SANTA MONICA, Calif.-
Here’s an idea for a Halloween jaunt: Plan a pilgrimage to the site of your favorite horror movie or scary story.
Whether your taste runs to Edgar Allan Poe, Stephen King or news accounts of infamous crimes, “Creepy Crawls: A Horror Fiend’s Travel Guide,” by Leon Marcelo (Santa Monica Press, $16.95) can help inspire an itinerary.
A fascination with King’s books and movies will take you to Bangor, Maine, where the writer still lives. Many of his stories are set in a fictional town called Derry that’s modeled on Bangor. You can visit Betts Bookstore, which specializes in books related to King’s works; the Mount Hope Cemetery, where scenes from “Pet Semetary” were shot; places from the novel “It,” including the Kenduskeag Stream Park and the Thomas Hill Standpipe; and King’s house, an Italianate mansion with a wrought-iron fence that features gargoyles and a three-headed griffin.
Poe fans will want to stop by the writer’s grave in Baltimore, at the Westminster Cemetery on the the corners of Fayette and Greene streets, and also at the Edgar Allan Poe House & Museum at 203 N. Amity St.
For those with an interest in witchcraft, Salem, Mass., is home to the Salem Witch Museum, the Salem Witch Trials Memorial, and The Witch House. For fans of “The Amityville Horror,” there is a chapter on how to find the original house where the notorious murders took place on Long Island, in New York, as well as information about how to find the house in Toms River, N.J., where the movie was filmed.
In London, those with a taste for the macabre might want to dine at Cafe-In-The-Crypt, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, in Trafalgar Square, where a restaurant is located in a real underground crypt, with gravestones of centuries-old corpses lining the floor. Or take a “Jack the Ripper Haunts” walking tour, visiting five spots where the notorious 1888 murders took place. And no visit to Paris would be complete without a trip to the Catacombs, where skulls and bones are stacked in a labyrinth of underground rooms. The remains were brought there in the late 18th century from a medieval cemetery.
For more information about “Creepy Crawls,” visit .
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