An urban explorer from Nottingham has revealed what it's like to visit paranormal hotspots across the county.
Charlene Kemp, 32, has been visiting various different sites across Nottinghamshire and the rest of the UK for years with her team.
Ms Kemp travelled all over before the pandemic began with fellow explorers Chrissie Rising and Simon Wilson.
They often video or live stream their experiences to their thousands of followers on Facebook and Charlene has even won awards for her daring explorations.
She says one of her most surreal experiences was during a walk through Mapperley tunnel in May 2019, where the group heard a noise that sounded like a steam train's whistle.
They visited in the middle of the night and the tunnel has been closed for decades.
She told Nottinghamshire Live: “It sounded like an actual steam train that would have run through the tunnel – we weren’t expecting to experience anything like that.
“We heard what sounded like the whistle of the train. I turned around and said ‘what was that?’ Someone said ‘that sounded like a train’. That tunnel hasn’t been used for years.
“I’ve never heard anything that spooky before – it was so clear and sounded so similar.
“There have been reports of children playing around there actually hearing a steam train and running away – before they realised there can’t have been a train there."
The group uploads some of their videos onto their page Paranormal Hauntings - they've visited well-known spots around Nottinghamshire such as Newark Castle, and Ollerton Hall to explore the grounds, explain its history and search for ghosts and the paranormal.
While they do not have permission to access some of the sites, Ms Kemp explains that they follow strict rules when they are exploring.
"I have been doing it for several years and I’ve visited several different places around here," she continued.
“We leave absolutely everything as we find it – we just take pictures and video, that’s it. Then we leave.
“When we visited a church near Annesley Hall, which was publicly accessible, we picked up what looked like a woman’s face in one of the windows.
“We didn’t notice it at the time but our viewers spotted it. We think it looks like the face of Mary Chatsworth, who used to live there.”
Their page has nearly 80,000 followers and Charlene plans to travel to other places to continue exploring once restrictions are eased.
