I went to Childers searching JP to witness a signature and she was at the Grand Hotel.

Whilst waiting for all this to happen, I picked up a brochure and discovered the Hotel is haunted.

http://www.grandchilders.com.au/ghosts.htm

Most of the town of Childers was ruined in a disastrous fire in 1902, destroying the building from what is now known as Dimmeys down to the Grand Hotel. One building that survived was the Grand Hotel, but in the years that followed, the old pub had its own share of tragedy. A woman is believed to have hanged herself in one of the guest rooms and a man was allegedly thrown from a landing and died after he informed on an illegal betting ring.

Various publicans of the hotel are reported as saying their lives were being disrupted by at least one ghost. Nicknamed `Luke’ he wanders around upstairs and down, opening locked doors.

A visitor to the hotel, while walking up the extremely narrow, steep stairs leading to the roof was surprised to see scratch marks on her legs, as if something had reached through the stairs and inflicted the injuries.

One guest in 1997 was going up the front stairs, reached the first landing and felt what she reported as `something’. She looked up into the linen room above her and saw a man, dressed all in black, turn of the century clothing. She felt no fear and proceeded to her room, sat on the bed and said later that she had felt calm and not at all threatened.

Many guests report that they have awoken in the middle of the night, feeling that an arm was draped across their shoulders. There was no-one else in the room.



At 4.30am one morning in August 2004 the publican, Dennis Corliss and a maintenance man were working in the bar when they heard heavy footsteps running down the front stairs and the stairs creaking. There was no-one there and no-one had been staying in the rooms at the time

Accommodation is from $45 a night…next time I am at Childers I intend to stay here and see if the ghost visits me.

Then there’s the matter of the lightning strikes which caused many thousands of dollars worth of damage – exactly seven years apart – in October 1997 and October 2004

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