Visiting Wellington

With recent press, we've gotten a lot of requests for information about visiting Wellington. A few tips if you plan to go:

• If you go to visit the spirits at Wellington, please be respectful. Please don't taunt them or use other guerrilla ghost hunting techniques. Spirits are people without bodies. Treat your encounters with them as you would treat face to face encounters with living, breathing human beings.
• Once it starts snowing up at Wellington, access becomes increasingly difficult. This typically happens in mid-November, although the first snow often comes as early as mid-October. As more snow piles up, the threat of avalanche becomes a real danger. Please be aware of this danger before you go. Access is not open to Wellington again until late June or early July.
  
• It gets very cold up in the mountains. Dress  in layers and wear supportive boots.
• Bring lots of bug spray. The mosquitoes are huge and hungry.
• Among the wildlife spotted at Wellington are bears and cougars. Just thought you'd like to know.
• If you visit, stay out of the old Cascade Tunnel, which is crumbling and has a danger of flash floods.
• The Iron Goat Trail is a mountainous trail through the wilderness. Use all precautions you would take on any such wilderness trail, such as hiking with a friend and being aware of any wild life.
• Thrill seekers have been visiting Wellington recently and leaving a trail of trash. Please clean up after yourselves. If people continue to come up and leave trash lying around, there's a good chance that access will be cut off and no one will be able to enjoy this amazing place. Have some respect and clean up after yourself.
• It is illegal to remove train debris from the crash site. Please respect the site and leave everything in its place. If you feel you need a souvenir, then take a picture.
• The Iron Goat Trail is an active hiking trail. People hike it to enjoy nature and experience history. If you are up ghost hunting, be respectful of the hikers in the area.
• The ghosts at Wellington are not there for your amusement. They are the spirits of human beings who remain at Wellington for their own reasons. It is very likely that there are the spirits of children there, as well. They do not "perform" on command, although they may choose to communicate with you if you treat them with kindness and respect. While there is a lot of activity at Wellington, there are times that there is no activity. Taunting, yelling and provoking won't change this. If the ghosts choose to interact with you, they will do so in their own way in their own time, and you have a better chance of interaction if your behavior is kind and respectful.
• The site is quite remote. Cell phones may or may not have service depending on your provider and where you are at the site. There is no power. There are only outhouses, sometimes without toilet paper. Some good things to bring: hand sanitizer, toilet paper, handi-wipes, first aid kit, emergency supplies, bug spray, sunscreen.