Along the main drag in Asbury Park is a one-of-a-kind venue called Paranormal Books and Curiosities, a self-proclaimed “experience boutique.”  This combination bookstore/museum/seance parlor is a quirky stop even by Asbury Park standards.  The bookstore proffers a huge selection of paranormal titles and local lore as well as paranormal themed T-shirts and gift items (think Edgar Allan Poe bobbleheads, anatomical drawings of the Jersey Devil, zombie statuary, ghost hunting paraphernalia and so forth), and offsite ghost hunting services for those being haunted by a pesky relative or leftover resident spirit.  The museum housed next door contains oddities like an Abraham Lincoln death mask, Jersey Devil artifacts, an alien under glass, videos of ghost encounters, explanatory panels about Haitian zombification, werewolf/vampire repellants, relics from the ill-fated Castle Morro ship and the like.  There is a charge for admission to the museum–$5 to enter the museum, $13 for combination museum entry and ghost walk tour.

We opted for the combination ticket, toured the museum (which packs quite a bit into a small space) and then headed off on the Ghosts and Legends Tour of  downtown. Our spunky guide in shorts and Converse All Stars with a candle lantern was part of the ghost hunting crew and full of colorful stories about otherworldly encounters past and present.  Among the tales were: screams of a drowning woman (a prostitute, natch) in the lake who sparks on occasion local residents to call 911, all for naught; the spirit of a little kidnapped girl in the boarding house-turned-pub who has run many a burly bouncer from the premises; residual visitors from the Castle Morro disaster; the Lenape Native American who walks through the intersection on Cookman Avenue near JFK Park; and more. There’s also a boardwalk tour, but we only had time for one foray that night.

Although we didn’t have any supernatural encounters of our own (aside from the gorgeous moon that was out that night and more than once arrested our attention), the tour was lively and entertaining–well worth the $13.  Recommended!