A tour guide based in Galveston, Texas, has claimed that she has encountered real vampires, both on her tours and in the streets of the city. The claim came during an interview on the HORRORble Podcast, hosted by Askia Booker, where the guest, who goes by the name Spooky Gin and runs Spooky Galveston tours made the assertion. The clip was later shared in a TikTok video that has since gathered over 1.5 million views.
Gin told Booker that most people encounter vampires regularly without realizing it. “You encounter vampires on a regular basis in your life and probably don’t even realize it when it’s happening,” she said. She went on to explain that she believes there are different types of vampires, with energy vampires being the most common kind.
“I know that sounds insane, but there are different types of vampires,” she said. “One of the most prevalent kind are energy vampires. They will suck all of your energy away. It’s just a completely draining experience.”
Gin says she stops all tours during Mardi Gras because she has allegedly run into vampires in the streets
Beyond energy vampires, Gin also claimed that she has encountered what she appeared to suggest were literal vampires during her time running tours in Galveston. She said she makes it a practice to suspend all walking tours during the Mardi Gras season because of these alleged encounters. “I stop doing tours when Mardi Gras is happening,” she said. “For the weeks that Mardi Gras is occurring, I will not do walking tours at all.”
“I have had vampires on my tours and I have run into them in the streets,” Gin alleged in the interview. Gin is not the only person to have reported unexplained paranormal encounters in unlikely places.
When asked how she was able to identify these individuals as vampires, Gin pointed to the nature of the questions they asked during her tours. “They asked a lot of questions about things that most people that take a vampire tour don’t ask about,” she said. According to Gin, the individuals in question were asking about European vampiric traditions and specific historical figures associated with vampire folklore, including Jacques St. Germain.
According to Locations of Lore, Jacques St. Germain is a folkloric figure who threw lavish parties, told guests stories of ancient times, and claimed to be a descendant of the Count of St. Germain. Legend also holds that Jacques bore a striking physical resemblance to his purported ancestor and was accused of murdering a woman. Gin said that the tourists on her tour were asking about St. Germain and about various other people who had historically been accused of vampirism. “It was one of the weirdest tours I have ever given,” she recalled.
Gin’s second TikTok clip on the subject, in which she elaborated on her experiences during Mardi Gras, also went viral. In that clip, she described the atmosphere during the festival as feeling off. “The vibe is off and you just see things,” she said, adding that despite the celebratory nature of the event, the city “doesn’t feel safe” during that period. Viral moments involving people being followed or stalked in unsettling encounters have also drawn significant attention on social media in recent months.
Most of the comment section of the original TikTok video appeared to be about energy vampires. A user wrote, “Pretty sure my children are energy vampires.” Not all viewers were convinced by Gin’s claims, however. User Angela DiCicco wrote, “Different things about different stuff, a whole lot of nothing explained.” A user from Galveston, @satxmercedesguru, appeared to lend some credibility to the general atmosphere Gin described, commenting, “I’m from Galveston, she is not lying.”
