"Yesterday upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today
How I wish he'd go away.*





"Over a century ago, if people saw a ghost, the Victorian Lunacy Department might have sent them here ...





"... to the Aradale Hospital for the Insane ...







"It's one of the State’s first lunatic asylums, located at Ararat - and we're going in …






"People from all walks of life have had ghostly encounters at this sprawling, 63-building complex ...






" ... and none of them could be called certifiable …







"Which is exactly how authorities described 1000 or so "clients" who died here ...






"... and are perhaps trapped, victims of institutionalisation at its worst …"







Paranormal investigator Gary recounts a ghostly encounter he had during a preliminary investigation inside Aradale's old admissions building ...




Paranormal investigator Blaine explains how he recorded a strange voice in the mens' wing of the hospital ...





"Although closed in 1993, many of the rooms are intact ...







" ... the morgue, padded cell, even the operating theatre where experiments - including lobotomies - were performed …"





Gary & Drew enter Aradale's abandoned morgue, hidden from the hospital's view by trees ...






"Mmm … a citronella tree - used to disguise the smell of the morgue - they weren't crazy …"






In Part 2, paranormal investigators Gary, Jose & Blaine organise an overnight vigil at the old hospital ...





Our Haunted Australia field researchers patrol the maze of corridors in search of ghostly activity ...





Field researchers Dizz & Di set up trigger objects with laser-activated trips to record any ghostly presences ...





Field researcher Mel takes a temperature reading in one of the haunted rooms ...






Paranormal investigator Jose analyses a ghostly female voice recorded by our EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) equipment ...





Field researcher Daniella monitors ghostly activity from the Haunted Australia mobile control room ...





Chief investigator Gary hears an old-fashioned telephone ringing in a locked room & investigates ...






Produced & directed by Stelios Kokotos with sound by John McPherson. Photography by Stelios Kokotos, Ron Dorre & Ian Dart. Sponsored by The Haunted Bookshop. Images copyright 2007 Mystical Guides Pty Ltd.

* "Antigonish" by William Mearns (1899).