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Nineteen eighty four, when I was
seventeen years old, my entire family and

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I drove up to Kerne County,
California to go off road camping for a

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long weekend. We arrived at our
destination and found a dirt road that went

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off the highway into a ravine that
was a beautiful shaded area, and it

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was up against the Kern River.
It was surrounded by lots of trees,

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and there was a nice little creek
that broke off from the main river,

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and it flowed right in front of
our camping spot, and then it curved

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down the ravine the same way the
main river was flowing. There were twenty

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of us in five vehicles. We
set up our tents and made lunch.

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Afterwards, we cleaned up, and
half the family went whitewater rafting, while

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the other half went to find a
local grocery store to replenish our food supply.

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I stayed behind and decided to read
a book under the shade of the

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trees. The wind was blowing just
enough to turn all the leaves into a

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million little fans, making it very
comfortable to sit and relax on a hot

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day. After about an hour,
I decided I should bathe while the family

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was still gone. I gathered up
my things and walked about thirty yards down

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the little creek about twenty five eat
down from the highway, to a nice

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little pool that looked ideal for the
job. There were a lot of trees

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and bushes to conceal me from any
passing motorists, and I quickly got into

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the water and started washing. After
a few minutes, I got the worst

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feeling of dread I have ever felt
in my life. The feeling of being

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watched intently was so powerful I could
barely breathe. I panned the surrounding trees

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and bushes, but I didn't see
anything. I got out of the water

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and gathered up my things and walked
the thirty yards back to the camp site.

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I dressed inside my tent and then
went back out to resume my position

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in my chair with my book.
But now it was hard to concentrate.

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I couldn't stop a thinking of that
earlier feeling of being watched, and because

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of that, I was now listening
to every sound around me. After an

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hour and a half, everyone returned
to camp. We barbecued our dinner and

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then cleaned up our mess. The
adults sat around the camp for our drinking

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beers and wine coolers and telling scary
stories. My boyfriend, who was Native

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American, and I turned in around
midnight. At two in the morning,

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I was awakened by very heavy footfalls
coming from the direction of the pool that

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I had bathed in earlier. I
sat up and started to shiver. Whatever

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this was, it began rummaging around
our campsite. I was frozen, barely

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breathing and listening intently. After five
minutes or so, this extremely large,

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upright fur covered creature walked right by
our tent. It was very bright.

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It was a clear night. The
moon and stars were like a million night

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lights in the sky. As it
walked past our tent, I could see

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its shape clearly. It was massive. The tent turned completely black under its

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shadow. Its head and upper body
were huge, and I could tell it

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was covered with hair. Its enormous
arms swung with every stride, and its

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breathing sounded like thunder and an oak
barrel. I remained motionless as it walked

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on by the tent and down the
opposite way into the ravine. The next

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morning, I asked my boyfriend and
if he had heard or seen anything last

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night, and of course he said
he hadn't. He's very aware of these

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creatures, but in his culture,
you just leave them alone. After breakfast,

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I decided to walk back down to
the pool where I'd bathed the day

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before. There was an area of
bushes about forty feet further that was matted

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down. It was not that way
the day before. I walked over to

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it and I could clearly see that
something large had been sitting or lie in

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that area. I remember thinking to
myself, Wow, I just saw bigfoot

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last night. The next thought was
if it had walked out of the bushes

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while I was in that pool,
I could have been at lunch. We

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camped there for another two days without
any incident, for which I'm grateful I

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was able to sleep in peace.
I'm fifty two years old now and I

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live in Los Angeles. There have
been a lot of more sightings closer to

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civilization here, such as in our
local mountains and hills. Now I'll leave

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those stories for other people to tell. Thank you for letting me share my

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story. As a child growing up, every summer from the age of five,

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my father and grandfather, older brother, and myself would drive from Chicago

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to Sue Narrows, Ontario, staying
at a resort. There were no roads

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to the resort. We had to
travel the last thirty minutes by boat.

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My mother usually came up later with
my three younger brothers. This place was

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great. They pumped water out of
the lake to a homemade water tower and

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spigots were located here and there around
the camp. The water was beautiful.

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The resort was made up of a
main lodge and ten or twelve cabins on

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a five acre peninsula. A generator
started around seven pm for lights. There

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was no telephone and no overland route
to town except over the ice. During

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the winter. They would even cut
ice each winter and keep it in the

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ice house, buried in sawdust,
keeping the ice for years. There were

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five lakes and they were all connected, and there were boats in eight other

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lakes to portage into for different species
of fish walleye, smallmouth, Northern Pike,

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musky, and Lake trout. Some
lakes had all species of fish and

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some were more specific. We poured
stoffened too a lake called Hope Lake.

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I remember there was a hermit living
on an island in this lake, but

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we never saw him. From early
on one of the Oglalla Sioux guides we

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hired would always tell us to watch
out for the gorilla of Hope Lake.

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Every time we fished with this guide, he gave us the same warning.

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It was quite unnerving to me as
a child, even into my teenage.

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Years later, in years I got
my first job. I bought a car

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and a new fourteen foot Smokecraft small
car topper boat and my own nine point

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five horsepower Johnson outboard motor. This
gave me freedom to venture off on my

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own fishing, and I could stay
as long as I wanted. On my

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solo fishing trips, I would stop
at midday on shore for lunch, and

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I would do some swimming or exploring
in the untouched forests of Aspen Beach and

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pines. I'd let my imagination room, wondering if anybody had ever explored the

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places that I was walking on.
Portaging into Hope Lake alone for small mouth,

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I always felt very uncomfortable or actually
afraid. Once having drugged my boat

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across and on the water, always
felt more at ease, but never completely

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comfortable. Something always bothered me.
It was a great little lake, but

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the years of warning by the guide
stuck with me, and I eventually quit

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going to Hope Lake by myself.
Closer to the resort, and in the

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evenings, I would go out after
dinner just before dark to get in an

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extra hour of fishing. I enjoyed
the sounds of the loons and watching the

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otters play. I didn't do this
every day. Sometimes I would go with

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my friends to hunt for muskie,
but I loved the solitude of fishing my

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spot in the evenings alone. One
evening, after getting into my little spot,

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I dropped my anchor and I cast
a minnow and I began to relax.

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I looked around, taking in the
whole scene, and on a rock

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island not far from me, I
saw a deer laying on the island close

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to the water. As I focused
in, it was obvious this deer had

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been mutilated. The head was attached
with antlers visible, but the body had

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been ravaged. The kill was fresh. I had fished this spot the two

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previous evenings and the deer was not
there. The kill had to have taken

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place within the last twenty four hours. I stared at the macabre scene and

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it occurred to me the loons were
quiet. There were none of the usual

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sounds I loved hearing during this time
of day, other than the horde of

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mosquitoes trying to drain me of blood. I had seen wildlife swimming in the

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lake, deer, bear and other
smaller creatures, but I never saw anything

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alive on this small rock island.
And all the years that I fished this

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area, and I spent at least
five of the seven days a week fishing

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this spot. During the evenings,
I heard my bobber slap the water.

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I looked over and a big fish
was running with the bait. But at

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the same moment, the most dreadful
feeling came over me. I felt like

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something evil was in the area.
There's no way that I can convey my

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senses at this time or in words, but I never felt anything like that

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in my eighteen years on Earth.
I am sixty one this year, and

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I've never felt it since. It
overpowered my natural instinct to set the hook

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on this big fish, so I
didn't. I just let him run until

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the spools snapped tight out of line, and with my pocket knife, I

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cut the line. I dropped my
rod in the boat, and I calmly

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prepared to leave the area. Something
was on that island, something evil,

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and it meant business, and I
was not going to push my luck.

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There were two routes back to the
lodge. One would take me thirty minutes.

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The other would take an hour around
a long peninsula where I normally dragged

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my boat over to save a long
ride. I was not getting out of

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this boat, so I took the
long route. The farther I got from

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that island, the better I began
to feel. Making the turn around the

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end of the peninsula at full throttle, I saw a mated pair of loons

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setting on the glass like water.
I cut the engine and began drifting,

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and I could hear them making the
lonely call they do at the end of

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the day. Darkness was coming fast, but the sound of those loons seemed

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to calm me, and I began
to feel normal again. I actually stopped

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when I was far enough away from
the island and made a few more casts.

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A good pike raised to my bait
once, but it never hit.

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That just made the night normal even
more. I made it back to camp

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ate a good supper, and I
had a restless night of sleep, but

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I felt like I was safe.
This event was forty four years years ago.

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I've been back to the area many
times and had several great weeks of

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fishing on those beautiful lakes, but
it's been years since my last trip.

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I have even motored past that Rock
Island a few times, but I never

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stopped. I doubt I would enjoy
fishing that spot again. I hope to

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get back there someday. I hope
when I see it again it has not

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changed. The days were filled with
fun and the nights were magical watching the

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Aurora borealis and the millions of stars. It is my favorite place in the

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world. But on that day,
something was on that island and it was

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watching me. It did not want
me there, and I followed my instincts

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and I left. I'm not in
any way saying that it was sasquatch,

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but I have a hunch that it
may have been, but I may never

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know. I grew up in the
woods of northeast Alabama, hunting and fishing

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like any good Southern boy. I
started deer hunting when I was six.

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I'm thirty eight now, so that
makes thirty two years of hunting experience.

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I've been all over the Southeastern States, plus I served fifteen years of active

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duty. Through all of my experiences, I don't think I can recall ever

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being scared in the woods, not
even when the bullets were flying by me

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when I was overseas. It happened
so fast that I think instinct and training

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takeover, and there just isn't time. It always hits me after the fact.

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I've been a straight shooter, and
I've never given much thought to bigfoot

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or any of those types of beings. I always accepted that other people believed

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and that I didn't until this happened
to me. It was a cool winter

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day on the dark side of dug
Or Mountain where me and my dad were

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bow hunting. It was one of
my favorite spots to hunt. I could

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always count on and sing and maybe
even shooting one there. It was about

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a two mile height through some really
rugged country, but it was worth it.

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As we walked in, my dad
got to his tree first and I

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walked another five hundred yards or so
to my tree. I quickly settled in

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for another typical day of honting.
I saw some doze early on, and

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I got excited, and then things
got real. Remember how I said that

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I've never been afraid of the woods
that changed instantly. This day, I

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was sitting in my tree when I
heard something coming up behind me. I

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know the woods and the animals that
lived there. This was different and it

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was really odd. And then it
just stopped. Everything was silent. It

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seemed like every critter for miles just
hid. Okay, maybe it wasn't that

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big of a deal. But then
I heard it again and it was closer.

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I knew something wasn't right. It
sounded like a big, heavy set

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man walking. It got closer still, and I was expecting it to be

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the game warden. It was getting
late in the day and it made no

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sense why a grown man would be
walking in from that direction. A man

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would be heading towards the road.
I was searching for any answer that would

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make sense while I watched the area
it was coming from. It walked between

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me and my dad and then it
stopped. It cut loose with a roar

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so loud that it made my spine
shiver. It felt like it lasted forever.

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I got the idea that this thing
didn't want us there. My heart

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was pounding and I was experiencing real
fear. My dad texted me, did

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you hear that? And I replied, yes, it came from your direction.

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He said it sounded like it came
from mine, and that confirmed that

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it was between us. Dad said
just to hang tight and let it get

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dark. Maybe it'll move on.
I heard it stop, so I knew

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if it moved, i'd hear it
again, even see it. But it

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was quiet, and I had the
feeling it knew that I was there at

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dark. Dad sent me a text
saying climb down and had my way.

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I climbed down and packed my gear, and I started making my way towards

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my dad, knowing I was heading
right towards this powerful thing. About halfway

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to my dad, I started realizing
when I stepped that it stepped, and

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I stopped and it stopped. I
shined my light, but I didn't see

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anything. It was close, though, so close that I could hear it

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breathing, and it was definitely something
big and heavy. I made it to

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my dad and right away I said, Dad, we're not alone. Something's

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trailing me. His immediate response was, oh, you're losing it. Bear's

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code. He's pretty much any animal
in Alabama runs away from humans. I

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told him that it was following me, and we started walking towards the truck,

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and it continued to follow us.
Dad did what I had done.

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He motioned for us to stop,
and whatever was following us stopped as well.

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We started walking again, and then
started walking with us. He shined

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us flashlight, but he couldn't find
it either, and I could see how

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spooked he was. At this point. It matched us step first step all

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the way out. We crossed the
creek and it made a splash bigger than

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both of us put together. It
seemed to be getting bolder as we walked.

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It got louder and made more racket. I held my flashlight in my

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mouth, my bow in one hand, and my knife in the other.

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I was fully expecting it to charge
at any minute. All I could think

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about was getting to the truck.
An hour long hike away over rugged terrain

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in the dark. Was something huge
following us. At this point Dad told

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me to take the lead, putting
himself between me and this thing. We

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kept pushing forward to the truck,
and when we finally got there it felt

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like we'd been hiking for hours.
We didn't stop to pack our stuff.

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We tossed it all in the bed
and Dad cranked up the engine and got

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us out of there. He drove
us out faster than I've ever seen him

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00:17:08,400 --> 00:17:12,119
drive. I turned the cab light
on and I looked over at him.

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I've never seen that look on my
dad's face before. It was somewhere between

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scared and disbelief. I asked him
if he ever saw it. He just

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said, I don't want to talk
about it. We haven't hunted there again.

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Dad has never spoken openly about that
night. Neither of us have ever

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been back to that spot, and
to this day, it still gives me

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chills to think about it. I
never hunt far from the truck now,

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and I'm always on alert, just
like I was back when I was in

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the sandbox.