KINGS HOLLOW RR TUNNEL--

Deep in the Appalachian hills of Athens and Vinton counties stories of the paranormal abound to this very day.

In the case of the above tunnel and its neighbor the Moonville RR tunnel reports of apparitions linger from the area's history of death and ghostly mayhem when white-man's presence was first being established there in the 1800s.

Legends?  Maybe.

My lady Sue and I were there on a recent geocaching adventure and stumbled on this account of some geocachers that had preceded us just a few weeks earlier:

"As we got to the (Moonville) tunnel we noticed other flashlights and a guy in a robe in the tunnel. As we proceeded thru the tunnel the guy was dressed up like a grim reaper. At first I thought he was a prop, but as we passed him he turned his head and watched as we went through the tunnel. We then came up on some other weirdos that didn't really talk to us as we said hi."

This from the log of some folks who visited in the dark of night, October 26th last.

"Once we got through the tunnel we found the site of where the old railroad bridge existed and saw the road on the other side. We decided to cross the river down below and follow the road to retrieve the other two caches: Moonville Cemetery and Moonville Rocks.

As we got to the cemetery we started to hear those people chanting and beating a drum. Once in the cemetery there was a pentagram fire in the middle of the cemetery and items on graves. The items were coins and other weird stuff. We quickly found the next cache and decided not to stick around much longer as the chanting and drum beating continued."

When we visited that very cemetery just days later we shivered at the heap of cold embers from that fire and the odd trinkets remaining on the mostly tumbled tombstones.

From the web site Hauntedhocking.com we found this illustration (right) featuring the very tunnel Sue is pictured in above.

They explain, "Kings Tunnel was located on one of the more remote and eerie sections of the railway built...around 1857.  It was forged through a mountain-like hill and was almost 350 feet long.  Kings Station was located nearby.  Like (nearby) Moonville and the other ghost towns of the region, it was a small mining town with little more than a schoolhouse, post office, general store and the shack-like houses of the workers."

"The tunnel still exists even if the railway tracks are gone.  The reek of creosote used to preserve the wooden beams permeates the air and nothingness echoes against the walls.  But, if you go there and visit, taking the rocky path, listen closely and you might hear a little bit of the past still lingering in the air.

Or, you just may see a filmy white apparition following you in the darkness of night.  It happened to one railway walker on a dark rainy night.

The young man stated he had left to meet his father and a woman in a white dress walked just ahead of him.  The faster he walked, the faster she walked.  Then suddenly she disappeared completely.

The ghost was later identified as a woman who had, just weeks after giving birth in June of 1878, committed suicide by slitting her throat with a razor.  She had been married less than a year and lived just a couple of miles" from the tunnel.

That's Sue (below) as we finally found the geocache in the Kings Hollow tunnel then were glad to make a hasty retreat into the normal comfort of a sunny, late fall day.