My mom and I have been coming to Salem every October for the last seven years. We’ve taken many walking tours, and usually what I enjoy most is being able to walk around areas that we don’t usually know how to get to, or things we haven’t seen before. Usually we do ghost tours, but I signed up for this one to try something different. While this tour focuses a lot on the Witch Trials, our guide Sara did an excellent job of weaving much more of Salem’s history throughout. This tour is well paced, packed with information, but what makes it especially different was Sarah was able to bring more of the personal stories and humanity (or lack of) during the Trials to light. I think so often when we’re learning about history it’s easy to feel removed from what happened, and lose personal connection with what people endured. This was the first tour I went on where I was affected by what was being said; I actually got choked up in a few spots. I wholly recommend this tour, and I’ll definitely be back. Mixed in with the tourist shops and kitschy souvenirs, this is the real deal.