Although Penn State has a beautiful, sprawling campus, a certain section is a bit more desolate and uninspired than the rest.

We’re talking about central campus: the area just east of the libraries and home to mostly laboratories and big stone buildings. And whether it’s the tunnels underneath or the foreboding rooms and signs, this section of campus happens to creepier than the rest. If you wanted to find a ghost, this would be one of your first stops.

With Halloween right around the corner, we descended into these depths to check out the spooky sights for ourselves.

The number of tunnels underneath these buildings was honestly appalling and makes you wonder where else Penn State is hiding secret passageways. The sound of squeaky shoes bounce around the walls and the rare sighting of another human will make the hair on your neck stand up.

Emerging from tunnels feels less scary but just as desolate.

The buildings in this area really give you Cold War or Chernobyl vibes. Since Mueller Lab was built in 1963, that checks out. Mueller is a haunted house in itself, especially when empty. Each floor has different, equally terrifying color themes. Who knows what sort of weird experiments they’re doing in there?

The basement of the Pond Laboratory was probably one of the most off-putting places I visited. Its low-hanging ceilings, sounds of running water, and “no admittance” lettering made me want to get out of there as soon as possible.

I descended lots of narrow, dark staircases to explore these buildings, but there’s one in Sparks Building that I didn’t dare go down:

Yeah, no thanks. But some of the freakiest sights to behold were just regular classrooms and buildings completely empty in the middle of a school day. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, most of these places were desolate.

Sounds of students doing socially distanced labs or murmurs of professors leading virtual lectures in big, empty classrooms were barely detectable.

Also, I (probably) found the JoePa statue. No big deal.

Happy Halloween, Penn State!