SC EP:647 Into The 400

Kenny writes "I had an encounter in 2005 about a week after hurricane Katrina. I’m from a small town about an hour north of New Orleans called Ponchatoula. We didn’t get any structural damage but we did get a lot of downed trees.

I was about ten years old and living with my grandparents. For the next couple of weeks after the storm me and my grandpa would clear as much of the trees and other crap out of the yard. After a few days we were starting to run out of clean clothes so my grandma had me go out to the pond in our backyard to get some water so that she could boil up and wash some clothes in this big 55 gal pot we had (typically used for crawfish) because we still didn’t have any power. I didn’t think much of it and went out there with some buckets. For some backstory we only lived about 3 miles aways from Manchac Swamp and were surrounded by pine forest except for the 7 acres of land we lived on which was clear except for about 30 pecan trees.

Anyways, when I went down the bank I heard a bunch of noise like trees crashing from the other side of the pond. I started watching over there and then what I thought was a bear came out of the woods and stopped at the opposite side of the bank. I knew we had a few black bears in the swamp but had never seen any so I just stood still to watch it. After what felt like a few minutes I saw it reach into the water and snag up a catfish (cats were the only fish we kept stocked in the pond).

Being a 10 y/o who loved nature I thought that was pretty cool until it stood up and stretched. The kind of way someone who just woke up would with its arms reaching up to the sky. I could see that it still had the catfish in its hand. Seeing that thing stand up I froze. I don’t think it ever noticed me because as soon as it got done stretching it simply turned around and went right back the way it came. After a few minutes when I couldn’t hear it anymore I just ran inside and needless to say we didn’t get any laundry washed that night. I never saw or heard anything else after that but yeah that’s my story and just thought that I would share.”

 
Dusty writes "I've been thinking about writing you for a while now but haven't committed to the idea yet; well here goes.

I have had many strange encounters with paranormal and supposedly "unknown" or at least "unpublished" entities. I had a sasquatch road crossing encounter when I was a kid. It was pretty basic, it just ran across the road in the middle of the night while I was out with a cousin of mine.

I was 12, and my mom had passed away in March of 2000, and this encounter was close to the 4th of July. After my mom died I was kind of on my own most of the time, and would get dumped off with various people from time to time because I wasn't welcome at "home". Life was pretty traumatic at the time looking back, and maybe that's why that encounter didn't really stick with me to be honest.

It happens at night, probably around 0100-0300 in the morning, I had been with an older cousin of mine who was more of a child than I ever realized, and he never really grew up. But when you're 12 and life goes tits up you don't think about those things. I would hang out with him and his drunken friends a lot and cruise back roads and things like that. I started learning to drive because they're getting drunk and stupid and I'd drive people home.

We were going to his house from a local lake one night, and a sasquatch just crossed the road in front of us, probably in 3 east steps, and walked into a big field headed for a creek. I turned in my seat and watched it for a few seconds. We made it to the highway and turned and headed for town in shock. We made it to his house and I didn't think I slept much, and I was just flabbergasted the next few days. But nobody cared to notice, and my cousin was so drunk and hungover he didn't remember what happened.

The creature was massive, bulky, tall, upright Harry and the Hendersons looking critter. It was a breathtaking experience and it happened so quickly that it almost didn't register for a while what we saw. We both just looked at each other, wide eyed and pale as could be. I remember saying we just saw a bigfoot!!! But that was about the end of that encounter.

I went into the Marine Corps at 17, and was stationed in Washington DC in late 2006, at a ceremonial unit that marches funerals in Arlington, Presidential ceremonies, among other important ceremonial jobs for the Marone Corps. Our barracks was "out in town" as we didn't have a formal "base" it is just a small post just north of the navy yard.
It is the oldest post in the Corps, and has been in place since 1801. During the war of 1812 when the white house was burned by the British, the Marine barracks and Navy Yard were attacked and the Marine barracks supposedly burned down. From the stories I've heard several Marines were killed in the collapsed barracks.

One night while on duty I was walking down the lower parking area, an underground secure parking garage under the barracks. I heard screaming and yelling coming from the locked, heavy steel door that closed off the electrical equipment room for the barracks. A secure concrete room with a heavy steel door. It sounds like dozens of people inside screaming and yelling to get out, rifles slamming on the door from the inside, and then it just stopped.
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end, the temp dropped and it was so scary down there I just took off running. I hot the stairs well closest to me and ran up several flights of stairs in dress shoes, which isn't easy to do. I made it to my duty post and didn't leave for the rest of the night.

Another night I encountered another spirit down there. Another "barracks ghost story" for which there was no shortage. A young girl had been run over one night playing with her ball on the ramp between parking levels. I was on duty walking the lower parking, and as I got closer to the ramp I could hear little feet slapping the concrete, a small girl giggling and a ball bouncing up and down the ramp. She was headed down the ramp to me as I ran past.

That was the last time I was ever down there after dark alone."

Frank was hunting in 2010 with a friend of his in Georgia. Frank later found his friend in his truck shaking and he looked like he was in shock. He explained to Frank what he had seen that day. Many years later Frank would see a creature and he describes it tip-toeing up to a deer before grabbing it and running off into the woods.

Tonight I will be speaking to Kelly and Zach. Kelly writes "I'm an avid outdoors person and have had multiple jobs which required me to work in remote locations, sleeping out under the stars and having experiences I can't explain.

My brother turned me on to your podcast about a year ago after I had an encounter myself. I called and told him about it and he told me to listen to your podcast. After hearing some other stories I realized I had more encounters that I had never shared because I didn't know how to explain them. I'll just share some of them here and see if you would like more info.

The encounter I told my brother about that had him recommend your show took place in western North Carolina near the town of Hot Springs. I was out exploring on my own, which I do a lot and found this abandoned road. I began following it and maybe a mile down the road I saw some skid marks. Being curious about the marks because the road was not accessible, I wandered off the road near the skid. About 300 yards away I found a small teepee type structure built that was about the size of a small tent. I kind of assumed it was built as a blind by hunters. There was no trail or anything. As I looked closer at the structure I could tell the branches had been snapped off to make this structure, not cut with a saw. Not knowing anything about sasquatch or the huts people have reported I looked at this thing a long time trying to figure out how a human would have made it. The other curious thing was the leaves on the inside of the hut were not disturbed, like the structure had been there a while without anyone going inside of it. I began looking around the area more and found two smaller, similar structures. At this point I thought it was a boy scout camp or something where they had built these. I looked around further and started noticing that small saplings had been snapped all around these huts. The only thing I could think is that a vehicle had driven over them but there was no way a vehicle could access this area without leaving a massive sign. I'm about 6'2 220 and I tried snapping them and couldn't get anywhere near being able to snap them. As I began to look around the area further I noticed all the birds stopped chirping and there was a weird chill in the air. I became pretty uncomfortable and then I started hearing what sounded like someone clicking their tongue extremely loud and occasionally a high pitched whistle. At this point I decided I must have stumbled into someone's property or drug area and started to move away. The clicking began to surround me and scared the shit out of me so I started moving quickly to get out. I then heard what sounded like rocks were being thrown. I never stopped to look back but just got to my vehicle as quickly as possible and drove to the nearest bar where I wrote down my encounter.

After listening to other episodes I was reminded about a time I worked out at a hunting and fishing lodge in northern New Mexico. I used to get up at 4am every morning and drive around the ranch to make sure all the boats were cleaned and dried out for the guests. This was a gigantic ranch (they say it was bigger than Rhode Island) so you could easily go days without seeing another human. I drove to this remote area in the high country and came around a turn right around sunrise. I spooked this massive creature, which I assumed initially was a bear, it went from being on two legs down to all fours and ran like a wolf. The area it ran was through this open meadow that was probably about 1-2 miles long (if not further) downhill. Its hard to explain but the vantage point I had was from up above and the animal ran down towards a lake. This thing ran those 2 miles in under 10 seconds. It ran with long strides like a wolf but the ground it covered was insane. I told people about it at the ranch and they all made fun of me and said I was seeing things.

I have a couple of other stories that are similar if you'd like to hear more. Thanks for taking the time to read this."

Zach writes "I emailed you about 2 years ago regarding the footprints my uncle and I found in Schuylkill county, Pennsylvania. After taking some time to think about my own sighting and some other encounters and stories told to me by family, friends and coworkers.....I've decided to finally type up an email.

My sighting: In April of 2014, I was in my last few months of high school and had been working at a nursing home in Pottsville, PA in the kitchen. My mother at the time was the supervisor of the the place and I was getting a ride home with her after working 0700-1500. We were driving south towards my hometown, which is only about 4 miles from this sighting. I was in the passenger seat looking out the window, down towards the Schuylkill River and railroad tracks that run along the same route. The train tracks are about 75 yards from the road on a 45 degree angle. The leaves were not on the trees yet because it was right before spring, so I can see the tracks pretty good. Next thing, I see this tall and lengthy.....creature. It almost had the look of Treebeard from the Lord of the Rings Movie. Very tall, long, thin appendages and I could see dark brown/black hair. This creature was standing on the side of the railroad closest to me, looking down at the ground. Not sure why, but it was so eerie and just didn't register in my head until we got home. I told my Mom and she really didn't react. Totally didn't think it could be a sasquatch until you described the different types.

Bernie writes "Wes, I'm seventy three years old now and live in the beautiful Texas hill country southwest of Austin. This is what happened fourteen years ago.
It was my last night at work and I was closing up my department in Salmon Creek, at the north end of Vancouver, Washington.

My best friend called and asked if I was flying out soon. She wanted me to come by, and said she had a twelve pack of Blue Moon. "Prettiest lady I know" I affirmed as I headed toward Battleground.

We hung out for a couple hours. Her boyfriend had cheated on her and I listened to her broken heart with sympathy, and I tried to give her hope for the future.
We said our hasta la vistas. I got back on I-5 north and got off at Woodland and headed up Lewis River Road. I had been living there for six weeks in a spare bedroom I was renting. It was a ways to my boss's property, on up past the fish hatchery, almost to Ariel where D.B. Cooper supposedly bailed out of that airliner, west of Mt. St. Helens.
The moon was nearly full on that night of August 22, 2010, as I parked in my spot 30 feet from the forest, just off to my left. My window was down and I was listening to the radio. The Foo Fighters were playing "Times Like These." The tree frogs loudly approved and I popped open my last Blue Moon that Darcy sent home with me.
I lit a cigarette, reflecting on our good times, how much I was going to miss her, and hoping our paths would meet again. Speaking of missing, I was seriously missing my two teenaged daughters that currently lived in Texas for the past six weeks.

Tomorrow was Monday, my son's 39th birthday, and I'd be in Raleigh with him Wednesday night. I had a lot on my mind.

I looked to my right scanning for life. Tina's doublewide sat on 4 acres, and was dark and silent, the front door 80 feet from me at my 3 o'clock. No signs of her sister and brother-in-law, who were notorious for wandering in the moonlight, but it was only one o'clock in the morning right now. I had another smoke and nursed my beer as it had been a very long day at work.

I couldn't believe my ears when suddenly out of nowhere, what sounded like a million birds started screaming in the forest just to my left. Every hair on my body stood out as I reached to kill the radio. This surreal cacophony went on for maybe a whole minute when I heard something that would have knocked me over had I not been sitting in my car.

I have since listened to vocalizations on YouTube and the nearest thing to what I heard was "The Ohio Sound," except that was far away and I was probably less than 100 feet away from the source here. Also there was no descending vocalization once it reached it's deafening crescendo. The force behind that howl/scream was somewhere between a really hungry lion, and a very pissed off T-Rex. Think up-close Jurassic Park. I was sitting in my old Ford Contour and my bones and organs were vibrating. I have since learned that was the result of the infrasound it produced. I was terrified and felt disoriented, also effects of infrasound.

Things have never really scared me. Hell, I'm an old guy from Texas. I'd seen lots of crazy shit, but I jus0couldn't move. I just sat there thinking someone like me might get eaten. When the roar finally peaked, the birds and frogs were totally silent; not a single peep or croak was heard, and I was still vibrating. The silence was broken by a few seconds of the sound of something moving away in the woods. There was a creek in a ravine out there about 50 yards straight ahead and I started hearing what sounded like large rocks smashing against others.

I happened to look at the front porch as Tina turned the light on and stuck her head out, looked my way, dipped back and closed the door. I figured since the beast was in the ravine, I had a chance to make a run for the house.

I was shaking when I entered, and she said I was pale and asked what was wrong. I told her I thought she had a Sasquatch in her back yard.
She just laughed and laughed and laughed. I told her I was serious, but she snickered and I went to bed. It took a long time to fall asleep that night.
The next day I avoided the backyard and drove into Vancouver to get my cat. I pretty much stayed in my room when we got back. The next day I sold my car to Tina's mother and stayed in my room. Wednesday, Tina drove me to Portland to fly to Raleigh.

I told my son about it after I had been there a couple days. He was intrigued, and then I put it all in a box for several years. I knew people would laugh. I wish assholes were as hard to find as Sasquatches. I never mentioned it again.

A couple months ago I started listening to podcasts, especially yours, and it's really been all consuming, but in a very beneficial way: the realization of the existence of an ancient, feral species that has no concept or need of money to survive.

They are truly free. I feel we are the newcomers here, living our lives in chains."

Randy writes "I'm from prince Edward island, Canada I'd like to tell you about my story that I had. When I was open Alberta, Canada, I was up Norris for appointment. 

My first encounter took place in 2012. I was driving a water truck and had to stop because a bunch of Caribou were crossing. I saw what I thought was a black bear and a brown bear crossing up ahead. I yelled "Hey Bear!" and they both stood up on two legs like a man."

About two years later, I was on cold lake weapons range. It was either a male and a female or 2 I just seen the eyes.

I will be interviewing Kelley Lockman. Kelley is an American actor, director and screenwriter. Born and raised in Georgia, Kelley's passion for film eventually led him to film school and then to acting. Kelley has appeared in various TV shows and films, including Tyler Perry's "A Fall From Grace." He has written and directed his own work and recently completed "A Sunset in Winter," in which he wrote, directed and starred.

He started a new project called I Believe in Bigfoot Project. You can watch the episodes on YouTube. Check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JO04DCiqtp8

Kelley writes "We spoke a few years ago briefly. The Squatchwatchers made an introduction for me. At that time I was beginning the process of working on a documentary about Bigfoot. But since then things have gone a bit crazy! The path I started to go down led me into places I never expected and I’ve been able to document some truly amazing stuff! The story became so huge that its just too much for a movie. I am now releasing it as a series on YouTube and Rumble."

A listener writes “I’ve had a week of direct encounters with my dad, brother and uncles in central Utah back in the early 80’s while deer hunting. Over the following 30 years, I’ve had at least four more probable encounters in the same area. I think that I’d like to tell you about them.”

Spoke to the witness and he has agreed to come on the show. He recounts a hunting trip with his father, brother and uncles back in the 80’s.

Kip writes "I guess I’ll get right to it. Back in the late 90’s I had 3 separate terrifying encounters with some type of large black creature over 3 years. The first two encounters were roughly in 1997 & 1998. I was in high school at the time and 16-17 years old. And the 3rd was in late 1999 so I was just about 18. I can honestly say that they were so disturbing that I have thought about them often ever since. Two of the encounters I had multiple buddies with me and the most disturbing encounter I was alone exploring the mountain behind our home on our 4 wheeler.

I grew up in a Southern California city called Corona. Its roughly 1.5 hours north of San Diego and next to Riverside. At this time the upper portion of the city had miles of orchards extending from the edge of the housing developments all the way to the base of the mountains that separated us from the coast and Orange County. As a kid myself and my family spent a significant amount of time on this mountain range hiking, mountain biking, exploring the various canyons, and a few of the abandoned tin mines. Although there were known predators such as mountain lions and coyotes that we would see from time to time, I never felt scared being in this area but always knew to be cautious.

At the time of what I would consider my first encounter our town was changing a lot. Hundreds of acres, if not thousands, of the orchards were being leveled to build more homes. At this time being of high school age this was a total bummer. All of the cool places we would explore or hang out were going away every week and being replaced with massive housing developments.

Because of the size of one of the housing developments, there was a large storm drain project that the army core of engineers was in charge of. This project was situated near the mouth of one of the larger canyons and was intended to divert stormwater underground to who knows where? This area was completely fenced off with barbed wire fences and they even had an on-site security guard at night. This entire area was surrounded by thick orange groves and also avocado groves. Knowing that there was a massive underground tunnel being built and also being obsessed with exploring abandoned mines, there was no choice but to explore this.

I did some recon during the daytime hours and figured out the best way to sneak in at night hopefully without being detected by their on-site security guard.

Late on a Friday evening my buddies and I drove my truck on a dirt road deep into the orange groves and parked it behind a large pile of dead orange trees that they had ripped out of the ground. This was an area that I was very familiar with. In this area, they also had bulldozers, graders, and loaders parked near a water tank. We snuck through the trees, scaled a barbed wire fence, and at this point the Avocado Grove began. We easily made it in and explored these tunnels which were kind of a disappointment because there was really nothing to them other than concrete and scaffolding. Feeling somewhat underwhelmed we decided to head back to the truck which was roughly a half mile from the tunnel. Upon exiting the range groves we saw headlights coming our way so we quickly jumped behind some of the heavy equipment thinking the security was coming to bust us. To our surprise, it was a two-door Honda Civic with two chicks. Being curious teenage boys we were immediately wondering if they were hot. Lol. After spending some time checking out all of the cool heavy equipment we made it back to my truck. Knowing that the road they were driving on was eventually a dead end we were surprised to see that they still had not come back out. We decided to investigate to make sure they were ok. We assumed the girls were probably drinking or smoking weed because this was not a well known place and was quite creepy especially at night due to how secluded it was. The three of us piled back into my single-cab Chevy truck and started heading in their direction. As we rounded a sharp turn on the dirt road we could see their car parked at the dead end off in the distance. As we got within 100 yards of their car we could see something black crouched down behind the car. The first we thought we had was that maybe one of them was behind the car but as we got closer we could see that it was definitely not a girl and appeared to be completely black and hunched over as if it was hiding and watching them. I had one of those Walmart special 12 million candle spotlight that plugged into the cigarette lighter in my truck. My buddy Aaron turned that on and hung out the window shining it down the road. We then thought that it must be a bear of some other creature but it was not looking like anything that we were familiar with which was kind of a weird sensation seeing something that we were not even sure what it was. As we were now within 50 yards or less, to our horror, this creature slightly turned to look towards us and stood up. This was nothing that we recognized. We immediately began freaking out yelling at one another "what the hell is that thing?!!" I hit the gas and we accelerated towards their car while keeping the light on it!

To the south of where the girls were parked was another barbed wire. (To clarify, all of these fences were roughly 7' tall chain link fences topped with like 18" of 3 strands of barbed wire. A sizeable fence). The fence was within 15 feet of the edge of the road only separated by a small ditch that may have been 2' deep. Beyond the fence was a wide open field that had already been scraped of all vegetation. The base of the mountain was probably 400-500 yards away from this location. This creature which I would estimate was between eight and 9 feet tall took two steps towards the edge of the road and literally vanished before our eyes. We saw this happen from maybe 50 feet away. I slammed on the brakes and we slid on the gravel road stopping about 10 feet behind the girl's car. We jumped out paying no attention to them and immediately started shining the spotlight into the field. When the creature vanished we could not understand what we really just saw. Our minds were thinking of rational explanations like maybe it dove into the small ditch just out of sight and squeezed under the fence somehow. Or, maybe it climbed over the fence really fast and somehow we didn't see that which makes no sense. We were grasping for any explanation besides it literally vanishing into thin air. In reality, we should have seen the creature maybe 20 feet away on the other side of this fence running across the wide open field if it had somehow jumped this fence but like I said it had vanished. We had all become very animated at this point yelling and freaking out at what we had just seen. Probably thinking we were absolute psychopaths, the girls in the car immediately started the engine lipped around and just took off. I did hear one of them yell "what's your F-ing problem???" Rightfully so. We calmed down after a few minutes and started to collect ourselves. There was no sign of the creature at all, and because it was a gravel road there were no visible footprints. We stayed shining spotlight for probably a half hour, absolutely shaken by what we had seen. We saw nothing, absolutely nothing. It was now close to 1 am and we rushed back to my house and immediately woke my dad up from a dead sleep and told him what we had witnessed. A little back story on my Dad, he grew up in Starvalley Wyoming. He spent most of his years as a youth as a youth and teens in the mountains hunting. In his late teens and into his 20's he was a hunting guide. He guided hunters from all over the world into the backcountry on horseback. My Dad was tough and fearless, and if anyone would have encountered something like this before it was him. He immediately got out of bed and once we settled down a bit he wanted to entire story, every detail. After listening to our story he became very quiet and serious. He sat down at the table and said "Boys, I have no doubt that what you saw tonight was real. I do not think this was any type of animal but rather a being. Sometimes we are allowed to see things from the other side of the veil or maybe even another dimension. I don't know why we do but I think this is what you experienced tonight. I do not want you going up to that area anymore." after that he told us this was nothing to mess with and not to ever pursue it.

It was so unsettling and still to this day I could call either one of my two buddies and have them recount the exact same story word for word. This creature was not how I pictured the typical sasquatch. it did appear to have a shorter sleek jet black fur. Its fur almost absorbed our light and was almost difficult to distinguish any facial features at all. It was almost like a 3 dimensional shadow if that makes sense somehow? It was very tall and athletic-looking. It did not have a massive hulking build but rather a very sleek, powerful, and fast type of build if that makes any sense. Think fairly jacked sprinter instead of a giant bodybuilder. That experience has bothered me ever since. Monday came around and we thought we had the craziest story that we could ever tell at school. To my dismay, people thought we were so full of crap and honestly did not believe us. That really pissed me off but also disappointed me. We didn't really tell anyone else after that reaction from a few people in fear of being seen as weird or just lying.

Second Incident

This encounter still scares me to this day and I still have so many unanswered questions. This took place maybe 8-9 months later. maybe a year. My parents had sold our boat and bought some 4 wheelers instead. I loved this option! I spent everyday after school enjoying this amazing new found sense of freedom and exploring the mountain behind our neighborhood which was about 1/2 mile away. There were fire roads, old trails, and riverbeds leading up to the canyons. If you would ride to the top of the mountain on a clear day you could see the ocean and Catalina Island off in the distance. A girl that I was friends with who had very wealthy parents just bought a brand new 4 wheeler. She tracked me down at school and asked if I would every want to meet up after school and take her exploring. They literally lived at the base of the mountain but about 3 miles from my house. I was stoked! A few days later I loaded up the 4 wheeler into the back of my truck and met her at her house. I did not know this area very well so this was extra exciting to go explore a new area. We went down the road a ways and decided to cut up through some orange groves on a slightly overgrown road. We climbed a few windmills to get a good view of what was further ahead. After weaving in and out of the labrynth of trees and small dirt roads we ended up at a gate. On the other side of the gate were some avocado trees, bee boxes, and an overgrown trail that turned into switch backs leading up the mountain. This looked awesome and I was so intrigued by it for some reason. A few minutes later an old man pulled up in an old fafrm truck and was PISSED that we were in there. He yelled at us and he said "and don't you ever think about ever going up that road, never go up there!" At the time I though he was just being a grouchy old dick but now looking back I think he knew something and was actually trying to run us off to keep us safe.

My defiant teenage brain now had absolute tunnel vision on returning a few days later, finding a way around the gate and exploring whatever that road led to. I had to know where those steel switchbacks led to. Sure enough, a few days later I went back...alone. I had a pocket knife, camelback full of water, and was getting in no matter what. I found a way to cut down into the river bed and up a very steel embankment which put me on the other side of the gate. I showed that old man! After cruising around atg the bottom of the hill for a few minutes I was disappointed only seeing old abandoned farming equipment in the weeds. Now it was time to follow the narrow trail up the steep mountain. Just as I was starting up the trail there was a really sketchy narrow section where it had washed out around a culvert. I carefully made my way around it trying to keep from sliding down into a washed out ditch. As I made my way up the vegetation began changing. There were tons of massive oak trees growing in a large ravine and and along the edge of the trail.

By this time I was WAAY up the mountain and could easily see across the whole valley looking out at Ontario and Rancho Cucamonga way off in the distance. Then I found the most bizarre things ever. Huge, old, single wide trailers probably from the late 60's or 70's just sitting on the side of the mountain. There were 3-4 of them one above me on the trail and a few out on this point on the other side of the ravine filled with the massive oak trees. Areas had been dug into the mountainside for the trailers to sit on. I still don't even understand how they could have ever placed those up there unless by a massive helicopter or something. A trailer would literally be impossible. I thought "Well this is super weird but I'm totally exploring these. The first one was really beat up and had no windows or doors. I hiked down off of the trail and began cutting through the ravine to get to the others. The oak forest I was cutting through was thick. even though it was still very light outside, it was very dim under the shade of these massive thick trees. The ground was covered in probable 6' of leaves and was very noisy when walking through. I checked out the other trailers for probably another 45 minutes. Nothing amazing but still interesting. At this point the sun would be setting by the time I got down the mountain and I did not want to try to find my way back out in the dark so I started heading back toward the trail that my 4 wheeler was parked on. I was walking through the bottom of the oak filled ravine when all of a sudden something just stopped me in my tracks. Everything had become so quiet. I'm talking impossibly quiet and I immediately noticed it. I have never experienced anything like this. I was if I just walked into a soundproof room but in the middle of a ravine. I immediately had the feeling that I was not alone and that something dangerous was watching me. I slowly started scanning my surroundings and had such a strange claustrophobic feeling. All I could hear was ringing in my ears. No birds, no breeze, not even the sound of the trees moving slightly. I had never experienced anything like this. I began feeling a very distinct dark and creepy feeling. As I looked at the hillside in front of me, maybe 15 feet in front of me I experience the most intense fear I have ever felt to this day. A quick glint caught my eye and as I looked at where the glint came from the weirdest thing happened. The only thing I can compare it to is when you are staring at one of those weird stereogram pictures. You are straining your eyes and then all of a sudden the 3-D image comes into focus. I was staring at the hillside right in front of me which was covered in leaves. There was a large gray rock to the right and slightly above the rock but 3 feet to the left was the trunk of an oak tree. I was staring at the leaves and in the space between the tree and the rock I saw it. It was like all of a sudden my eyes came into focus and I could see it. I hated what I saw. It literally paralyzed me with fear. I was a sprinter on our schools track team so running was always my best option. I literally could not move. I was looking at what I believe was that exact same creature we spotted that night close to a year prior. It truly was probably 8-1/2 to 9' tall. The hillside in that spot was very steep so it was kind of laid back against the hill perfectly camouflaged between the rock and tree but its body was in full view. It did not move but its shiny black eyes just intensely stared at me. I stared right back. I do not remember seeing any whites to its eyes but could tell when its eyes moved because of the glint they created. The eyes looked like tow shiny pieces of obsidian or glass. This is the part that scares me the most. This was not a friendly encounter by any stretch of the imagination. This was not a goofy and happy harry and the hemdersons experience. This thing felt so mean and evil. As it stared into my eyes in that intense quietness I literally could feel that it hated me and did not want me there. I did not hear any type of voice but I could feel the most wicked and intense hate from it. I could literally feeling in my soul that I don't think I was even breathing for an unknown amount of time. I know that sounds weird. I don't know how long I stood there in that trance or whatever this experience was, but I distinctly remember feeling my lips beginning to tingle and feeling dizzy. It was enough to snap me out of it. I stumbled backwards and weakly scampered up the opposite side of the ravine. I was so slow and felt like all of my strength was just absolutely gone.

I was pretty much in tears and felt like I may have just almost been attacked or killed. I got on my 4 wheeler and started backing down the trail as fast as could because it was too narrow and the hillside too steel to actually turn the machine around. I got to a switchback area and did probable the most frantic 20 point turn every performed. I was so certain that at any second this creature was going to come sprinting from the edge other oak trees and kill me. I raced down the trail and could not believe my eyes. The narrow area where the trail had mostly washed out around the culvert had large branches and brush literally piled up with other brush. It was probably 3 feet high and was no doubt there to block me or make me stop. I basically said F it and crashed right through the edge of it and made it right through. Getting back to the truck was a blur. That was probably the hardest that 4 wheeler would ever have been ridden. For quite awhile after that experience I really thought that creature could come back and find me somehow. I don't know what it did to me but it absolutely got in my head and I have never felt that much hate and disdain from anything like that in my life. After finding your podcast I have been thinking about that experience so often and recounting so many of the details. I can remember that experience like it was yesterday. I can tell you exactly what the temperature was like outside, what the air smelled like, the smell of the exhaust from the 4 wheeler, and the smell of the leaves and dirt in that ravine. I think that day is pretty much burned into my soul. That creature was the most terrifying thing I have ever laid eyes on. I honestly don't even know what exactly to classify it as. It shares some similarities to a sasquatch but it was so long and slender while still appearing very strong and fast. This might sound crazy but it really felt like it was from some other place or realm. I have had a few very close encounters with bears while camping and while that was scary, especially being in a tent, it wasn't even in the same universe as how terrifying encountering that thing was. I never ever considered going anywhere near that spot ever again and still would not even today. I felt beyond helpless against that thing and am just grateful nothing actually bad happened. I did feel like that experience was a strong warning from that thing. I have often wondered if it was extremely angry at the massive changes taking place in the area with the destruction of all of the orange, lemon, grapefruit and avocado groves. It could have been the perfect environment to remain unseen and an endless food supply. I honestly just don't know.

Third Incident

So this encounter I still don't understand. My buddies and Had just graduated from high school. It was the typical time in life when everyone start going their separate ways. One of my good friends Derek was getting ready to move to New Zealand for a few years and another immediately off to College in Utah. I was working with my Dad who was a general contractor and was working as a superintendent helping build our commercial construction projects. As a last fun hoorah 4 of us got together and went off-roading and exploring south of our town down the I-15 a little ways. This was an area somewhat new to us but as the housing developments continued to boom we knew in a few years most of those areas would be gone. I remember driving down a paved road and the area was heavily wooded with oak trees. I was driving and we came around a bend in the road. Now today as an adult, this would have been such an awesome place to have a home on a few acres. It was beautiful and secluded. All of the homes had a significant amount of land and were really spaced far apart. I noticed a long gravel driveway leading up to some large pepper trees. The front lawn of the home looked like it was dying and we could just make out the house back in the trees. The garage door was open and so was the front door. Out of curiosity we backed u and drove up the driveway towards the house. Sure enough it was completely vacant. I suspect that one of the large developers had purchased all of the land to later build one of the current golf course communities. We could not believe our eyes. The people must have moved out no longer than the week before. We yell\ed hello a few times before walking into this vacant home. It was immaculate! Literally clean and well kept. It was a decent size single level home with a 3 car garage. All of the furniture was gone but there were a few random odds and ends left behind in a few of the rooms and garage. We were not the kind of guys that would vandalize a place like this. We thought it was so cool and decided to come back later that night and camp out inside. I think we all told our parents the classic type of story that each of us would be at another house but in reality we were staying the night in this abandoned house. We grabbed sleeping bags, pillows, and my friend stole this massive red candle from his mom's Christmas decoration shelf in his garage. That was going to be our source of light since we didn't have a lantern that we could take without it looking too suspicious. We arrived back at the house just as it was almost all the way dark and boy this place looked creepy now. Especially with the way it was tucked back into the trees. And the house was a good size house which I would estimate between 2300-2500 sf. Backed my truck into the garage and glossed the old style wood garage door that had the big springs on the sides. The power had been shut off to the home so we had to open and close the garage door manually by pulling the disconnect on the opener. We set up shop in the center of the living room and had the angle sitting in a paint can lid with all of our sleeping beds spread out around it.

We got settled in and were just talking about future plans, good times we had together throughout the years and just typical conversations. It was a really fun night. Just as we were all getting tired and winding down we thought we heard a weird sounding strange whistle outside. We all shut up and listened but didn't hear again. We blew out the candle. No more than 15 minutes later we heard something hit the large living room window really hard which immediately woke us up and scared the crap out of us! All of the blinds and curtains were gone so I felt like we were in a big fish bowl as soon as we relit the candle. As we were discussing what that loud noise was we heard the strange whistle again. It was a longer whistle and a lower tone than what you would normally whistle. We were so far from the town or really any real road. Nobody even know we were at this house. Then another really loud bang on the kitchen window and another on the dining room sliding glass door. Then another weird long whistle. We were absolutely crapping bricks. There would be a few minutes of complete silence followed by another loud bang on the windows or side of the home. Whatever was out there was seemingly walking in circles just pounding in the windows and would intermittently do a long weird sounding whistle. We were beyond terrified and knew whoever was out there could see us inside perfectly while we could not see it. I ran to the nearest bedroom and pulled off the bi-fold closet doors. My friends did the same and we started putting them up against the windows to block the view into the home. These loud pounds on the windows and sides of the home got more and more intense and began happening all around the home which really made us believe there were multiple people outside tormenting us. We yelled out some obsentities and threats telling them to get the hell out of there. This went on literally all night. We were so scared that we didn't even try to leave. it was pitch black outside. With my truck being parked in the garage that meant that someone would have to manually open the garage door and hold it open long enough for us to drive out and then be exposed for a minute outside of the truck. We were so freaked out that was absolutely not an option. We removed hanger rods as weapons or whatever we could find. We ended up with a shower curtain rod as a weapon too although it was really light weight and cheap. After hours and hours of this nonstop horrifying ordeal the sun began coming up and it stopped. We waited until it was fully light outside and tore out of there as fast as we could.

Later that afternoon I got up from taking a an since I hadn't slept at all that night. It was Saturday. The more I thought about that experience the more it pissed me off. I wanted to go back with my Remington 870 shotgun and sneak in on foot and see who is there during the day. Maybe it was some rogue homeless people that were pissed that we took their spot? I called up my buddies Zach and Derek. They were down to go back and spy on the property to see the bastards that did that to us. Zach snuck out his dads 12 gauge shotgun so now we had two. We had no intentions on using them but wanted some sort of protection in case it was some creepy Charles mansion type people. By the time we made it back out there it was basically dusk which would give us cover with it getting darker. We went back to the house after parking 1/4 mile down the road and sneaking in on foot. We could not believe our eyes. The entire house had been absolutely destroyed. Every window broken out, every door kicked in and laying on the ground. The garage door we had opened to pak inside laid broken on the floor of the garage. we peaked inside the house and the amount of destruction inside looked like it would have taken a group if grown men hours to do. This house was 100% destroyed. Destroyed to the point that nobody would even think about trying to stay there. Broken glass was everywhere. All of the bedroom doors were broken right off the hinges and laying on the ground. The drywall had so many holes smashed through it. The ceiling fan in the dining room was ripped down. It was so insane we could not even believe what we were looking at. how could this be the same immaculate place we had stayed the previous night. At that point we were really pissed off.

The gravel driveway continued up through the trees and towards the hillside which was basically the base of the mountain. We decided to go see what was up there. We walked a little ways further being as stealthy as possible and I immediately hated what I saw. There were two old mobile homes, very similar to what I had seen a few years before on the mountainside where I had that horrifying encounter with the black creature. The moon wasn't full but was providing a decent amount of light. We decided to check out the two trailers to see if it looked like someone had been squatting in them. Feeling brave being armed we checked them out, They were in terrible condition and disgusting inside. Leaking roofs and water damaged everything along with tons of sharp glass from all of the broken windows. They no longer had the wood steps to the front door so he had to hop down about 3' back into the ground. No sooner had we jumped down and walked out away from the trailer I heard that weird whistle again. Just as I looked up towards the hillside in front of us I caught a glimpse for just a split second of something that appeared to be tall and black. Just as I started realizing that someone, or something was like 30' in front of us a large boulder/rock about the size of a medium watermelon sailed right past my head in between my two friends. The strength it must have taken to throw a rock that large and heavy was unimaginable. Had it struck any of us it would have most likely been fatal. I didn't even think twice and started unloading my shotgun at where briefly saw this figure. I unloaded all 5 rounds and immediately started pulling more from my front pocket. My friends were completely shocked and began yelling at me saying just to run. We did, we ran away as fast as we could and didn't stop until we reached my truck a ways down the road. We never told our parents or anyone else. My friends were kind of mad at me for shooting at the figure even though that rock would have probably killed one of us had it hit us in the head. I didn't regret shooting at it, he, whatever it was. I really hoped I got a piece of him in return. We NEVER went back to that property or even the area in general. Nothing about that mountain felt safe anymore.

28 years later, as I have been replaying these experiences over and over since listening to your podcast I have started to research that area. i pulled up google earth and went as far back with the dates as I could which was the late 90's. I did this one night with my two oldest kids after telling them the story. It was actually very shocking to see how close each of these encounters happened from one another. As the crow fly's, the first two encounters happened only within 1/2 mile or even slightly less from one another. The last encounter/incident has only 1.5 miles away but also right at the base of the mountain where there were thick orchards and oak trees. Very interesting to say the least. Anyway, If you made it this far reading all of this I appreciate you hearing this experience. I have honestly been so reserved for so long in sharing these stories with anyone because I don't want to seem crazy or weird. But after listening to your countless episodes I realize that there are so many others that have had strange experiences that cannot be explained.

We ditched California and moved to East Idaho 11 years ago. I spend a significant amount of time riding dirt bikes exploring our local mountains on remote singletrack. I ride with a cool group of buddies. We have seen wolves, black and brown bears, and mountain lions, but nothing even remotely as scary as what I encountered in our little local mountain range in southern California. Go figure."

Link to Sasquatch and the missing man

As I mentioned on last night's show, I would be doing a swapcast for Merkel Media's new film Sasquatch And The Missing Man. I told Tony he could ask me anything he wants. I hope you enjoy our hour long conversation.

Check out The Confessionals here: https://www.theconfessionalspodcast.com/

Chad writes "In 2003 a hunting friend and myself had a very strange thing happen to us. I live in Mercer county Ohio, it's in West central Ohio, flat land, small box woods, and miles of corn fields.

I live in a small town called Celina, we have one of the largest man dug lakes in the world its 5 miles wide and 10 miles long, it was dug by hand by German immigrants for a water supply for the cannel systems in Ohio . I'm telling you this because I think these things could travel the old cannels from time to time, the BFRO has a one report from back in the 70's close to the cannels.

One night while out running our coondogs we had a very weird night. We had very nice hounds that did their job, no nonsense dogs.

We cut 2 dogs into a section we often hunted, it didn't take long for my dog to open up on a track, and the my buddies dog opened up.

Shortly after the dogs went quiet, followed by high pitched squeaks from both dogs and then not another peep out of either dog. We had tracking collars on the dogs but we couldn't get a signal from them , these collars can be tracked for 5 miles or so...But we had nothing.

We looked at each other discussing why the dogs were acting strange, coyotes, running a deer, we didn't know. But our dogs almost never ran off game.

It was early September so the corn was 7 or 8 feet tall and still green and we was standing in it, All of a sudden I had an overwhelming feeling of fear sweep over me, we heard something running around us in a circle, it sounded like more than one thing and it was big, it stopped moving and i could hear heavy breathing and they started moving again... Not going to lie I was scared very scared.... I moved closer to my friend and asked him if could hear that and what is it...

He just said be quiet listen .. we heard some more movement and then nothing. We continued to try to track the dogs but nothing. All of sudden I heard something splatter I looked at John and he said what the....His shoulder was covered in a thick clear slime that smelled awful. It freaked John out.

We headed back to the truck. Keep in mind these dogs are worth literally thousands of dollars so heading back without them wasn't an easy choice.

We got back to the truck and found both dogs hiding behind the back tire of the truck, we had to drag them out from under the truck...Not normal, these big walker hounds could have easily killed any animal we have here.

We loaded the dogs into the dog box got into the truck and the smell from johns jacket was the nastiest thing I have ever smelled, John actually had to put it bed of the truck...

What do you think happened...? Was it cryptic related?"

James “Bobo” Fay from the podcast Bigfoot and Beyond returns to the show along with Tony Merkel from the Confessionals Podcast to play the Quarantine Trivia Game. There will be a surprise guests as well.

"Due to extensive community transmission of COVID -19, the CDC urges citizens to refrain from non-essential domestic travel for 14 days effective immediately," Quarantine Trivia Game for you guys. I hope you enjoy it.

A listener writes “I had 4 encounters on 3 different properties, 2 of which I know was Bigfoot and 2 that couldn’t have been anything else and nothing else makes since. All these encounters took place while deer hunting here in northeast Alabama. I also have a strange story about the balls of lights that my grandma told me about on the property we’re I had 2 of the encounters.”

Spoke to the witness and he said “I was hunting and the neighbor had a huge dog.I thought this large dog had its back to me in the treeline and I was mad because he was going to ruin my hunt. I looked away scanning for deer and when I looked back at what I thought was the dog I was shocked. It was now standing on two legs staring at me. I was in shock and could not wrap my head around what I was looking at.”

We are also going to speak to David and his son who had an encounter in Utah. David's son ran ahead of him on the trail and saw a creature on the trail. His son screamed and David thought he was hurt as he caught up to his son he heard something very large tearing through the woods.

Cliff was born and raised in Long Beach, California. Throughout his youth, his interests were drawn towards both the physical and biological sciences, as well as to music. These interests later brought him to dabble in a wide variety of sciences in college before later deciding to pursue his degree in Jazz Guitar.

Cliff can be heard performing guitar around the Portland area, when he’s not busy in the field. Cliff’s interest in the sciences drove him to a teaching career where he could share his love and appreciation of the natural world with young people, and particpate in the occasional sing along.

While Cliff was navigating his life, his growing interest in the bigfoot phenomena drove him to travel to other parts of the country to look into the mystery. By extensively travelling the West Coast, he found himself unsatisfied with living in Southern California and wanting to live closer to bigfoot habitat. After living in various parts of California and Washington State, he eventually settled in Portland, OR where he lives today.

https://northamericanbigfootcenter.com/

James writes "I had on my uncle small farm in Ozark County, Missouri. This happened during the summer of 2017. My uncle owns and operates a small beef cattle farm where he has cows, chickens, and goats.

I was visiting my family that live in the area because I live in Kentucky now. We was talking and he was telling me about how some of his chickens a had been pulled out of there pens and disappeared over the last couple weeks. We both agreed there may be a coyote or two getting into his chicken pin. I like varmint hunting so I agreed to spend a couple nights out there and see if I bag the coyote for him. I had brought my .300 AAC AR build to shoot with some of my family. It was equipped with a day and night sight because I mainly use it for coyote and smaller game hunting. Well one the second night I was posted up in the top of his barn that has a small opening on the second floor that faced the wood line.

I was scanning the woodline with the night setting when I noticed something moving some small trees about 150 yards to my left. So i focused on it. As I watched this 7 and half 8 foot tall creature stepped out. It was covered in dark hair. The moon was almost full so I had alot of illumination to help my night sight. At first I seemed like someone in a ghillie suit. But I quickly realized it wasn't as it cover the halfway to the chicken coops in just a few steps. I yelled out stop or I'm going to fire. The thing stops and I can see it stare directly up at me and bare its teeth. It let's out this ungodly roar and barrels toward me. I quickly switched my weapon to fire and open up on it at about 75 ft.

I empty my first mag and was reloading my second when it slammed the side of the barn shaking it. It aimed down and emptied another half a mag directly down on it. It looked up at my yelled and again and made a beeline straight back into the woods. My heart was pounding. I have done 2 combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan and this rattled me to my bones. I waited till morning to climb down and make my way back to uncle's house. I told him what I saw and what I did. We went back and couldn't find blood but found some partial tracks.

We ended up calling our family friend who was a Missouri Conservation Officer and he came out. I told him my story and with a serious face and tone he told me dont tell anyone and hed handle it. Well there's my story."

Al in Connecticut writes "Hey Wes, I had a short encounter, I know what I saw and I am a huge skeptic...WAS." Spoke to Al and he owns a farm in Connecticut. He said after weeks of animals coming up missing he saw what was taking his animals. Al said "It was so strange I had doors to the cages and whatever was taking the animals had hands because it had to open the doors. Early one morning I went out to find several doors open and I felt like I was being watched. I was saw what I thought was a tree stump. Something wasn't right, I picked up a stick and threw it at it and this thing stood up and took off running on two legs. It was huge."

James Fay, or Bobo, was born and raised in Manhattan Beach, California, and has been interested in the Bigfoot mystery for as long as he can remember. As a teen, he became an avid surfer, a skill set he would eventually use to investigate reported Bigfoot sightings in remote areas of the country.

While in college, Bobo spent his downtime in the woods attempting to locate a Bigfoot. Following college, he took logging jobs on Native American crews to absorb their knowledge of the Sasquatch legend. In addition, he increased his Bigfoot knowledge by taking jobs building roads and commercially fishing in Northern California.

Bobo says that he saw his first Sasquatch while on an investigation with veteran Bigfoot researcher John Freitas in 2001. Since his initial sighting, Bobo claims to have glimpsed Bigfoots on a few other occasions, but it was this first visual sighting that moved him the most.