Winchester Mystery House Candlelight Tour Review (2017)

The actors were believable and enthusiastic. Their performances are well rehearsed, especially the tour guide, who had the most dialogue as he took us to different rooms of the house and told a story about each one. The spiritualist in Sarah Winchester’s bedroom performed a s������������������ance with cards and told us of an evil spirit in the mansion. There was a woman who spoke of the death of Sarah Winchester’s spiritualist and presented an urn, opened it up and removed a note. Then she asked a person from our group to read it. After the person read the note, the woman told us that the evil spirit has taken over the house. Towards the end, the elderly man told us he would use the Edison Spirit Machine to capture the evil spirit.

Besides these main actors with real dialogue, there are multiple actors silently watching all of us from behind doorways and across hallways. One of them even growled at the guests to create a startle. Most of them silently watched as the tour guide walked us through, giving some of us the creeps and adding a spooky vibe.

The spiritualist in the card room had the best use of props by holding a deck of white cards, only marked ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. He placed the deck on end in a wine glass and, as he asked the spirit questions, a single card would independently rise from the deck with the answer. This is a common magician’s trick that’s done with playing cards, but using this trick in a s������������������ance setting was really cool. The woman with the urn and elderly man with the spirit machine deserve honorable mention in use of the props.

All the dialogue used by the actors effectively told a story that tied in with the Winchester Mystery House perfectly. The actors did fulfill their roles, even the silent watchers.

The Winchester Mystery House Candlelight Tour is safe to walk through. The stairs had just enough light to allow guest to see. No tripping hazards were found. At various cities in the Bay Area, there are billboards signs advertising the Winchester Mystery House, but there are no obvious directional signs when you get to San Jose. Once you get to Winchester Street, the large commercial sign is easy to see. Parking is easy to find, because there are several spots on the property and a parking lot across the street. Tickets are found in the gift shop, which is accessible from the parking lot. Just beyond the gift shop is a small courtyard with a concession stand and restrooms. There was no queue entertainment, but looking at the architecture and well-groomed vegetation helped pass the time. The staff was professional, helpful and very friendly. Other areas of interest are the garden, the Winchester Firearms Museum (3 room display of various Winchester rifles) and a shooting gallery.

One thing that really sets the Candlelight tour from other haunts is the use of sound effects. Upon different room stops in the tour, various sounds were heard. As the spiritualist did his trick with the Yes and No cards, ghostly moaning noises were heard. Similar noises came from the urn room, where a note was read. When the tour guide took us to the wash room, odd growling sounds came through and the tour guide dismissed them as plumbing and pipe issues.

There were three instances of the evil spirit manifesting itself. The effect showed a man in a haze who would talk about, possessing the house. His voice had an echo; a typical effect used for ‘voices beyond the grave’. At the start of the tour, our guide shows us a wheelchair that was used by Sarah Winchester, then the calm was broken by the sounds of boxes falling to the floor. Then we were taken to Sarah’s s������������������ance room and the calm was broken by an air blast.

One of the neatest aspects of the tour was, from time to time, different visual effects would happen while the tour guide played oblivious to it. There was a room behind the tour guide where ghost with a skull fact floated across a doorway. From another room, outside of the window was a lantern hovering in the air, rising and falling. All of these various effects, worked to create a spooky mood. The house itself is well detailed without the Candlelight tour, but the tour did add various props and details. The last room of the tour had the Edison Spirit Machine, with an elderly scientist and a psychic medium. The machine generated light effects and electrical sounds. As the psychic sat in his chair, he became possessed and his chair would rise and fall while the evil spirit spoke through him.

The theme of the Winchester Mystery House Candlelight Tour is easy to figure out as the tour guide takes you through the house. The history of Sarah Winchester and her obsession with spiritualism plays a huge role in the tour. This theme is reinforced though out every scene and great pains were taken for the historical accuracy. The haunt’s location absolutely authenticates its theme because, after all, if you plan on creating a haunt based off of Sarah Winchester, then there’s only once place on planet earth to do it: her former residence, now known as the Winchester Mystery House.