AFTER claiming to have spent the best part of New Year’s Eve battling otherworldly entities in a haunted house in Powys, an Abergavenny man has announced that 2025 will be a great year, if you’re a ghost.

Semi-professional paranormal investigator Johnny Turnip told the Chronicle, “It may sound weird but after me and the boys spent the end of the year having visitations from the other side, I can tell you ghosts will have something a resurrection in 2025.

"We may not reach the dizzy peaks of Victorian times where nearly every house was haunted and there were pale-faced apparitions in shrouds behind every corner. "Still, from what I can gather from my wanderings in the afterlife, ghosts are getting a bit bored of being stuck in limbo and ready to do some serious haunting again.”

Turnip added, “And thanks to the portal between this world and the next that me and boys opened on New Year’s Eve, it’ll make it a lot easier for any have-a-go headless horsemen and ladies in black to pay a visit to this realm and scare the living Jesus out of anyone whose mind tends to turn on them like an attack dog in the early hours.”

Turnip explained that he and the boys was forced by the warlock Earl Elderflower to spend a night in Cherry Tree Cottage as bait for an ancient nature spirit, things got a little “messy!”

Turnip revealed that after the Earl dropped them off in an undisclosed location in Powys on the early evening of December 31, and released Big Tony and Puerto Rico Paul from a “spell of possession” that had them believing they were Crockett and Tubbs from the 1980s cop show Miami Vice, they headed reluctantly into the haunted house.

“Although most of Powys can be described as the back end of beyond, this cottage that the warlock had condemned us to spend the end of the year in was proper out in the sticks!” Explained Turnip.

“The cottage was at the end of one of those dark country miles that seemingly stretched on for eternity, and the house was one of those places that looked like it was riddled with a brooding, malignant, and eternally evil presence that wanted to swallow our souls while singing Ed Sheeran songs.

"Yet in hindsight that might have just been the festive period playing with my temperament.

“Ever since I was a child I can get quite bleak at Xmas. Nanny Annie ‘Horror Show’ calls it the curse of the Turnips and says the only solution is to self-medicate with Malibu and painkillers for most of December.

"I once tried to put in a disability claim for what ‘Horror-Show’ gravely calls ‘festivitius’ but I didn’t get far. But that was back in the 1990s when the boys at the job centre could spot a chancer on the make a mile off. We’re a lot more aware of mental health weakness now, so I’ll probably give it another crack in the New Year. Every little helps!

“Anyhow, as we climbed out of the Bentley the wind was howling, the rain was lashing, the dark was claustrophobic and before he left to go wherever warlocks go to see out the end of the year, I heard the Earl cackle and shout, ‘Good luck my three sacrificial little piglets. I will use the third eye to watch and wait for the hour when the ancient one draws near.’

“And with that, the Bentley roared off, and as its headlights were swallowed by the darkness and we were stuck in Powys as the year, and for all we knew, civilisation came to an end.

“‘Christ on a bike’ Exclaimed Puerto Rico Paul as he looked around. ‘I’ve just had a terrible thought!’

“‘Don’t even say it!’ Snarled Big Tony who clenched his fists, breathed deep, and looked up at the sky like he wanted to fight it.

“‘We didn’t bring any booze!’ We all screamed like a demented collective as it slowly dawned on us that we’d come to Powys on New Year’s Eve with not so much as a Babycham between us!”

Turnip added, “As we all mentally explored the logistics of walking god knows how many miles to the nearest country pub in such harsh weather, weighed up with very real risk of getting lost in the unforgiving Powys countryside, dying of exhaustion, and being eaten by badgers or mistreated sheep, we decided against it.

“Even if we did make it to some run-down watering hole there was a strong likelihood of it being frequented by nothing but a horde of cousins who were also werewolves, or worse still, farming types, who would take one look at us sophisticated Monmouthshire types and decide to boil the flesh from our bones and use our skulls as drinking vessels. I once made the mistake of camping at the Royal Welsh agricultural show and know exactly what happens when the sun goes down.”

Turnip explained, “Realising there was a very real possibility of having to usher the New Year in dry like a gang of nuns or bread-baking millennials we gritted our teeth, and like sworn men of duty, we turned stoic and unwavering to the door of Cherry Tree Cottage and marched inside.

“The thought of it being haunted didn’t bother us one bit, the thought of trying to sleep without any booze was a different matter. Yet we used to do it in the eighties so we could do it again.”

Turnip told the Chronicle that as they pushed open the old wooden door that “groaned on its hinges like a bull with insomnia” Big Tony reached for a light switch and was surprised to find not only did the house have electricity but the decor was also surprisingly modern.

“I was expecting a kind of Victorian gothic vibe to the place with candles, cobwebs, and suits of armour, but the place was covered with this cheap and nasty laminate flooring and the walls were painted this garish cherry pink colour. They even had those crappy big framed black and white photos of elephants and the New York skyline.

“Best of all, in the living room was a huge Bluetooth speaker, a properly positioned dart board, and a pool table.

"Things were looking good and then they became great when Paul shouted from the kitchen that the fridge was full of cold lager and the cupboards were full of crisps. There were even a couple of bottles of whiskey instead of cleaning products beneath the sink. Almost as if the house instinctively knew our secret ways.

“As Paul put some Erasure on to get us in the party mood, we settled back on the fake leather sofas, cracked the beer open, put our feet up on the classy pine coffee table, and started to get into the spirit of things.

“‘If this is what a haunted house is like, then I’m looking forward to the afterlife!’ Purred Big Tony as he downed a can in one mouthful.

“‘Amen to that brother!’ Purred Paul while downing a shot if whiskey.

“And as we all drank and sang along to ‘Drama’ I looked at my watch and it was 9 pm. Not long after things began to get really weird!”