Canoe the Caney — Attraction in Cookeville

We booked the 8pm “Haunted” canoe tour for four people. They said to be there at 7:30 or the bus will leave you, so we got there at 7:15. When we got there, they pitched us a $20 “exclusive” ghost/paranormal/ whatever tour of the graveyard we were already going to see on the regular tour. We passed, but a lot of people paid for it so props to the guy selling it. That group left at 8:00.

Fast forward to 8:30 and we still haven’t left for the tour. Eventually we all get on the bus and head to meet the story teller at a graveyard in the middle of a camp near Center Hill Lake. The graveyard was pretty cool and there was some good historical info provided by the storyteller and, overall, he seemed like an alright guy that can tell some tales.

That’s about when the fun ended. We proceeded to walk through a Christian retreat that used to be an Army camp. We stopped on occasion to hear ghost stories. We looked at two trees… seriously. Something spooky I guess may have happened there in the 50s near a tree that looked like a trident which, I guess, is supposed to symbolize the devil? I don’t know, but God bless the storyteller for trying.

We kept walking down a small, paved road for several hours through a working retreat with lots of buildings with their lights on and people enjoying a relaxing weekend inside. Imagine if you were at like a state park with cabins but there were more street lights.

After about 2 hours, we finally see the water and the canoes. We stop to hear another “story” about another tree because I guess it was struck by lightning after a guy planted it because his wife died nearby? Not sure, but another tree story. Again, the dude tried and I appreciate that.

We finally get in the boats. It’s probably like 10:30 at this point. We paddle a couple hundred yards to a cove that is supposedly- and I believe it give the history of the area- over an old cemetery. Definitely kind of eerie but I didn’t care at this point. We then paddle back a couple of hundred yards and wait for everyone else to get back so we can get on the bus. We probably made it back to the shop around 11:30.

Again, the storyteller tried and I have to give him credit as he’s clearly trying to make lemonade out of lemons. If you are expecting a 2 hr spooky canoe trip down a dark river, this certainly isn’t it and feel like it’s mismarketed. In the whole 4 hours we were there, we were in a canoe for 30 minutes on the lake when we could’ve been in bed. The other 3.5 was a very slow walk through a church camp.

The whole thing honestly just felt like an end-of-season money grab and I don’t blame them for trying. I did not feel like it was worth the money, time, or late night, but to...

Just checked out. This was an amazing and fun! We opted for the haunted tour, night canoe trip. We didn't see any ghosts (my daughter did) but we felt something off once or twice. We got to play with the ghost box - found a headstone with my daughter's birthday (Will's) and she said "that's my birthday Will" and we both clearly heard a male say "Happy birthday", among other things, through the static breaks. Even my son and his gf heard the other responses. I have only 2 things to complain about (assuming my son heard correctly) no phone camera flashes, so no pictures. No. 2 is I'd have loved to stay in the graveyard with the ghost box for hours if I could have- only with the security of a group though. Sam is an amazing story guide, I felt perhaps some of his experiences there might be something he can't quite make go away - we could see some spirits might have made their homes in his life. He tells the stories with emotion, passion, and authenticity. It was cold but that's on me waiting till season end. We had little moonlight, so it was very dark, which made the star filled sky beyond breathtaking. The stars, night canoe, everything was really spectacular. Did you know there are no currents in a lake apparently, yet my daughter in law and I were fighting currents.... no wind... so whatever it was pushing and pulling us was very persistent and very present. At one point I couldn't shake that sensation that something was following me; then my left side was a little colder than my right - then my DIL said she felt something pushing her exactly where I was feeling that "something". That made me certain I wasn't wrong about it being there. My son and I noticed a white figure in a tree and thought duh, it's probably "tree". But when I got him to get a phone open for pics, (no flash) we both watched it vanish. I won't say we witnessed ghosts, but I won't say we had nothing happen either. Aside from this specific experience- we all learned we enjoyed canoeing and want to learn. We plan to go back when it's warm weather and get good so that by October 2024 - we'll be ready to conquer the haunted cove! We haven't had a chance to share or look over the pics we did get- if I find anything great I'll be back...

We booked the Canoe the Caney “Haunted Tour” and arrived 30 min early as instructed. We got talked into paying an additional $40 ($20 each) for what we were told was an authentic ghost hunter add on who would go over more in-depth on how to use the various ghost hunting tools. We were given one really cheap EMF meter that cost maybe $10 bucks. They didn’t even let us each use one, only gave one meter per party. When we got on the black bus and rode to the cemetery, the ghost paranormal guy was a no professional- a joke basically and was one of the worst storytellers we’ve seen. He didn’t even know his dates, facts, and was all over the place, and didn’t really go over how the ghost hunting tools. We felt this was a waste of money. What was worse, the tour guides were careful to not let us take pics of the headstones where family names showed, but had no problem letting tour participants walk all over the grave sites (between head and foot stones) which we felt was totally disrespectful! Don’t waste you extra money for the extra time with a supposed real ghost hunter!

When the main tour guy started the tour, we thought it would be a short time of walking with stories before the main canoe tour part started, but OH NO, we never got in a canoe until the last 45 min and that wasn’t even on the actual Caney river, but a lake called Center Hill. They gave us free time to paddle around in the dark in the open lake and explore a nearby cove that no one explained anything while everyone went their own direction in the dark. We paddled into the cove and explored a bit then back to the dock area feeling totally misled and ripped off. This tour was nothing as described - we expected a haunted canoe tour on the actual Caney river! This was not at all what we got! We drove 2 hours for a very...