Ybor City Ghost Hunting Trip

Tampa, Florida: After months of talking about going and life getting in the way, we finally made it to Ybor City for a ghost hunting tour. Friday after work we headed north for dinner and a night of ghost hunting in what would turn out to be the best ghost tour we have been on.

Located in the heart of Tampa, Ybor City was the center of Cuban life in Tampa. Here Cuban immigrants worked in Cigar factories and lived in the small casitas located throughout the neighborhood. While the factories have gave way to clubs and restaurants, the Cuban culture is still evident throughout Ybor City. 

After arriving in Ybor, we began our evening with dinner at Columbia Restaurant. Opened in 1905, it is an original landmark here in Ybor City. The restaurant is just as much of a reason to go as the food.  Spanning an entire city block, the building housing the Columbia is elegant in its design and the history within its walls is amazing.

The food at Columbia was very good.  This was our first trip to the Ybor City location, but we have eaten at Columbia before in Sarasota and St Augustine.  We started with the 1905 salad and some Sangaria before jumping into the main course.  I had the Palomilla which was a thin sirloin steak topped with onions, parsley and lime served with yellow rice.  My wife had Roast Pork “A la Cubana" and black beans with rice.  My son went way out on a limb and had mac and cheese.  The food was delicious and did not disappoint.

After dinner, we hit the streets of Ybor City and headed over to meet our tour guide at King Corona Cigars.  On the walk over there, we were introduced to the party crowd who flock to Ybor City on a Friday night.  We have been to Ybor City many times before, but never at night.  Wow, what an experience, think Bourbon Street in New Orleans.

At King Corona, we met our tour guide Greg and the rest of our twenty eight member tour group and hit the streets of Ybor City.  On the walking tour, Greg told us about the dark history of Ybor City and its history of mafia criminals, prostitution and more.  With the rich dark history, it is only fitting that there would be so much paranormal activity here.

In addition to walking the streets of Ybor City, the tour also included an interior investigation of two buildings.  The first was the Don Vincente Hotel.  The hotel was once the site of a hospital and its basement was the morgue.  The hotel is that haunted that it appeared in an episode of the Dead Files titled "Hotel Hell".

While I didn't really catch much in photographs, my wife and her friend did have an experience in the bathrooms in the basement.  While in the bathroom, my wife said she just didn't feel right in there, had a very uneasy feeling.  Her friend from work said she found it hard to breathe in there but the feeling went away after she left the bathroom.  They didn't think too much about it until Greg was telling the group about the documented spirit activity regularly takes place in the third stall in the bathroom and in the corner near the bar. Then my wife had that look on her face, she was in the third stall.  Two and two now makes four.

Then it was time for the highlight of the tour, the Cuban Club.  The Cuban Club is the fourth most haunted site in America.  It to was featured on TV on the show Ghosthunters in an episode titled "Club Dead".  The staff from the show said it was one of the most active investigations they have had.  The team of investigators had a interaction with a child spirit in the basement who communicated with them using a flashlight.  This was later experienced while a crew from Bay News 9 was filming a segment at the club.

However we did not have any experiences like that on our visit.  Actually, the photographic evidence we collected was rather minimal.  I think the large group may have had some bearing on the results.  The only real interesting photo we got was the first one here in this article.  I can not really explain what is going on.  I had the camera set on a faster setting to avoid blur in the low lighting and alternated with flash on and flash off.  The settings worked good all night until this photo.  It was taken in the seating area of the auditorium and right after the photo, the camera battery went completely dead and would not power back on.  Was it paranormal or just a quirky electronic device, who knows but it did make a pretty cool photo.

After investigating the Cuban Club, our tour came to an end and we headed home.  We have taken several ghost tours and the Official Ybor City Ghost Tour has been the best one so far.  To actually investigate inside two buildings featured on TV investigations was a great addition to the tour.  Plus our guide Greg did a great job telling the history of Ybor City and made the tour very enjoyable.

I can't wait to come back and do the tour again.  The operate of this tour also does a historical overview tour of Ybor City that I would like to try on our next visit to Ybor City.  If things work out as planned, I would like to do an overnight trip to Ybor to do the history tour, take the ghost tour again and spend a night at the Vincente Hotel.  But first I have to get the finances in order for the trip and more importantly, make sure I have the guts to spend the night in the haunted hotel.

Click on the photos above to view the entire Official Ybor City Ghost Tour photo gallery.