PARANORMAL CONFINEMENT Parramatta Gaol Saturday 8th March was our first, and the first ever, investigation of Parramatta Gaol. We arrived at the Gaol feeling excited about our new location and ready for a night of investigating. Walking around during the late afternoon you can get the sense that this location has many secrets and had seen many tragedies. We started the night separating into our groups where we would head off into our first location for the first 1 hour vigils at 4 wing. Walking around the cell blocks felt sad and depressing with the tiny 2 metre by 2 metre cell inmates would live in for their incarnation. I started to walk off down a corridor when I heard heavy breathing in my ear I turned around thinking another team mate or tour guest was there and there was no one there. I walked out to find Nic and asked if she heard a heavy breathe and she said no. After about 30 minutes 2 of our tour guests had to leave the first cell block because they continuously felt sick. We then went to our second location 5 wing where another team had seen a full apparition earlier. All our guests had gone into cells when I started walking down an isle I heard a woman’s voice in my ear I turned around and there was no one there again. I couldn’t understand what the voice said but it was a woman voice. About 5 minutes later I heard another voice but one of a child. For some reason near 4, 5 and 6 wing I continuously got the feeling of women and children playing. One of our guests got so sick near the suicide cells they had to be taken out of the location. While waiting for our guests to come out to go to our final location one of the guests said Were waiting for our friend we saw him walk on the top level, I said No he’s gone to the toilet there was no one left in that building. The guests then said No we thought he was up there. He was defiantly out of the building. Our final location was 6 Wing another massive 3 level cell block. We had only been in the cell block 6 for 5 minutes when we heard a door slam on the above cell blocks. Unable to go upstairs there was no one on those levels at all. Every single team member and guest was accounted for. For a majority of the rest of the investigation we all spent all our time on one side of the cell block together. Not really thinking anything of it until after I wonder if we were all gathered to one end for a reason. Sascha 
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Saturday 28th September We started our night off as per a usual tour, meeting our guests downstairs and guiding them through the building. As we were all about to walk off to our first location, both Adam and I heard a female voice that seemed to come from the second floor where no one was present. I thought to myself “it’s started early, it’s going to be a good night”. We separated into groups, and I took my first group into the residence for a Ouija board session. Nothing was really happening so we decided to do a ghost box session instead. We were asking questions when we started getting direct responses. I asked how many people were in the room and the answer was “Seven”, which was correct, I asked how many females were in the room, and we heard from the ghost box and answer “Five”, which was also correct. I then asked the same questions over again and got the same answers. We asked “are you happy here?” and got the response “I’m trapped”. Also while doing a ghost box session we continued to hear little knocks in the kitchen area. After the Residence we went into the Dressing room and did an experiment doing a meditation while starring into a mirror. I have never done this experiment before but it was definitely a scary experience. I saw my face change shapes, and the more I sat still, staring into the mirror, the more I could see my face moving as if it was trying to change but I was not moving. One of our guests next to me saw what she thought was a black curtain moving across the back of her, but when she turned around there was no curtain, only mirrors and a wall. I took 2 guests outside to try an experiment by doing an EVP session near the Georges River, to see what we could capture, if anything. We started the Ghost Box session and for the first 5 minutes, we didn’t really have responses, until the gentleman started asking questions, and then the responses began. After 15 minutes we all decided to go back inside to review the footage. I put the EVP recorder in my pocket and started to walk off when I felt as if something had kicked me in my side. Upon reviewing the footage we had some direct answers to questions. I asked the question “What is my name” and there was a direct response “Sascha”. Five seconds after that you can hear another voice saying “Hey”. Peet came over the review this and pointed out that the Voice saying “Sascha” and “Hey” sounds exactly like Adam (my husband). On our EVP recorder we also captured the second where I got kicked. You can hear me walk off and then a brush of wind and a thumb, then half second later you can hear my reaction to being kicked in the leg. Another great night at the Casula Powerhouse. Thanks Sascha
 APPI had a very interesting tour on Saturday night, at the Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre. It’s strange, one month we’ll get nothing – maybe someone will feel like somebody whispered something in their ear, or maybe the equipment will be particularly active – and then the next month, things get REAL.
Our tour started as normal. Nic and I went down to the foyer, after assisting with the set up in the theatre, to greet our guests. Unbeknownst to us, Adam and Glen had decided to provoke a little in the theatre. Adam had “met” our resident theatre ghost before (and nicknamed him Crispy), and he mentioned to me earlier on that he felt like ‘Crispy’ was around that night. Our tour commenced, and we had just begun the outside part of the tour, when Sascha discretely approached us, asking if Nic could please go and talk to Glen. I had no idea what was going on, but continued the tour as Nic went over to Glen. Nic eventually caught up, and as we were walking, explained to me that Glen was feeling ‘effected’. He seemed to be harbouring a deep anger for Nic. She told me that when she touched him, in an effort to ‘ground’ him, he was so tense he was vibrating. We thought it was over. We were wrong. Our tour continued, and eventually, as we do with all tours, we ended up in the theatre. We put on the videos that our guests watch, and Nic and I sat down and discussed the events with each other, in whispered voices of course. Every now and then I would glance over at Glen, and he seemed to be frozen in place. One time he was looking back at me. As I watched, he smirked at me, in quite an unpleasant way. I discussed this with Nic, who discretely made her way to Darrin (who we like to call Mr Big Guns because of his muscles). She asked Darrin to go down and stand with Glen – there was just something about him we didn’t like. The videos finished, and Nic and I continued the final leg of our tour. As we were talking, there was an extremely loud ‘BANG’ which seemed to come from the gangplanks above us. Immediately Glen and Darrin went out the back of the theatre to investigate. Darrin later told us that once we were out of the theatre, Glen was fine. Talking about the noise, looking for its source etc. They returned to the theatre, and the second they did, Glen’s strange behaviour resumed. The tour concluded, and it was time for the guests to begin their treasure hunt. I walked over to Glen, and saw he had a very strange expression on his face. I leaned towards him, and it appeared his eyes were going to pop out of his head. I immediately felt like I was in danger, and backed away. After a quick consultation, we decided that Adam and Darrin should try and get Glen out of the theatre, as quickly and quietly as possible. Ha. They both took one of his arms each, and suddenly Glen started struggling against them. Glen isn’t a small man, but he’s nothing compared to the combined strength of Darrin and Adam, and yet they struggled immensely, getting him out of there. Glen growled and hissed the entire way out, and once out on the first floor corridor, he collapsed to the ground and begin dry retching. I found them outside of the building, and gave Glen a piece of cake and orange juice, in an attempt to ground him and bring him back. One of our guests also came out and said some prayers over him. I’m not sure if it was the food and drink, the prayers, or just being out of the vicinity, but Glen eventually did return, and although a bit shaken, was no worse for wear. In Glen’s words, written the day after the tour: “After 10hrs of sleep and cleansing I still feel exhausted, but I have been writing every thing i can remember. I feel he was on the property when CPAC (Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre) was built and made himself known to workers. Fire was the cause of death or the injuries from it cause - right now my lungs are still burning. It was brought up a while ago that it could be a possible elemental but it's not the case he was just a nasty in life and has continued to be. The woman aspect is interesting the ones on tours he doesn't care for, its the ones he knows he wants to destroy, to me I honestly felt Nic had betrayed me in some way and had to pay. I don't remember the bangs in the theatre, but the rage leading up to it… I wanted to throw something at a wall or knock over a cupboard or stack of chairs in frustration.”  Click on image The team have mentioned their experiences of the constant ‘shushing’ throughout the night….but wait…there was more.
When we broke into vigil groups our first port of call was the Dar! DAr! DAR! DUNGEON! Daz and I took the group on a mini tour of each of the rooms, sharing stories of what has been experienced down there. The group spread out in the dungeon, two participants spent time in the morgue, conducting an evp session, and another two spent some time in cell two (trying to remain cool, calm and collected…trying). One brave soul had a lone vigil in cell one. Daz and I waited in the officers mess, ready to run to the rescue. At one point the ladies in the morgue yelled out, asking if anyone had ‘shushed’, then the rest of the group popped their heads out into the hall saying they had heard it too. We were all dead quiet at the time, and there was no-one else around as everyone was in their assigned groups conducting vigils. They settled back to their vigils, and Daz moved to the third cell while I waited in the hall. One of the girls in cell two freaked out, saying that she saw a shadow person walk right beside her, then out into the hall. She described it as a thick black mass brushing past her to make its way out of the cell into the hall. This made her and her friend feel very uneasy, and they remained in the hall for the rest of our time there. Later in the night I bit the bullet and finally succumbed to a lonely old ten minute vigil in the dreaded dungeon. Once those lights go out it’s extremely unnerving to say the least. I was positioned between cells two and three, facing the old morgue, back to the officer’s mess. I could hear movement in the officer’s mess, a shuffling type sound. My eyes were fixed on the morgue, so they could adjust to the darkness. If I looked in the darker areas I could see the lighter areas easier. There were two instances where I saw a black mass move from cell one into the hall then lost it in the darkness. I then saw it move back into cell one. Were my eyes playing tricks…who knows? I do know that my focus was strong as I was trying to take in the experience as a whole. One other stand out moment of the night was when we were standing outside, behind A Block, and I noticed a blue light come from one of the upstairs windows. It beamed from right to left and only through the one window (there are two windows facing the back of the building fairly close to each other). There aren’t many opened rooms up there so we went to investigate. First strange thing was that there was no-one in the building. At this stage of the night everyone was either enjoying Sasha’s soup or watching the dungeon lone vigil live feed. Second strange thing was that the room where the light came from was locked, as were the two adjacent rooms. No rhyme nor reason for this strange blue light. - Nic, Lead Investigator, APPI  Adam's description of "The Matron". Greetings parapeople.
Let us take a journey, picture it if you will… A chilling Saturday night, driving through the gate of one of Liverpool’s oldest building complexes, passing walls built buy convicts and labourers. The night started off like any other ordinary night for team APPI, with a walk though the buildings, a laugh and good times. With night well and truly fallen, our group of victims… oops, sorry ‘participants’, started to arrive, and we all gathered in home base and discuss the events for the evening. After all the pleasantries were done, we took the group for a wander and showed off the lovely buildings. While standing outside the last building we went though with part of the group, Peet walked out the door and asked if any one had “shhhhhhhhhhhhhh’d” them while walking out. Following her was Sascha and Nic, as well as the last part of the group - all who confirmed they had also heard a loud shhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…. Mwhaaaaa, the night had begun. So splitting into our 3 groups, Peet, Ryan and I, with our group following, set off to what I call “Patti’s room”. Peet put me in charge of the group, while she sat back, and Ryan filmed the events. We were in the room for only a little when strange things were afoot. One of our group members started seeing a shadow person in the back of the room, so Peet and I went off to see what we could feel - BIG mistake on my part. I felt contempt and a bit of rage dwell up inside of me. Peet was standing next to me called out to me. I look at her for a while, then stood up, walked to her, looked her in the eye and said “You should show more respect, you should show respect”. With that Peet grabbed me by the arm and walked me out of the room. After calming down I walked back into the room, feeling what I had felt before, but having more control over it. To me, it was a matron of the old hospital, showing us she does not like or want us there. I once again made my way to the back of the room, and this time I felt what I could only describe as someone leaning on me, on my right side. It was cold and heavy. Very unpleasant. So, with our first vigil drawing to a close, we descended the spiral staircase of the main hall, and meet with the other teams at home base. With a quick breather done, we set of to the dungeon (insert demonic laugh here ). We placed the willing victims in cells of their own, with the two ladies choosing to go into the first cell together. When the vigils started, Peet, Ryan and myself set off to do our vigil in the morgue at the end of the hallway. Not to long into the vigil we started to here what only can be described as very cartoon villain laugh, with no reaction from any other people, we let it be. Again we heard the laugh, and again no reaction, we began to think that perhaps we were the only ones hearing it. Then, all of a sudden, BANG! We all 3 of us looked at each other with the kind of look on our faces as to say wtf? Then BANG.....BANG. By this time Ryan and I have both jumped up, opened the morgue door, and again heard BANG,BANG,BANG ,BANG. We both legged it down to cell 2 where the banging became frantic and louder. We both yelled out to the person in cell 2 with no response, apart from the banging. We pushed on the door, but it would not open. We pushed again but it was still closed. Both Ryan and I put our shoulders to the door and pushed, and out came the gentleman in cell 2, looking pail and shaken, saying someone was in there with him and wanted out. We took him out side to ground him and make sure he was ok. Being the trooper he was, he went back into the hallway to continue. Not much happened after that, but what had a happened was a first for me to witness. With all the vigils complete, we started free time. Our very talented tech manager (audio visual) Glen started an experiment that involved a person sitting in the halls of the dungeon alone for 10 minutes, monitored by CCTV (outcome is still in review). With Peet and I walking the grounds in the wee hours of a cold Sunday morning, not much happened to us, but boy did we have fun. The sun slowly came up over the horizon and I managed to grab an hours snooze in a massage chair – pure luxury. The night had come to a close, so we bid our guests far well, packed up all of our gear and agreed that a great night was had by all! We said our good byes to each other and went our separate ways, and off to bed we went.  Saturday 13th July.
We held a paranormal sleep over at Liverpool Tafe, and like most investigations, I was very excited to jump in and start investigating this amazing location. At the beginning of the night, when we were walking down the stairs in block C, I heard a voice saying a very loud “Shhhhuussshhhh”. This was heard by the lead investigators Peet and Nic, and also by our guests as they were walking down the stairs. During our free time, I took some guests to the music room. While asking various questions, we all heard another big “Shhhhuuuusssshhhhh”. Everone in the room heard it. I asked “if anyone is there, could you tap on the window?” and we all heard what sounded like pebbles being thrown on to the glass. I looked outside to see if anyone was there, and no one was outside, nor where there any pebbles to be seen. Another guest that was outside the door at the time walking past, and ran in saying “Did you just hear that, that was loud”. We are not too sure where the noise came from, but it definitely sounded like pebbles being thrown. I then asked if everyone could stand all around the room, in different corners, to see if we knew where these noises were coming from. We then heard what can only be described as an evil laugh. The activity in the music room was definitely exciting, and whoever it was wanted to let us know they were there. Later that night I spent 10 minutes in a lone vigil in the Dungeons. It was relatively quiet, but I did hear some little footsteps and the constant feeling of being watched was evident. During the early hours of the morning, Peet and I did a walk through of the buildings. While walking up the spiral stair case it felt like someone was running up behind me, kicking my feet as I reached the top. I quickly span around and told Peet what I had felt. We were both standing still when it was like someone was walking around in circles around me, the floor was moving and making creaking sounds, but we were both not moving. The overnight investigation was definitely exciting, and the amount of activity happening during the night was plentiful. Every team member and every guest experienced something different on this night. - Sascha Brooks, Case Manager  After a full 24 hours to recover, it's time to recap some of the experiences we had on Saturday night/Sunday morning, and to individually recognise our absolutely brilliant crew. Each crew member will tell of their own experiences – I’ll talk about what happened in my team.
During our initial walkthrough, to familiarise our guests with all of the buildings, we were very obviously “shushed”. We were walking down the stairs of C Block, nearly at the end of the tour, and everyone was talking amongst themselves, making their way out of the building. As Nic and I reached the last few stairs, we heard it, very loudly. It was so loud that it was over the top of everyone elses conversation. We were not the only ones to hear it, many of the guests also heard it. At first we all assumed it was one of us who had made the sound. But nobody fessed up, and really, it makes no sense – except in the sense that nobody who visits a hospital, at that time of night, would be as noisy as we were. Throughout the night many other people were also ‘shushed’ at various times. It seemed to be the theme of the evening. Adam and I (Peet) led a team together, and started off in one of the rooms on the first floor of B Block (the oldest building). This was once a hospital ward, and I basically sat back and let Adam take control… and control is what happened. After sitting in the room for a while, Adam came up to me and told me that “We should learn to show some respect”. He said it in a way which was not to be argued with. We were not being disrespectful in anyway, but something told Adam to say that to me. After that, it all started happening! One of the people in our group could see a lady, dressed as a ‘Matron’ at the back of the room. She was watching us and was not at all happy that we were there. Another guest saw the shadow of a person moving on the wall – when we were all still. There was very obvious tappings on the windows, tables, EMF equipment randomly going ‘off’ without any explanation etc. Our next group vigil was in the dungeon (du du duuuuuuuuuuuuuun). Three of our guests went into the individual cells for lone vigils, another went into the officers mess, and Adam, Ryan and I went into the morgue. As we were sitting there, we heard a diabolical laugh coming from one of the cells. Imagine the kind of laugh a cartoon villain makes – it was a real “mwahahahahaha” kind of affair. We didn’t go and investigate, thinking perhaps one of our guests made the sound on purpose, but it kept us on edge, listening even more intently. About 2 minutes later, we heard loud banging coming from one of the cells. We raced out, and as we got closer to the second cell, the banging increased. It took the combined strength of Adam and Ryan to open the door. Our guest inside raced out of the cell, and we took him outside to calm him down. He felt like someone was in the cell with him. Without meaning to, it was he who did the diabolical laugh. Next thing he knew, he just had to get out, but could not seem to open the door – it wouldn’t budge for him. Just as it initially would not budge for both Adam and Ryan when they were trying to push it. All very strange. Sascha led a team for the first time, and really stepped up to the challenge – with Glen’s assistance. She was in charge of those who wished to investigate using their senses and intuition. She will tell what happened to her team in her own words. Nic and Darrin also had all kinds of wonderful experiences in the areas they took their team to. More to come :D Glen soldiered on and looked after the lone vigils in the dungeon. It was a long night for Glen, he had worked all day during the day, then had to run home to the Blue Mountains to pack his gear before driving back to Liverpool. Good on ya Glenda! There were some great experiences in the dungeon, from people being touched, doors banging, being told to be quiet etc. So once again, the old Liverpool Convict Hospital/Army Barracks/State Asylum lived up to its haunted reputation, and we’d like to thank every guest who joined us for this fabulous night. - Peet, Lead of APPI Ever been out in bushland and heard sounds that just don’t make sense? Having spent a fair amount of time in Australian bushland I have gotten to know the sounds of nature, and especially the noisy movements of wombats and roo’s. Just last weekend we were out in the wild yonder investigating a fantastic location, and decided to venture out to the adjoining buildings to take a peek. We were walking along the tree lined path, and out from the darkness came the loud stomping of what can only be described as footsteps. It started to the left, then a few seconds later happened again, but this time it was 10 metres to the right. It was weird enough for us to pay attention and investigate further. We walked out into the ‘field of darkness’ to try and trace the source of this noise. Silence. Darkness. Eerie. Then bam bam bam bam. Same again, with a short silence, then again around 10 metres away. To hear loud stomping of the two footed variety is something you don’t want to hear when hanging out in the middle of nowhere. The crew started to walk back to the buildings, but Peet and I were dawdling behind. We were slightly oblivious, as we were talking about the experience, when all of a sudden we both heard this ‘thing’ running up behind us, FAST! Needless to say we both screamed like girls (as you do) and as we started running to the rest of the group, we turned, expecting to see whatever it was that was trying to hunt us down and brutally slaughter us. NOTHING! Bazaar to say the least. The rest of the crew came running towards us and again we waited for the noise. Silence. It was a very strange experience. Yowie? who knows? I’m not really a believer in crypto. Yet to experience something like this makes you start to wonder, what is really out there? - Nic  About a month ago we were lucky enough to be asked if Mike Whitney from the Sydney Weekender could come out and do a segment on the show about our tours at the Casula Powerhouse. We said no... hahahahaha - just kidding, we said "Absolutely!". It was all in good fun and lots of laughs were had. We now know the meaning of the words "TV Tight"... Massive big thanks to our wonderful team for being the 'crowd', to my mum and dad for coming along and starring in the show, and to my partner John for his support and for shoving team members in front of the screen from time to time. And the biggest thank you of all must go to the wonderful Casula Powerhouse itself, and it's beautiful staff who are always so brilliant and accomodating to us. A special mention to Keirsten, Shanae, Julie and Jax. xxx A link to the video is above, and some screen caps below. Enjoy! - Peet  We held a ghost tour, as well as a paranormal investigation, at the Casula Powerhouse on June 15th, 2013. During the tour and investigation we had a lot of activity, ranging from hearing footsteps, hearing voices on the ghost box, and seeing flashes of light. We were on the second floor and could hear footsteps going up and down the stairs for around 2 minutes. When the boys ran up to investigate, there was no one there. After the tour participants had left for the night, I was on level 1 chatting with a fellow paranormal investigator, saying how I kept seeing flashes of light out of the corner of my eye on level 2 and 3. Naturally I was hoping he wouldn’t think I was completely nuts, but to my surprise he said he was seeing the same thing. Seconds later we heard a groan that echoed across the foyer, and that went for around 5 seconds. After we heard the groan, we headed into the theatre. About 10 minutes later our talented cameraman Darrin came in and asked us to have a look at what he had captured. He had left his digital camera shooting with no one around, and his camera picked up a white flash of light going past the camera. The energy in the Casula powerhouse was incredible this night. Definately looking forward to our next investigation. - Sascha, Case Manager / Assistant Tour Guide |
AuthorAll members of the APPI Crew will be posting blogs on what we have been up to, each from our own perspective! Archives
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