14 Terrifying Travel Experiences That Left People Shaken

Traveling is about adventure and creating memories, but sometimes things take an unexpected turn. From mysterious knocks to unexplainable events, even the most exciting trips can leave you unsettled. It’s not just the sights you see that make travel unforgettable, it’s also the unexpected moments, both thrilling and chilling, that stay with you forever.

• “My mom was traveling for work and sat next to a man (fellow business traveler) on the plane. They had a casual conversation and exchanged business cards. Later that evening she’s in her hotel watching TV and gets a phone call from the front desk that her husband is here and they want to know if they can give him a key to the room. Turns out the creep on the plane was pretending to be her husband to try to get into her room.” mmmannino / Reddit
• “A friend and I once stayed at a pretty fancy B&B for the night. The lady who owned it was absolutely lovely, but would appear out of no where. We’d be sitting alone in a large room with one doorway and suddenly she was in the room with us. Either this joint had secret doors or something really creepy was going on. She seemed to know things that we’d said or done as well. The thing that tripped us out the most was hearing someone trying to open our door during the night. She was super lovely and the building was beautiful, but we were relieved to check out the next morning.” redraymus / Reddit
• “When I was like 14/15, I went with my family to Las Vegas and we stayed off the main strip in a 2 bedroom suite. My parents left to go out and enjoy the night while I stayed with my younger siblings. They slept in the bedrooms and I was in the living room watching TV. I think I dozed off at around midnight and when I woke up, I was in a stairwell. Outside of the hotel room. I had no shoes on. I had no cell phone. No room key.
  I went to the front office and told them I was locked out of my room and they believed me and gave me a key.
  I still don’t know why I was out there. To this day, I have never sleep walked. I don’t know what happened. Maybe I did sleep walk, maybe something happened during those hours that I cannot remember. But it was creepy enough for me to share.” mcgrumpy_pants / Reddit
• “When I was a kid (30+ years ago) my parents and I drove from Missouri to Kentucky to visit relatives. Well, we stayed at one creepy motel in the Appalachian mountains somewhere (probably Kentucky). There was this odd 3’x3′ square cabinet door set into the wall above the toilet in the bathroom. I stood up on the toilet seat to open it.... and it opened into complete darkness. To the outside (it was night). No window, no screen.... nothing but open air. No lock on it either. I stayed awake all night.” dirtymoney / Reddit

• “I was in a hostel in Vancouver and was settling in when my bunk mate arrived. She was an older, woman in her late 50’s/early 60’s from Melbourne doing some world solo travel (she alluded to ‘being alone now’). She asked me about NYC (I’m from there) and answered almost everything that I told her with a subdued, almost whispery ‘that’s amazing’.
  In bed later that night, I turn over in bed away from the wall and see her standing by my rail with the moon from the window pouring over her. She’s wearing a long, white nightgown and her hair is in a disarray, almost glowing and she’s staring at me. Her face is at an angle so half of it is in shadow and she whispers ‘that’s amazing’ and then goes back to sleep.” redangdit / Reddit
• “My friends and I were staying on the haunted floor of the Alex Johnson hotel in the Black Hills, obviously trying to see or hear something. About 1 am we get tired and call it a night since nothing exciting had happened yet. While we’re trying to sleep the cabinet the tv was in keeps opening and closing on it’s own every few minutes. So my friend took a picture once when it opened and the photo showed this dense white smoke that looked like it was leaving or entering the cabinet. We got what we wanted but didn’t sleep great after that.” ManicFirestorm / Reddit
• During a school trip to Scotland in 1990, we stayed at a small beachside hotel. While most of the group went to a party, my girlfriend, another couple, and I took a quiet walk in a park and returned early. The next morning, at breakfast, we realized one of the students, Mark, was missing. The chaperones panicked, and the hotel staff began searching every floor. Everyone was worried, with some girls even crying. After an hour, they found Mark in a room one floor above his own on a nearly empty level. No one could explain how he got there, leaving everyone, including the staff, baffled.
• “My wife and I stayed at a nice hotel on our honeymoon. The morning after our wedding, we woke up to a random 12-year-old boy in our room. Turned out, he went to the vending machine and left the key in his room. He told the front desk he and his parents were in our room. The Bell Hop let him in our room.” Unknown author / Reddit

• “I traveled to the Netherlands for a work conference. I took time off to spend a few days in Amsterdam. On my third night in my hotel, at 1 am someone came to my door and kept wiggling the handle and kept loudly pushing and pulling the door for 1 min trying to open it. After there was complete silence, I was too scared to say anything, since I was traveling solo. I checked the peep hole and saw no one there. I couldn’t sleep the rest the night. I reported it to the front desk, but they didn’t do anything.” Nbchd2012 / Reddit
• Our family went on a trip and we stayed at a quaint roadside inn in a quiet town. It was an older building, but the reviews online made it sound charming. Our room was on the second floor, and that night, everything seemed fine until around 2 a.m. when we heard muffled voices and footsteps in the hallway. Thinking it was just late-night guests, we ignored it and went back to sleep.
  The next morning at breakfast, we overheard another family asking the staff about “the man pacing the hallways.” The receptionist froze and quietly explained that the second floor had been under renovation for weeks, and no other guests were staying there. When we checked later, the rooms around ours were indeed empty and covered with plastic sheets and paint buckets. No idea who or what we had heard.
• “Mom, my sister, me, and sisters friend. Around 1am we get a phone call. Apparently there had been several calls saying there were screams coming from our room. We had all been very quiet for the last several hours as we were sleeping. Then we suddenly get banging on the door which was security wanting to check everything was okay. My mom told him through the door she wasn’t opening it. They left us alone after that. Still wonder why that was about as we were in dead silence.” prettysouthernchick / Reddit
• When my sister and I visited Italy, we stayed in a historic hotel. At the end of our hallway, we noticed a locked door with a chain and a sign that read, “Do Not Enter.” Curious, we asked the front desk, but they only said it was “for maintenance.”
  That night, we heard soft knocking coming from the door. Thinking it was staff, we ignored it, but the knocking grew louder and faster. Feeling uneasy, we called the front desk. A staff member came to check and nervously said no one had been working there. The next morning, the door was sealed with nails. When we asked about it again, the staff wouldn’t explain.

• On a solo trip, I checked into a hotel without telling anyone. After a nap, I got a call from someone claiming they’d noticed me at check-in and wanted to meet. I hadn’t seen anyone earlier, so I felt uneasy, especially since the rooms opened to the outside.
  I nervously checked outside, then hurried to the office to report it. The staff said the caller claimed to know me, so they forwarded the call. I told them how scared I was, and they apologized, moving me to a safer room. Thankfully, I never saw the person.
• “I stayed in a dorm in a hostel a year ago, I think it was about 20 beds. The hostel wasn’t too good, there weren’t any lockers where you could lock up your back pack so I just shoved it under my bed. One time I woke up in the middle of the night with a guy next to my bed who was sorting through my stuff. I was still half asleep so I didn’t realize he was trying to steal from me and just asked him what he was doing, he answered he was searching for a socket to charge his phone but my bed wasn’t any near to a wall so that was a pretty bad excuse. After I woke up he left pretty fast and I never saw him again. Luckily all my stuff was still there but after that I always kept my wallet under my pillow.” one_78 / Reddit

Reading about these people’s experiences is both chilling and fascinating at the same time, making you wonder what lies beyond the ordinary.