The Specter Files ep.1 (pt2): Into the Depths

(for real this time)

(Lucy, I can’t believe you’re too scared to watch this! We lived it! But, fine, I’ll continue to transcribe it for you.)

“Where are we going first?” Samantha asks as she steps out of the Specter Mobile’s side door. Klaus offers her a helping hand, but she doesn’t take it, smiling politely instead. “The Bloody Falls?” The rest of the Specter Detectors are standing in a familiar place. It’s the Mammoth Cave Visitor Center Parking Lot. (It’s so cool to have been standing in the same place! We’ve been inside that van!)

“That’s the main attraction.” Sheryl speaks in her normal, non-camera, voice. “We have to build up to something like that.”

“I thought that we open with the headliner.” Samantha replies. She’s the only one who isn’t wearing anything Specter Detector related, but she’s carrying a large canvas tote bag full of strange equipment. (I still don’t recognize most of her ghost hunting tools- they are different from the Specter Detector’s main devices.)

“I’d forgotten about that.” Sheryl replied. But then she shrugs, “But maybe it will be better to go for a slow burn, and build some suspense.”

Cody is the last to exit, closing the door. While they organize equipment, Clancy explains the plan clearly and succinctly, like he plans on keeping this in the video. “Today we’re meeting Ranger Lorie, and she’s introducing us to the cave. And the group we’ll be sharing our tours with.”

(That’s us!!!!!!)

Klaus frowns, interrupting him. “So, that’s just decided then, without me?”

“We talked about this last night.” Clancy rubs his eyes. “Sheryl already okayed it with the ranger.”

“I’m sorry, I was too busy setting up cameras with Cody.” Klaus continues to frown. “Since someone else wouldn’t help.” He turned to face the camera, and we hear Mark’s reply.

“The woods up there creep me out.”

“I agree.” Sheryl nodded. “The north side just feels different, like something, or many somethings, are watching us from the woods.”

“Well hopefully the ghosts up there can wait.” Klaus checkes his watch. “With the weird ferry schedule, we’re wont have time to investigate Maple Springs for a couple days.”

(I don’t know why they left this in. The Specter Detectors usually don’t spend this long showing how they are planning things. I wonder if they are padding their episodes so that Mammoth Cave can be a whole season of their T.V. show)

“That ferry was strange too.” Sheryl yawns. “Did you notice that we couldn’t see anyone in the cabin last night, but the driver was visible when we rode across the river today? You’d think that they would have a light on at night in their cabin, or something.”

“Oh.” Cody replies, “The ghost ferry of Mammoth Cave. I like that angle.”

Klaus sighs loud enough to get everyone’s attention. “Guys, let’s go meet Ranger Lorie, and . . .” he pauses to sight again, “the others.” He takes control of the conversation, while Mark follows them through the parking lot. “Cody, tell us what you learned last night.”

“Right!” Cody speaks. “So, it turns out that Ranger Lorie, our guide for the next couple of days was the park Ranger who first discovered the bleeding walls of Mammoth Cave. She was leading a tour to one of the most popular formations in Mammoth Cave, when they began to notice something dripping from the walls.”

“A red liquid,” Sheryl turns around, walking backwards to address the camera. “Which witnesses, including Ranger Lorie have described as ‘resembling blood.’ While Mammoth Cave is known to have it’s share of ghost stories and haunts, it was this spectral emanation which brought us, scrambling, out of Cincinnati.”

Klaus keeps walking, with his back to the camera as he takes up the narration. “This story was first brought to us by a Spectator who lives in nearby Smiths Grove, Kentucky, and when we saw the headline in her local newspaper, we knew we had to come down here to investigate. Of course, since we are investigating in a National Park, it took us a little while to arrange things with the Park Service. We are headed now to meet with the Ranger who first witnessed the haunting. She will be our guide in the coming days.”

The next part seems to have been added in post, as Klaus continues to speak over a montage of shots as the team meets with Ranger Lorie in the visitor center. And we’re there too!!! (although there aren’t any clear shots of us.) Then the montage continues while we all hike down to the historic cave entrance,

Klaus narrates, “Of course, because we are shooting in a National Park, and a delicate World Heritage Site, we need a guide to brief us on the rules and regulations, and to ensure that we protected the local ecosystem. And who better to guide us than Ranger Lorie Miller, who has been working in Mammoth Cave for over a decade, and who first witnessed the blood flowing in Mammoth Cave?”

There’s a shot of Ranger Lorie talking to them, while Sheryl takes over the narrate. “While we were being filled in on the history of Mammoth Cave, and the Rules we would have to follow, I couldn’t help but be distracted by the strange feelings I was getting about the cave, an open maw welcoming us, practically calling us down into the dark. Although the entrance seemed beautifully mundane to photograph, little did we know that in less than an hour we’d be in for the scare of our lives!”

And then they have a scene with us!!!! It’s only the backs of our heads, since only Ric was around to give permission for Bethany to be in their show, but we’re all there!!!!

And they even kept in the bit where Bethany explains the rules of the park!

Mark films the Specter Detectors, (and the backs of our heads) as we stand over the historic entrance: a deep hole in the side of the hill blanketed in fall leaves. Ranger Lorie and Bethany give a short talk on the history of the cave and cave safety.

The historic entrance.

I don’t know what they kept in, because Bethany and I were skipping through it, (Bethany was too embarrassed to watch it), but it was something about how we had to keep our hands to ourselves because our oils would kill the cave rocks, how we had to wash our shoes to prevent the cave bats from exploding with fungus, and all the other usual cave safety stuff.

But then there’s a new scene, after the rest of us have gone down into the Cave, Ranger Lorie waits up top with most of the Specter Detectors.

“So, Ranger Lorie,” Klaus asks, “How does it feel to return to the cave after witnessing the terror at the Frozen Niagara? I’m surprised you’re still giving tours. Do you think it was a message from beyond?”

“Well.” Ranger Lorie replies. “There’s a long oral history of ghosts in Mammoth Cave, and this wasn’t my first experience. It was very scary at the time, but the jury is still out on that red substance. If it was a message, I’ll leave it to you ghost professionals to tell me what it was supposed to mean.”

“Do you think we’ll be seeing anything like that today?” Sheryl asks.

“Mammoth Cave is a big place.” Ranger Lorie replies. “We’d have to walk through miles of passages to reach that section. But I’ve heard many a story of ghosts prowling the section of the cave we’ll be touring today, and you have your equipment ready. Let’s see what we can find.”

The next footage shows the first leg of our tour. There’s more about the history of Mammoth Cave. Klaus, Sheryl and Cody take turns narrating, as they scan the old mining equipment with several of their tools. They talk about the Woodland Peoples who mined Gypsum thousands of years ago, about the miners who worked the caves in the early 1800’s to supply salt peter for gunpowder, and about the smoke trails of cave graffiti.

In the cave

Sheryl and Samantha discuss how limestone is good for containing ghost energy, and I laughed recalling her talk about ghost fish fossils.

The first time things get really creepy is when they are setting up the Spook Detector in the ‘Methodist Church’ section of the cave, while Klaus recounts the story of the preacher who used to climb up onto a rocky hill, and preach sermons to a crowd of miners sitting in the darkness.

Sheryl talks about the ghosts who supposedly join some cave tours, and the way Mark films the whole setup, I can’t tell if the extra people in the shadows are the us, the Specter Detectors, or actual specters. The lights go out, and we get our first infrared view, and Bethany laughed at me,

But Lucy, I swear, that there are more people in that camera than there were on our tour!

(I wish you would watch this so you would count with me.)

Justin, you, Bethany, Rudy, Me. Ranger Lorie. Then there are six Specter Detectors. Klaus, Clancy, Cody, Sheryl, Samantha, and Mark—who is holding the camera. That means there should be 11 red hotspots, but I swear I see 12! Sometimes it even looks like there’s a tiny 13th one in the background, further down the cave.

But the Specter Detectors don’t say anything about it, and the Spook Detector never goes off.

From there, we head deeper into the cave.

Sheryl narrates a bit about the mummies found in the cave, woodlands people who were either buried in nearby caves or found in Mammoth Cave. They focus on Ranger Lorie while she talks about how Stephen Bishop climbed over the Bottomless Pit on a ladder. (I’m glad we got a metal bridge!)

Then we go even deeper into the cave. I think Mark got tired, because there isn’t a lot of footage from the deeper section. (although, maybe that’s because we came back later.)

The footage picks up again in the room with the stairs, and there’s a wide shot of the Pillars of Karnak, and the metal staircase which will take us out of the cave. The Specter Detectors are scattered about the room, and you can just see us all grouped together as Bethany lectures us about rocks or fossils or something.

The Spooky Stairs!

There’s footage of everyone climbing the stairs, Justin and Rudy are just ahead of Mark, they stop at one of the landings, the screen goes black, and then there is a scream!

(Ok. I admit that one got me. Cody’s gotten better with their jump scare edits. You would probably have jumped out a window, or behind a couch if we were watching this together! Even though you were cool as a cucumber when this actually happened.)

I thought this would have been the perfect time to end the video on a cliffhanger, but there’s one more scene, and it’s something that none of us have seen before!

P.S. Lucy! While I was looking through my photos of Mammoth Cave for pictures of the spooky stairs, I found this! Do you think I found a ghost?