Ghost Chasing in the Reyes Adobe Ranch

By Stephanie Bertholdo


Is the historic Reyes Adobe rancho in Agoura Hills haunted?
Richard Senate, a wellknown ghost hunter, author and lecturer, deemed the 1850s house and barn haunted Sunday night when he conducted a tour and ghost hunt for 19 people-including me.

After recounting ghost tales of California's missions and telling spooky stories in the dark, Senate, his psychic wife, Debbie, and daughter Megan, 16, handed out divining rods to guests to try to lure out ghostly spirits who may still lurk in the home after 156 years.

They also used digital cameras and other electronic gadgets to capture disembodied voices and static electrical variations in the rooms-all possible signatures of a ghost.

The teenagers on the tour got into the spirit. They took turns using the dowsing rods made from coat hangers, and seemed to channel a few ghostly spirits who "answered" yes and no questions through the swaying rods. The bent ends of the dowsing rods were used as handles, and when queried, the two wires either stayed still for "yes," or crossed over with a "no" response.

One or two ghosts supposedly reside in the home, and an Oak Park High School student, Richie Warmus, said he had seen a face in the barn window. Debbie Senate told the boy he was just seeing a piece of paper in the window, but when they peered toward the barn again, the paper?-and the face?-were gone.

Although I consider myself a skeptic on all things supernatural, I experienced something strange at the home. As the kids took turns with the dowsing rods, I stood at the foot of the stairs looking down at the ground when Senate suggested taking a trip to the upper level. I thought I'd be the first person to climb to the second story. In a split second, a snakelike, partially vaporous white light-with a bit of substance to it-squirmed and shot through a square hole at the base of the stairs.

Do I believe this light was the beginning of a ghostly manifestation? I just know what it wasn't-it wasn't a light from a flashlight because it appeared three-dimensional and no one with a flashlight was standing near me. I t wasn't a figment of my imagination-I was finding the whole experience a bit funny, rather than scary, so I had not fallen into a state where I could be considered "ripe" for such an experience. I simply have no explanation for the light.

"When I first came I was kind of skeptical, and I wasn't expecting much," said Sharon Wu, a 16-year-old Oak Park High School student. "But there was a lot of tension in the room . . . and I got really scared."

Diane Olmstead, 49, of Moorpark said she wasn't sure she was a true believer but liked the way the hunt opened up the possibility of ghosts amongst us.

Brianna Fischer, a 15yearold who handled the dowsing rods in the house, said she had always believed in ghosts. She said she tried to keep the dowsing rod still, but couldn't control its movement.

Paul Fremeau, a junior at Oak Park High, backed her up. "They moved by themselves," he said.