The obviously haunted Winchester Mystery House in San Jose has built more supernatural interest in recent months, with a Helen Mirren-helmed film about Sarah Winchester in the works and a creepy attic room boarded up since 1922 having opened to guests in October. But now the spine-chilling attraction which as you know, has 168 rooms because the rifle fortune heiress Ms. Winchester kept building more to escape the ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles just opened access to more than 40 new rooms the public was not able to see before, and KRON 4 has a little sneak preview seen below.
It’s called the
“Explore More” Tour, and it opened Thursday to the public. It also costs a little more (ticket prices range from $20 to $47), and the house website says “For safety concerns children 10 and under are not allowed on the Explore More Tour.”
Because ghosts love to snatch little children!
You can see the third floor roof deck, previously not part of the standard house tour, in the video above. Other frightening features that visitors were not previously able to access include an area ominously called the South Witches Cap, the ability to enter the mansion through its front door, and a hallway behind that door that Sarah Winchester refused to let anyone ever see.
“There’s a story about Teddy Roosevelt knocking on the door and she would not let him in,” the house’s general manager Walter Magnuson
told CBS 5, who also have some exclusive footage below.
The Winchester Mystery House is playing up the renewed interest creeping to the location, as
Mirren and company were in San Jose shooting the film in recent weeks. “This house is a manifestation of Sarah Winchester and I think in that sense it’s haunted,”
Mirren recently told CBS 5 in a separate interview. Damn, she is one articulate, insightful dame! (NOTE:
She is, in fact, a dame.)
The tour is only open for a limited time, and the house has not indicated the timeframe. So you’ll want to visit soon before your access to these new mystery rooms goes bump in the night. We do know, however, that the Helen Mirren film Winchester is scheduled to be released February 23, 2018.
Related: Swinging Chandelier Spooks Tour Guides At Winchester Mystery House
