Chapter 5
One mile east of the Grand Canyon’s main village lies the Yavapai Lodge. This is the largest lodging facility within the park’s boundaries. This lodge is not a fan favorite of some overnight guests, because it is set back inside the pinyon and juniper woodlands, not exactly on the rim, with a perfect view of the canyon outside its windows. It does have quite a few benefits, however, as it’s close to the Grand Canyon’s primary visitor center, the park’s only supermarket, bank, post office, the Shrine of Ages building complex, and the historic Pioneer Cemetery. The Grand Canyon’s rim is only a short walk from the Yavapai Lodge by following the marked paved/dirt trails that wind through a beautiful forest with abundant wildlife as you stroll towards the rim. That’s why people come to the Grand Canyon—to walk around, look at the views, explore, and hike. Several walking trails branch out from the Yavapai Lodge heading towards the visitor center, the rim, and the Grand Canyon Village. Tourists can also rent bicycles for their entire family at the visitor center. In front of the Yavapai Lodge is a free shuttle bus stop for those who’d prefer not to walk.
After World War II, tourism within our country’s national parks increased drastically. The national government eventually came up with a plan to make our homeland parks safer for the average visitor, including adding more lodging to meet the high demand. That is why Mission 66 was created. Over one billion dollars was distributed between our country’s national parks for infrastructures and other improvements. The Mission 66 projects started in 1956 and were scheduled to be completed by 1966. The Yavapai Lodge was born from this plan.
The Yavapai Lodge as a whole was completed in 1972, quite a few years after its intended completion date of 1966. The reason it took a few years longer to finish was because every year the demand for more suitable guest lodging increased so the Yavapai Lodge continued to grow. The main lodge offers a large cafeteria, a better than average gift store, and another branch of the transportation desk. The overnight guest sleeping quarters are spread out in different buildings throughout a large area on both sides of the main road. The Yavapai Lodge offers 358 guest rooms that are divided up as Yavapai East and Yavapai West. The main lodge is in the parking lot that houses Market Plaza.
Haunting Is the Name of the Game
Even though the Yavapai Lodge is on the outskirts of the Grand Canyon Village, that still doesn’t stop a few ghosts from haunting a few particular buildings. The eerie activity seems to be attached to overnight guest buildings 2 and 5, which were reported to me by housekeeping staff. I believe these stories to be true because both of these employees had absolutely nothing to gain by telling their stories, and when they described the chilling encounters to me, they seemed honestly and genuinely terrified by what they had witnessed.
The first frightful story of any type of haunting that I heard about at the Yavapai Lodge was relayed to me by housekeeper George. He was a seasonal employee on a work visa and was grateful to have had the chance to come to the United States and work at his dream destination—Grand Canyon National Park. When George was a young child, he had seen photos taken by his grandparents years earlier when they traveled to the Grand Canyon on vacation. Looking at pictures of a giant hole in the ground with a river running through it made the young boy fall in love with the majestic sights, and he knew he had to come to the canyon to experience nature’s greatest accomplishment for himself. The park hires seasonal employees from all over the world, which gave George an opportunity to visit the United States but also offered him the chance to work at the Grand Canyon, which had been his aspiration since he was a child. George was one of the sweetest individuals I have ever had the privilege of meeting. His smile was contagious, his eyes were a shimmering snowflake, and let me tell you, his shyness was adorable. Due to him being very timid, it was hard to get him to open up about his paranormal experience when he was working at the Yavapai Lodge. George seemed fearful to even speak about anything paranormal because of his faith and upbringing. I also had to have a little bit of patience in trying to decipher certain words because of his broken English, but I was finally able to get the whole story out of him.
Late one morning in the spring of 2014, George was assigned as the housekeeper for building 5. He was cleaning an upstairs room and had sprayed a foaming cleanser onto a mirror. He left the cleaning product on the glass and headed towards the bathroom, and he felt as if something was following. A chill ran down his back and he broke out in a cold sweat. George was trying hard to ignore this creepy feeling and come up with a logical explanation, because ghosts don’t exist (but he is a firm believer in Bigfoot). George turned all of his attention towards finishing up with this room as quickly as he could. While scrubbing the shower, he became consumed with grief and said that he had to fight off the feeling of wanting to cry. George claimed that he felt as if someone or something temporarily took over his body because he remembered seeing memories and images belonging to a different person, place, and time.
George didn’t know what was happening to him and it all started after he felt like he was being followed. He needed to get the hell out of that room. When George finished the bathroom, he regretfully remembered that he had left the cleaning product on the mirror and had to go and wipe it off. As he approached it, George was terrified by the sight of a horribly disfigured man’s face looking right back at him from the mirror. The image had the facial features of a devil with its mouth contorted as if it was screaming in agony. George dropped all the cleaning supplies, ran straight out of the room and refused to ever clean any room dealing with building 5 again. That was all George would ever say about his horrifying experience. He told me that he couldn’t wait for his work visa to expire so he could return home.
Kate, another Yavapai Lodge housekeeper, was assigned to clean building 2 on a beautiful sunny day in the summer of 2013. She had been given a full list of all the rooms that guests had already checked out of. The first room she was going to start cleaning was on the second floor. When Kate reached the room, she knocked on the door three times and announced herself as housekeeping (this is mandatory), just in case someone was still occupying the room. There was no response, so Kate inserted her key card into the electronic lock to open the door. When she turned the handle to open the door, a woman started yelling from inside this room. Kate closed the door quickly, believing guests were still occupying the room. She looked through her paperwork again, making sure no mistakes were made on her part when it sounded like a fight broke out inside the room with a man and woman screaming at each other. Confused because this was supposed to have been an empty room, Kate radioed her supervisor to inform him that there were still people inside the room.
The supervisor called the Yavapai Lodge’s front desk to ask if the room occupants had actually checked out. A front desk employee confirmed that the room had been vacated earlier in the morning and was clear to be cleaned. The housekeeping inspector arrived at building two and went upstairs to where Kate was patiently waiting. The supervisor knocked on the door and announced that housekeeping was there to clean the room. With no response from anyone that might still be in the room, the inspector unlocked the door and entered the room that was quite void of any living being. Kate’s boss wasn’t exactly in a good mood about having to stop his other duties and chase would-be phantoms. Kate swore to her supervisor that she had heard a man and woman yelling at each other from inside this particular room. Thinking back, the inspector actually remembered another circumstance similar to this one a few weeks earlier involving a different housekeeper. Her supervisor told her about several odd things that he had recently heard about from different park employees about paranormal activity that had been taking place around the park.
Several times, overnight guests staying in building 2 have been awoken during the middle of the night by the sounds of children laughing and playing outside of their rooms. When the guests open the door to shoo the kids away, all they encounter is the sound of crickets. A few of these irritated guests have stated that the time it took to get out of bed to open up the door would not be enough time for anyone to hide. Children ghosts have also been heard inside some of the rooms giggling. One guest even said that while she was sleeping she was awoken by the sound of something jumping up and down on her bed. When she sat up to see what was going on, no one was there.
The Yavapai Lodge might be a little out of the way but it’s still a diamond in the rough. During the winter season, the park closes down the Yavapai Lodge due to an overall decline in visitation. The lodge does open back up briefly during the holiday season however. If you decide to make a reservation at the Yavapai Lodge and are unable to get a room in buildings 2 or 5, don’t be too disappointed. The very haunted Pioneer Cemetery is just a hop, skip, and a jump away.