This infamous mansion was once home to the socialite and serial killer Delphine LaLaurie, who brutalized and murdered her slaves. For nearly 200 years, paranormal activity plagued the house; when it became an all-girls primary school, students reported bloody scratches and mysterious assaults. Drawn to its dark mystery, Nicolas Cage — whose uncle, Francis Ford Coppola, owned a house across the street — bought the “ghost-front property,” hoping it would inspire a horror novel. Sadly, it didn't.

Each home in the Garden District is more majestic than the last, boasting distinct Greek Revival and Victorian details framed by canopies of oak trees and bougainvillea. Fans of American Horror Story will recognize the Buckner Mansion, a lavish home with more than 40 columns that once belonged to cotton kingpin Henry Buckner. It’s said to be haunted still by Miss Josephine, a former slave of the family.

Around the corner from LaLaurie, the Haunted Hotel — not a nickname— was home to the Axeman, the hotel handyman and New Orleans’s premier boogeyman, who killed at least 6 people during his tenure. In a letter he submitted to newspapers, the Axeman threatened another murder spree on a Tuesday night, promising to spare anyone “in whose home a jazz band was in full swing.” This being New Orleans, the entire city complied, and nobody was killed that night.

Voodoo, which came to New Orleans via West African and Haitian slaves and became fused with Catholic traditions, has an enduring presence in New Orleans. While some continue to practice the religion, others honor its traditions by paying a visit to the site of Marie Laveau’s tomb at St. Louis No. 1, where they draw three Xs on her grave for good luck. (There’s even a “Faux Laveau,” where scammers posing as tour guides used to bring visitors, and which is still covered with beads.)

Like many literary figures, Anne Rice found inspiration in the city’s lore, writing "Interview with the Vampire" at her home in the Garden District, and modeling the house of the titular bloodsucker after the Gallier House, a 19th-century French Quarter museum. (Several of her vampyric characters also dine at the renowned restaurant Galatoire’s.)

Though the French Quarter is littered with voodoo shops that can feel more hokey than mystical, Haus of Hoodoo is a spiritual apothecary that honors the tradition of hoodoo, which differs from voodoo: Hoodoo is a spiritual system that evolved from African folklore and botanical knowledge, and it was often practiced in secret by slaves. Fill your wicker basket with fertility dolls, indigo fabrics, ritual bath blends, and brass burners, or schedule a private spiritual consultation.

If you’re in need of more exorcizing amidst your ghoulish New Orleans adventures, Crescent City Conjure offers a range of classes in the spiritual arts, from Jewish Kabbalah to the ancient religion of Ifá, which laid the groundwork for Santería, Lukumí, and Haitian vodou.

For even more jewelry, crystals, tarot decks, curios, and psychic readings, head to Earth Odyssey, one of the city's most beloved haunts for local seers and seekers.

This old convent has become synonymous with the myth of the "Casket Girls," which supernaturalists insist is just a myth. Still, it makes for a good ghost story; legend has it that a group of eerily pale young women from France, brought over by boat in 1728 to marry French colonists, had with them coffin-shaped cassettes, inside which they were holding none other than the undead. Is it haunted? Visit the convent and see for yourself— or just admire the oldest building in the Mississippi Valley.

Built between 1722 and 1732, Lafitte’s is said to be the oldest working bar in the country. The legend of Jean Lafitte, the French pirate and privateer, is palpable in the bar’s peeling walls: that he and his brother used it as a base for their treasure-smuggling operation. Though, as the owners point out, “like most New Orleans legends, Lafitte’s is a gumbo of truth and French, Spanish, Cajun, and American embellishments.” Get the Purple Drank, which is as mythical as the lore itself.