Kingdom Arizona

Here's something we experienced on Route 66 in Kingman, AZ.

The Hilltop Motel, in Kingman Arizona, overlooking the eastern part of Kingman on Route 66, claims to have the "Best View in Kingman." It's a fine example of an well maintained motor court, with lots of neon, an atomic age style marque, cypress trees and vintage motor court furniture. Apparantly, Timothy McVeigh, who carried out the 1995 terrorist bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, was a regular at this motel as well the Imperial Motel across the street, during the planning stages of his deadly plot which claimed the lives of 168 people.

While we were yet unaware of this detail, my wife and I stayed at the Hilltop Motel in the summer of 2004 -- in room 119. Facing the swimming pool, room 119 does indeed offer a great view of the mother road (renamed Andy Devine Avenue) , as it heads west into downtown Kingman, and east towards the Interstate 40 juction. As soon as we checked in, my wife felt uncomfortable in the room, like something, or someone was watching her. She made me cover the mirror in the room with a towel just to be safe.

I experienced a nightmare in the middle of the night -- I dreampt I was reading a magazine in bed, and an angry presence knocked the magazine that I was reading out of my hands. I shouted "Hey, I was reading that!" My wife heard me shout in the middle of my sleep, and tried to wake me, but I had sunk into a deeper sleep and couldn't be wakened. It was shortly after this, that my wife was riveted to her side of the bed by something that she describes as a black shadow that surrounded her.

She claims that it sent electric shock waves pulsating through her body, and she could not breath, speak, or move. This seizure like experience lasted for what seemed to her to be several minutes. My wife has no other description or explanation of what occured, but insists that whatever it was, it was intent on hurting her. The next day, we poked around and discovered mysterious brown stains embedded in the linoleum of the bathroom floor. The room was clean enough, but behind the bureau were more stains in a splatter pattern.

Small holes, like bullet holes, were missing from parts of the concrete block wall at random intervals. Perhaps there are logical explanations, but we didn't mention anything about it to the proprieter who asked us as we were leaving, "if everything was alright during our stay." After breakfast, we headed up to Las Vegas. Throughout the day, my wife complained of soreness in her joints, and diminished symptoms of what she had felt so strongly the night before. We are both young, in good health, and travel often. We have yet to experience anything like this again.

By: smplatt@earthlink.net