Your night of ghost hunting with Brookes Paranormal is guaranteed to be a fun, safe and spooky one. Experience this historic location with exclusive access after dark, as you explore the eerie rooms and areas in search for the ghostly spirits that haunt here.

 

Here at High Peak Junction, you will get to investigate multiple areas across the site, including the Forge Workshop, the Joiner's Workshop, the Carriages, the Tunnel and Leawood Pumphouse. This location involves walking and outdoor investigating.

 

Our team are friendly, professional, approachable and knowledgeable with paranormal investigating, and we will guide and support you to make sure you get the most out of your investigation. Whether you're a paranormal novice or an experienced investigator, you'll be well-looked after and treated like family. This is an honest ghost hunting experience, so there won't be any fakery or trickery during the night. We believe that if activity happens, it happens for real.

 

On your ghost hunt, you will be split into smaller groups led by your team investigators to give you the best, personal experience possible. You will also get hands on with various pieces of ghost hunting equipment, such as EMF Meters, REM Pods, Dowsing Rods and Detectors, and participate in interesting paranormal experiments such as Victorian Table Tipping, Glass Divination and the Ouija Board.

 

You will also have a break halfway through the night, where we provide you with unlimited refreshments and snacks to re-energise ready for the next vigil.

Established in 1830 as a vital industrial interchange hub, High Peak Junction served as the hardworking convergence point where the Cromford Canal met the engineering marvel of the Cromford & High Peak Railway.

 

For over a century, this gritty yard bustled with workers making tools and equipment, train drivers and canal boatmen who navigated heavy freight. While the industrious sounds have faded into a peaceful nature trail, the site’s intense history has left behind a tapestry of folklore, paranormal activity and ghosts. Visitors, staff and late-night walkers have reported a variety of spooky phenomena across the location, from the phantom smell of coal smoke and the clinking sounds of tools inside the cold, empty stone workshops, to the terrifying historical account of a white apparition dragging chains through the old engine sheds and around the workshops. These eerie auditory and visual manifestations, suggest that the busy and dangerous operations of this old industrial landscape have remained deeply imprinted. Are you brave enough to be among the first to join us?

Over the years, there have been several accounts of ghost sightings, hauntings and supernatural phenomena reported at High Peak Junction, including the ghost of the Man in White carrying chains.

 

Around the 1880s, there was an account of the site's first known ghost sighting. A train driver named Hubert reported for early morning duty at the engine sheds, only to find the locomotives cold and no steam raised. The overnight cleaner, whose job it was to prep the engines, was nowhere to be seen. Eventually he was found to have barricaded himself inside a locomotice cabin, with a terrified look on his face refusing to come out. He revealed that in the dead of night, he had witnessed a phantom male apparition moving through the darkness around the workshops, describing this spectre as "summat white with clanking chains behind it". The cleaner remained adamant that what he saw that night was a ghost. But who is this ghostly male presence seen carrying chains? Will we discover more about him on our investigation?

 

Auditory phenomena is commonly reported by visitors, volunteers and late-night walkers reverberating from the site, from the sounds of non-existent machinery and train engines, clinking and banging noises, disembodied voices and heavy footsteps. Some have even heard shouting or screaming in the dead of night towards the tunnel. The sulfurous smell of coal smoke has also been sensed drifting through the air, despite there being no fires lit.

 

Shadow figures have sometimes been reported around the site, but interestingly late-night walkers and locals have spotted light anomalies flashing across the trail by the canal at speed. Are these phantom lights the residual remnants of old trains exiting?

 

Around the former catch-pit, the team felt a very oppressive atmosphere as if we were being watched and we weren't welcome. Many horrific accidents happened here, including one where a runaway wagon carrying gunpowder and limestone sped down the incline at speeds around 120mph, before launching across the canal and crashing. Working the catch-pits was a dangerous job, and it seems some of the men who attached cables to the wagons are trapped in spirit here.

 

And in both local legend and from visitor accounts, ghosts of Roman soldiers have occasionally been sighted in the nearby area, marching in formation along the trail and through the modern terrain that has changed since their time. The Romans did operate in this area as it was their hub for lead mining.

 

With both limestone embedded beneath, the still water of Cromford Canal and the rushing water of the nearby River Derwent, these factors create a natural stone-tape residue, which could explain some of the hauntings at this location.

DATE: Friday 25th September 2026

 

TIMES: 8:00pm - 1:00am (arrive 15 minutes early and wait patiently in the car park until a member of our team greets you for registration. They will then escort you across the bridges to base room. DO NOT BE LATE!)

 

LOCATION: High Peak Junction, Cromford Hill, Matlock DE4 5HN

 

PARKING AT EVENT: Car Park on-site (High Peak Junction Car Park: Lea Road, Matlock DE4 5AE). Please note parking costs £3.50 with it being free after 8pm, so make sure to bring change with you as the machine is coins only.

 

WHAT TO BRING: A torch, a warm coat/jacket, sensible footwear, any equipment you wish to bring along (your responsibility), your positive and open-minded energies.

 

PLEASE NOTE: Bringing alcohol or illegal drugs to this event is strictly prohibited. If anyone arrives at the event under the influence of alcohol or illegal substances, they will not be allowed to stay for the night and will be asked to leave immediately, NO REFUNDS!