Vineyard Ghost Walking Tour

Our family arranged for a private ghost tour of Edgartown. Our story is very similar to the others here on Unilocal.The storytellers were not especially good at telling stories and the male and female guides appeared unprepared. Given it was early in the summer season I wrote them and let them know our impression and that since there was plenty of time left in the season they had time to improve. My intention was to give them helpful feedback via e-​mail. One of them misdirected their email to me rather than their partner. In this communication they referred to our group as «the famous lost dumb dumbs». Obviously rude, however what could one expect from a pair that when we were ¾ through with our tour they began bickering with each other about how to divide their income from the tour that night and how one of them had to jump out of the tour to catch public transportation home. This was a full price, private tour that had not gone well, no story was told well and there appeared to be a lack of knowledge about their stories — no flow and nothing that would hold anyone’s interest. No one even bothered to offer a refund or a second tour for a discount. Nothing but an insult. I believe the «lost dumb dumbs» were nothing more than a reflection of their failed attempt at story telling and trying to keep the attention and interest of their audience.

My family and I recently went on the Edgartown ghost walking tour. The good news: it only cost 10 bucks. The bad news: it’s not very good.
Now, I have zero belief in ghosts, and am 100% skeptical about all things paranormal. 100% means that I think all of this stuff is complete nonsense. But I am one of those people who, while he may not believe in ghosts, sort of wishes there were, because that would be really cool! So I was more than willing to give this tour a chance to give me some mid-​summer entertainment.
Unfortunately, while the two tour guides – a man and a woman – seemed well-​intentioned, they really weren’t very good storytellers. The pacing of the tour was uneven, and there really weren’t enough stories that sounded remotely plausible, let alone actually hair-​raising.
By her own admission, the female tour guide was skeptical of ghosts when she began doing the stores four years ago. That made me wonder: why the heck would you start a ghost tour business when you don’t even really believe in the stuff?! Doing so seems extremely cynical, at best. And at worst, completely unethical. Regardless, she says that she now is a believer, based on the stories she’s since heard. Whatever.
One silly story involved the apparition of a recently deceased woman in the choir loft of an old church in full view of the people down below. Oh yeah, and then she vanished into thin air. Then there’s the former editor of the Vineyard Gazette who disintegrated like a Star Trek character being teleported. (That was the actual comparison one of the tour guides made.) I believe his dog was involved, as well.
But the pièce de résistance involved the famous fashionista Donna Karan, who allegedly was visited in her room at the stately Victorian Inn by not one, not two, not three, not four, but five, yes, five ghostly fishermen! Oh yeah, and some old spirit who reached out and touched her boobies, making for a grand total of six specters in one impossible-​to-​believe-​unless-​you-​have-​suffered-​a-​head-​injury-​or-​were-​raised-​in-​a-​prescientific-​tribe-​that-​has-​never-​learned-​what-​critical-​thinking-​is anecdote.

It’s your standard «scary story» setup: Four skeptical grownups set out on a nighttime ghost tour, along with some well-​meaning guides and about a dozen other foolish mortals (and their lousy kids), only to find themselves haunted by… nothing.
The two guides showed up unprepared, with nary a spooky cape or creepy cloak amongst them. They rattled off ground rules about keeping the surrounding spirits happy, and then spent about twice as much time selling the books penned by their mentor who handed the tour off to them three years ago. That’s right… THREE years ago! You would have thought this was their first time out! The stumbled and bumbled through a few stories about their friends who saw mysterious figures in the dark, previous tour groups who felt strange rumblings, and… something about a Persian rug that kept getting rolled up? I honestly lost track of that story mid-​way through. The whole presentation had all the theatricality of home stereo installation instructions.
I’m sure it’s a fine distraction for the under-​10 set, but good grief, guys! You’re on a New England coastal island filled with empty beach cottages and 200 year old harbors! Tell me some historical pirate legends or the Tale of the Wandering Widow… Make something up! I’d rather have a complete fabrication that at least *sounds* interesting than the Utterly True Story of the Psychic Friend Who Felt a Presence Once.
Needless to say, we left halfway through the tour, and the only «ghosts» we saw were the dead presidents that materialized on the money we wasted when paying for this ghastly tour.