What Reviewers Really Think About the Most Haunted Hotel in the U.S.
“Wife had an experience and almost passed out with all the energy!”
The Stanley Hotel, nestled among the Rocky Mountains in Estes Park, Colorado, is the famous real-life inspiration behind one of the most iconic horror movies of all time—Stephen King’s psychological thriller The Shining. So rest assured that the stately hotel is home to a slew of ghost stories.
Guests who make the pilgrimage to the hotel (whether seeking paranormal activity or not) will find a panoramic view of the Rockies and a grand, Colonial building said to have originally been painted yellow—the most expensive paint color at the time when the hotel was built in the early 1900s. The first hotel with electricity, The Stanley was rumored to be haunted way before King made it famous.
The bravest guests request to spend the night in Room 217, where a lantern explosion is said to have blasted the chief housekeeper through the floor of the room in 1911. It’s also where King later stayed. His experience in that room, as well as the long hallways and isolated mountainous setting of the hotel, inspired The Shining. Today, it’s rumored that the ghost of hotel founder Freelan Oscar Stanley still walks the grounds with his wife Flora who can sometimes be heard playing a tune on the hotel piano.
With haunted tourism more popular than ever before, we wondered what recent ghost-hunters have thought about The Stanley. From true believers to suspicious skeptics, here are the most haunting reviews of one of the most haunted hotels in the US.
Haunted Happenings
Whether you believe this hotel is haunted or not, the reviewers have a variety of takes.
“We used a spirit box and spoke to several spirits in 217, Stephen King's room, and in 401, one of the most haunted rooms in the hotel. The food was really good, and the ghost tour. My favorite was honestly the seance.” – Google, July 2024
“My mom and cousin had a bit of a weird experience with the elevator taking them to floors without pressing buttons and then reaching those floors and no one would be there 👀” – Google, August 2024
“Shadow in the bottom left of the video. Wife had an experience and almost passed out with all the energy! Teen got very loopy when exploring at night! Lots of energy and lots of history! Would not stay in the hotel. We stayed on the grounds and there was weird stuff there too!!!” – Google, August 2024
“Stayed in 217, a little weird... We won't share too much.” – Google, August 2024
“Later in the evening, we participated in the séance with Christopher Hannibal also known as Hannibal and during the seance he looked at my girlfriend and made some comments about her being on a porch with fireflies in a yellow house and something that her mom made or someone with an apron on had made! A the time she couldn’t remember.” – Google, August 2024
Not everyone can say they’ve had a haunting experience in this hotel…but something pretty close.
“I have always 'felt' some sort of energy when I have visited... actually staying the night, I felt something for maybe 10 minutes around 1 am but then it was gone. Haven't 'felt' anything since” – Google, August 2024
“I didn't hear much or see anything, but I did have a vivid dream” – Google, May 2024
Location Confusion
The Stanley was the inspiration for King’s novel and the exterior was used to set the scene for the 1980 movie featuring Jack Nicholson, but the majority of the filming took place at a studio in the United Kingdom. Seemingly not every guest knew that going in.
“The Stephen King tour was admittedly very fun, but the hotel has done a great job at misleading the public to think this is where the movie The Shining was filmed. It is actually just where the mini-series was filmed and where Stephen King was inspired to write the book.” – Google, August 2024.
“The Shining was not filmed here. Who cares anyway.” – Google, September 2024