hours, we wandered the historic streets of Annapolis, laughing, learning, occasionally getting a little creeped out, and seeing a city we’ve loved for years through an entirely different lens.
A lot of that credit belongs to our tour guide, Patricia.
This woman knew her stuff.
She wasn’t simply rattling off ghost stories. She was bringing history to life, mixing historical details with local legends, humor, and just enough suspense to have everyone hanging on her next word.
But what impressed us even more was the way she treated people.
She made eye contact. She listened. She welcomed questions, pointed out opportunities for photographs, and had this incredible ability to make every person feel like the evening was designed just for them.
And nowhere was that more apparent than with a young boy on our tour.
He was probably eight years old, and when Patricia asked what he wanted to see, he had a pretty simple request.
The most haunted house in Annapolis.
Well, ask and you shall receive.
Off we went to hear a particularly unsettling story about a husband who climbed into bed expecting to find his wife, only to discover that whoever was beside him might not have been his wife at all.
There were cold feet, the smell of roses, and a voice calling from downstairs.
I’ll let Patricia tell you the rest. She does it considerably better than I could.
But the ghost story wasn’t actually my favorite part.
What stuck with me was how Patricia made that little boy feel important. She involved him throughout the evening, encouraged his curiosity, and even got the rest of us cheering him on.
As a father, that meant something to me.
I love watching my own kids feel confident, included, and supported. Seeing a group of adults do that for somebody else’s child was genuinely wonderful.
He wasn’t just a kid being dragged along on an adult activity. He was part of the adventure.
And that, more than any advertisement about being family-friendly, showed me what kind of experience this could be for parents and their children.
The walking was comfortable, the group stayed together, and the guide adjusted the experience to the people participating.
We also learned about the work Historic Annapolis does to preserve and restore our historic buildings, sometimes going to extraordinary lengths to bring a property back to the way it looked centuries ago.
I’ve spent countless hours walking these streets, photographing these buildings, and sharing stories about Annapolis.
And yet, I still walked away having learned something new.
That’s what made this evening so special.
Not just the ghost stories. Not just the history. Not even how entertaining the entire experience was.
It was getting to spend an evening with my wife, doing something we both love, and being reminded that there’s still so much to discover right here at home.
Sometimes we get so comfortable with the places we live that we forget to appreciate what makes them extraordinary.
Friday night was a wonderful reminder.
Would I recommend this as a date night? In a heartbeat.
Would I recommend it to other parents and families? Absolutely. Watching how that young man was treated made a lasting impression on me.
And considering my wife and I have already done this tour before, the fact that we’d happily go again should tell you something.
A huge thank-you to Melissa, Patricia, and everyone at Annapolis Ghost Tours & Crawls for a fantastic evening. We were invited as complimentary guests, but these opinions are entirely my own.
And here’s a little something for my Dad’s Guide community. 👻
They’re offering special early 6:30 PM tours for Halloween week, and Melissa arranged a discount specifically for our readers.
🎟️ Code: AnnapolisDads1026
That takes $2 off each ticket for the qualifying 6:30 PM tours.
Whether you’re planning a family Halloween adventure or just looking for an excuse to get out with your significant other, this is an experience worth considering.
And now I’m curious.
When was the last time you did something in your own hometown that made you appreciate it a little more?
