Speaker 1: This happened in the early nineteen seventies in the small
Speaker 1: town of Piedmont, Missouri. There was extensive news coverage at
Speaker 1: the time. It began when we all started seeing lights
Speaker 1: in the sky. One was a huge ball, but it
Speaker 1: was too far away to gauge how big it was.
Speaker 1: Each night, we could all go to the highest point
Speaker 1: in our town and see the events unfold. We would
Speaker 1: watch as smaller balls of light drop from beneath a
Speaker 1: huge ball. There would be fifteen to twenty that would
Speaker 1: come out and then zip around in all directions, heading
Speaker 1: off to who knows where. Then sometime later, maybe fifteen
Speaker 1: or twenty minutes, they'd all start coming back, first a
Speaker 1: couple and then a few more. We started calling the
Speaker 1: big ball the mother ship. If the smaller bass sailed
Speaker 1: over our local radio station, it would go off the air.
Speaker 1: There was a lake about five miles from town, and
Speaker 1: they were seen coming out of that. These things were
Speaker 1: all over the place, but we never understood their interest
Speaker 1: in our town. One night, as we were coming back
Speaker 1: into town, we decided to drive through it and turn
Speaker 1: around at the feed store a couple of miles on
Speaker 1: the other side. As I was pulling into the parking lot,
Speaker 1: we suddenly saw a huge object floating up from the
Speaker 1: field behind it. We all jumped out of the car
Speaker 1: to see what it was. This thing was almost as
Speaker 1: big as the field that it was rising from. It
Speaker 1: had a dim glow, so we could see that it
Speaker 1: was round. There were portholes all around with different colored lights.
Speaker 1: I tried my best to see what was inside, but
Speaker 1: I couldn't see anything. It was completely silent. We watched
Speaker 1: as it floated above the telephone poles, and then, with
Speaker 1: lightning speed, it took off and was gone in three seconds.
Speaker 1: Shortly after that we moved to Kentucky, so we've never
Speaker 1: seen any other events. My mother, however, just told me
Speaker 1: a couple of years before she died of something she
Speaker 1: had witnessed. It wasn't long before her husband passed away.
Speaker 1: She had been visiting my brother and was in her
Speaker 1: car heading home when she saw something in the sky
Speaker 1: she could not identify. She had to stop and take
Speaker 1: a look. She said it was a see through like
Speaker 1: cling wrap, but floating and moving like a flag wood.
Speaker 1: It didn't seem to be in a hurry. It just
Speaker 1: moved slowly across the sky. We could never decide what
Speaker 1: it could be, but it was definitely something. If anyone
Speaker 1: knows what this thing might be, please comment. I don't
Speaker 1: even know what to call it. I would love to
Speaker 1: know what it is. I wanted to share these stories
Speaker 1: with you and the audience, and I hope you've enjoyed
Speaker 1: reading it. You may use my name and you can
Speaker 1: interview me if you like. Best regards, Anita. I stumbled
Speaker 1: across Dixie Cryptid on YouTube about a month ago, and
Speaker 1: I thoroughly enjoy what people are willing to share about
Speaker 1: their experiences with Bigfoot. I'm amazed at how much information
Speaker 1: is out there on this creature, and I'm intrigued by it.
Speaker 1: In fact, I've been intrigued by it since nineteen seventy eight,
Speaker 1: when I had my one and only experience. At that time,
Speaker 1: I was fifteen years old. So here we go, all right,
Speaker 1: here we go. Back around nineteen seventy seven or seventy eight,
Speaker 1: I was spending an October weekend at my dad and
Speaker 1: uncle's hunting camp near the south shore of Lake Superior
Speaker 1: in the north central Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The camp
Speaker 1: was built by my great grandfather. As usual, there were
Speaker 1: a bunch of guys at camp, including my dad, my uncle,
Speaker 1: my grandfather, and their hunting partners. All of these men
Speaker 1: were World War II, Korean War in Vietnam vets. They
Speaker 1: were big and strong and fearless outdoorsmen. When you shook
Speaker 1: their hand, you knew you had a hold of something.
Speaker 1: Our camp included two hundred and fifty acres of heavily
Speaker 1: wooded and rugged land. Our neighbors to the east and
Speaker 1: north of us owned a couple of thousand acres, also
Speaker 1: the same terrain and woods. My father and my uncle
Speaker 1: were hosting our annual woodcutting bee for the upcoming November
Speaker 1: deer season and winter snowshoe hair season. I loved the
Speaker 1: autumn up there, with the crisp bear and the colors
Speaker 1: and the smells. Sunday morning of that weekend was spectacular.
Speaker 1: As usual, Grandpa had made a hearty breakfast like only
Speaker 1: his generation could make. Now I needed to walk it off,
Speaker 1: and I asked Dad if I could go grouse and
Speaker 1: squirrel hunting before we started on the wood. He gave
Speaker 1: me two hours before I had to be back, so
Speaker 1: I loaded up my shotgun, put on my orange hat
Speaker 1: off down the camp road. Back then, the area was
Speaker 1: extremely remote, with only one country road. Our camp was
Speaker 1: a mile down a two rut road. Off the country road,
Speaker 1: I swung south of the camp road and up into
Speaker 1: the hills that were covered with oak and sugar maple
Speaker 1: and poplar. I was hoping to jump a rough grouse
Speaker 1: and maybe bag a couple of big gray squirrels. I
Speaker 1: had walked the land with Dad and Grandpa often, and
Speaker 1: I knew the lay of it. I had a compass
Speaker 1: pen to my hunting vest in case I got turned around.
Speaker 1: There was no such thing as cell phones to call
Speaker 1: for help in those days, and back then I was
Speaker 1: a tall and skinny kid. I was six foot one,
Speaker 1: but I could put the miles under my feet and
Speaker 1: I still can. About halfway into the hills, I decided
Speaker 1: to take a break in my uncle Charlie's seat in
Speaker 1: an area we called the big Ravine. And as I
Speaker 1: sat on the side of the ravine, I could hear
Speaker 1: something coming behind me. Well, I swung around in my
Speaker 1: seat and I got my shotgun ready, and over the
Speaker 1: hill came a red fox at a dead run. He
Speaker 1: came within twenty feet of me. Well, I didn't want
Speaker 1: to shoot the fox, so I just watched him slink
Speaker 1: through the forest. It was really cool and I couldn't
Speaker 1: wait to tell the guys what I had seen, And
Speaker 1: then I wondered what had spooked the fox, as there
Speaker 1: was nobody around for miles or so. I fought. Twenty
Speaker 1: minutes went by, and I felt rested enough to turn
Speaker 1: back north and walk over to a stand where I
Speaker 1: had seen a black bear while hunting recently. For about
Speaker 1: two weeks, I'd been baiting bear with fish scraps and
Speaker 1: such that I'd obtain from a local fish market in town.
Speaker 1: I figured it'd be a great bear bait and bring
Speaker 1: them in, and it worked. My intent was to see
Speaker 1: if I needed to replenish my bait bucket, which hung
Speaker 1: about six feet off the ground, and the bait stand
Speaker 1: with more fish and snacks, and so off I went.
Speaker 1: I used another two rut road on the property my
Speaker 1: Grandpa maintained for walking. It was quiet walking because the
Speaker 1: forest had melted off the leaves and the ground was
Speaker 1: damp on the road, and I walked silently to my
Speaker 1: bear stand. I knew the route that I was taking,
Speaker 1: and as I walked over the hip of a small
Speaker 1: knoll where my stand was located, I could see the
Speaker 1: bait bucket had been pulled down. Well. This was a
Speaker 1: good sign because bear were the only animal that could
Speaker 1: reach up and snap the rope the bucket was hanging from. Furthermore,
Speaker 1: I could smell something sour, which I figured was a bear.
Speaker 1: But black bear are nearly always nocturnal, and they only
Speaker 1: come out just before dark and then they disappear before dawn.
Speaker 1: Big bears get big for this reason. I climbed up
Speaker 1: over the hip of the knoll and I moved silently
Speaker 1: in the damp leaves, and then I saw something big,
Speaker 1: black and hairy over the bucket, laying on the ground.
Speaker 1: It was on all fours. My first thought was, holy smoked,
Speaker 1: that is really a big bear. And in broad daylight
Speaker 1: I could hear it rummaging around, which is why it
Speaker 1: probably hadn't heard me coming. Its hair and fur was
Speaker 1: kind of shiny. I wasn't thinking about anything but bear
Speaker 1: at that point, and I wished I had more than
Speaker 1: my twenty gauge pump with me. All of a sudden,
Speaker 1: this thing stopped what it was doing and it lifted
Speaker 1: its head to look around. Well, I'd positioned myself to
Speaker 1: shoot if I had to, should the bear charge me, Well,
Speaker 1: this thing was huge. I had a good view of
Speaker 1: the back inside of his head, and I was wondering
Speaker 1: why his or her head was shaped pointy. It looked
Speaker 1: left and then right, and then was facing away from me.
Speaker 1: If I'd had my dear rifle with me, that would
Speaker 1: have been one dead bear with a funny shaped head
Speaker 1: like that. Grandpa would have bawled me out if I'd
Speaker 1: have shot that bear and hauled me back to camp.
Speaker 1: And then I thought, man, this thing stinks. And then
Speaker 1: this thing must have sensed me, but it didn't know
Speaker 1: where I was. I was only fifty feet away, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, it took off on all fours
Speaker 1: directly away from me, and I was thinking, what in
Speaker 1: the hell is this thing? It ran like a cheetah
Speaker 1: from the TV series Doc Torre. Bears don't run like that.
Speaker 1: Not spend enough time in the woods to know this. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I was standing there in amazement until I couldn't hear
Speaker 1: it running any longer. I wasn't the least bit scared.
Speaker 1: I was armed, and I knew Dad and the guys
Speaker 1: were at camp, so if I didn't show up on time,
Speaker 1: they'd come looking for me. There's no way anything could
Speaker 1: face those combat bats down and lift tell about it.
Speaker 1: I started my walk back to camp as my time
Speaker 1: was up, and I had a good mile to walk
Speaker 1: and I could make it back in time. And in
Speaker 1: a quarter mile I made it back to the road
Speaker 1: and I wanted to be on that led back to
Speaker 1: the camp. But off to my east in the wood,
Speaker 1: I could hear something walking parallel with me. It would
Speaker 1: walk when I did, and it would stop when I stopped.
Speaker 1: This went on for three hundred yards. Whatever it was
Speaker 1: seemed like it was about forty yards out, and at
Speaker 1: one point I stopped and squatted down to peer under
Speaker 1: the brush, and I couldn't see it, And when I
Speaker 1: was about three hundred feet from camp, I couldn't hear
Speaker 1: it anymore. In fact, I heard a chainsaw startup, which
Speaker 1: would have been the guys getting ready to start cutting wood. Well,
Speaker 1: I told the guys what I had experienced the fox
Speaker 1: and the funny looking running bear on my walk back,
Speaker 1: and they listened to me intently, but we had work
Speaker 1: to do, and so the weekend went on. I had
Speaker 1: forgotten about my experience for years until the subject of
Speaker 1: bigfoot sisquatch came on the news. More and more. I
Speaker 1: hope you share my story. It happened just as I
Speaker 1: wrote it. I know what I saw and experienced it.
Speaker 1: I grew up in showing the outdoors, hunting and fishing
Speaker 1: as much as I could, probably at the expense of
Speaker 1: my high school GPA at times. When I left high school,
Speaker 1: I went into the United States Army as an airborne
Speaker 1: light infantryman in two different units. I was in the
Speaker 1: battalion scout platoon, which in a light battalion is something
Speaker 1: you have to be selected for. We spent a whole
Speaker 1: lot of time in the woods and small teams, trying
Speaker 1: to remain hidden and silent in the course of our duties.
Speaker 1: Every now and then, especially in Alaska, I would hear
Speaker 1: or see something that I couldn't place, but I was
Speaker 1: never thinking about sisquatch. It was not until after the
Speaker 1: Army that I became suddenly aware that something else was
Speaker 1: out there. My Army career ended at fifteen years of
Speaker 1: active duty. I was a senior in CEO, but I
Speaker 1: was stuck and recruiting and it was killing me. I
Speaker 1: long for the days of leading soldiers in the field
Speaker 1: and not trying to survive in the recruiting command from
Speaker 1: day to day. We moved from Maine to our last
Speaker 1: duty station, where I earned the right to be a hunting, fishing,
Speaker 1: and recreation guide. I say earn the right because to
Speaker 1: be a registered main guide is a bit of an ordeal.
Speaker 1: You can't just hang out a sign and start a business.
Speaker 1: The licensing process is thorough. You have to demonstrate you
Speaker 1: are a capable outdorsement and leader. The main woods can
Speaker 1: be a dangerous place, and the Department of Inland Fisheries
Speaker 1: and Wildlife are careful about who should or who should
Speaker 1: not be taking people into the wilderness. It was a
Speaker 1: great opportunity, but after the economic turndown of two thousand
Speaker 1: and eight, I struggle to keep things going for a
Speaker 1: few years. I ended up landing a great job with
Speaker 1: the federal government. Though I certainly don't spend as much
Speaker 1: time outside now as I would like to. I'm a
Speaker 1: lifelong outdoorsman who has probably spent a whole lot more
Speaker 1: time in the wilderness area than many of the keyboard
Speaker 1: skeptics who insist that we all must be crazy for
Speaker 1: believing in Sasquatch. I'm not just a believer. I'm a knower.
Speaker 1: My wake up call came in the main bear season
Speaker 1: of two thousand and nine. I was guiding an area
Speaker 1: just northeast of Bald Mountain Pond, a fairway southeast of
Speaker 1: the last paved road at Moxie. I had two hunters
Speaker 1: on stands two miles apart. It was nearing sunset on
Speaker 1: a beautiful day. Because I needed to pick up the
Speaker 1: hunters within an hour or so, I decided to quietly
Speaker 1: roll my truck out onto a high point on a
Speaker 1: logging road between the two hunters. From there I would
Speaker 1: hear any shots that might come from either side, and
Speaker 1: from there I could plan my approach to pick them up.
Speaker 1: Both stands were crawling with bears, so I expected one
Speaker 1: of them to harvest one. Typically, i'd wait until a
Speaker 1: half hour past sunset and that i'd start to walk
Speaker 1: into the stand and get them. In the dark. In
Speaker 1: those woods, a guide can't let their sports climb down
Speaker 1: on their own to walk out. That's just asking for trouble.
Speaker 1: I had the window down and the truck off, and
Speaker 1: I was enjoying air while reading an awesome Lewis Lamore book,
Speaker 1: and suddenly, from a dark shadow one hundred yards to
Speaker 1: my left, a loud howl erupted. This started as a
Speaker 1: low growl, and it worked its way up in pitch
Speaker 1: to a volume that no human can match. Whatever made
Speaker 1: this noise had lungs much larger than a human, and
Speaker 1: it was directed at me, and it penetrated deeply into
Speaker 1: the truck and into my core. I quickly went through
Speaker 1: my mental rolodex of critters from the main woods, and
Speaker 1: nothing matched. I wasn't in full panic mode, but I
Speaker 1: was a little concerned. I did have a loaded revolver
Speaker 1: on my belt, and I did unsnap the holster and
Speaker 1: roll up the window. There was something big in that
Speaker 1: dark shadow, but it was in the timber and I
Speaker 1: couldn't make out a shape. As dust grew, I slowly
Speaker 1: crawled the truck off to pick up my hunters. I
Speaker 1: went about my business for the rest of that trip,
Speaker 1: and I'd almost put it out of my mind when
Speaker 1: the season was over. Then it all dawned on me.
Speaker 1: While the family was flipping through channels on television one night,
Speaker 1: just as the kids were clicking past the show on Sisquatch,
Speaker 1: the team of researchers was deploying what they called the Ohio.
Speaker 1: Howell well, I'll be damned if that wasn't exactly what
Speaker 1: I heard. I stopped the kids at the channel and
Speaker 1: I watched transfixed through the end of the show. Since then,
Speaker 1: I've been fascinated by anything about this supposedly mythical creature.
Speaker 1: Well that's the end of my first story, and I've
Speaker 1: had one or two minor things happened since then. My
Speaker 1: daughter and I had some impressive wood knocks on either
Speaker 1: side of us while we were hunting deer out in
Speaker 1: the hard to reach part of the Black Hills of
Speaker 1: South Dakota. She thought that was cool, and since she
Speaker 1: was in her first deer season at about age eleven
Speaker 1: at the time. I have another story that's just as interesting.
Speaker 1: It isn't about me, though. At the time I was guiding.
Speaker 1: We lived in Jefferson, Maine. It's a great little village
Speaker 1: at the top of Oh gosh, here's another here's another
Speaker 1: name I can't pronounce. Let me try to sound it out. Okay,
Speaker 1: Tomorrow Scotta Lake, Damaras, Scotta Tomorrow Scotta Lake. I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna go with that. If you're ever there, it's well
Speaker 1: worth the stop at the village store to grab a
Speaker 1: sandwich and ask what the fish you're hitting on. My
Speaker 1: neighbor was also a registered main guide. In fact, he
Speaker 1: was a master guide. There were three of us there
Speaker 1: on the road. We're all pretty friendly with each other.
Speaker 1: And this fella also owned a Christmas tree farm which
Speaker 1: he liked to hunt on his own. His property was
Speaker 1: up the road and technically in the next town. One
Speaker 1: day he arrived in my driveway and he was a
Speaker 1: bit flustered. He was saying that he saw a werewolf
Speaker 1: on his property. He came down to see me because
Speaker 1: he knew I had young children. He was sitting in
Speaker 1: his tiny toolshit at the far back of his property,
Speaker 1: right along David's Stream. This was a habitat edge where
Speaker 1: the acorn laden oaks abutted his tree farm. At the stream,
Speaker 1: there was a deer trail that meandered alongside the inside
Speaker 1: edge of the oaks, and from his little shed it
Speaker 1: was an easy fifty yard shot. He'd been doing this
Speaker 1: for years because he was getting older. Hunting ridgelines and
Speaker 1: swamps was not for him anymore. Besides, it was his
Speaker 1: land and it was a safe place to shoot. He
Speaker 1: hunted ethically and he didn't bait deer. The natural fodder
Speaker 1: was enough to attract the deer. He said he saw
Speaker 1: a large creature walking on two legs, coming down the
Speaker 1: deer trail from right to left as he was facing
Speaker 1: the stream. At first, he thought the figure was a
Speaker 1: trespasser in dark clothes. As this thing got closer, he
Speaker 1: could tell that it wasn't a man. He said it
Speaker 1: was eight feet tall, and it walked on legs that
Speaker 1: looked like a powerful set of dog legs, which he
Speaker 1: said looked really awkward. This lifelong hunter and master guide
Speaker 1: described this creature as having a snout and pointed ears,
Speaker 1: unlike a bear. He said, the upper torso was powerfully built,
Speaker 1: like a serious weightlifter. The dog man creature walked until
Speaker 1: it was directly in front of him at fifty yards,
Speaker 1: and then it dropped to all fours and it ran
Speaker 1: down the deer trail toward where my house was at
Speaker 1: the time. Well, this frightened him because he knew that
Speaker 1: my kids spent a lot of time outside playing in
Speaker 1: the dirt or playing an army and just being kids.
Speaker 1: He told me his story with awe sincerity and no
Speaker 1: obvious deception. In his demeanor, he expressed fear and legitimate
Speaker 1: concern and sadly This kind man took his own life
Speaker 1: very shortly after the incident. I hope that his sighting
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with it. So there you have it.
Speaker 1: There are two stories from the great state of Maine.
Speaker 1: It is a beautiful place with endless miles of shoreline, forests, lakes,
Speaker 1: and mountains to explore. Just keep your eyes open and
Speaker 1: you just might see something when you're taking it all in.
Speaker 1: So I'm a Bigfoot believer, and I've read countless stories
Speaker 1: and have seen almost every photo or video documented on
Speaker 1: the Internet. In two thousand and seven, i'd been studying
Speaker 1: encounter stories for a year, and I'd heard of several
Speaker 1: in the Adirondack Mountains. It wasn't that far from where
Speaker 1: I live, so I convinced my best friend to take
Speaker 1: a hiking trip with me in search of Bigfoot. We
Speaker 1: were both in our twenties at the time and looking
Speaker 1: for adventure. Within a few weeks, we made our plans
Speaker 1: and purchased our supplies and loaded our backpacks, and we
Speaker 1: were on our way. We'd picked a remote hiking trail
Speaker 1: and headed out. An hour into our hike, the trail
Speaker 1: came to a fork and one path was well worn.
Speaker 1: It was clearly the path most people chose. The other
Speaker 1: path was overgrown and grassy. Which way should we go,
Speaker 1: my friend asked, and I pointed to the overgrown path,
Speaker 1: and I said, let's go that way. For sure, I
Speaker 1: knew if I wanted to have an encounter of any kind,
Speaker 1: I would have to choose the path less traveled. We
Speaker 1: hiked a long way before we reached a point where
Speaker 1: we could take a rest. My friend immediately noticed that
Speaker 1: there was no sound in the forest. No insects were chirping,
Speaker 1: no birds were singing, no other animals were even moving around.
Speaker 1: It was unsettling, and I thought maybe we were about
Speaker 1: to be attacked by a mountaine or something. I knew
Speaker 1: that silence in the forest usually meant a predator was
Speaker 1: in the area, so we decided to keep moving. Not
Speaker 1: long after that, the forest grew dark. It wasn't nightfall yet,
Speaker 1: but the sun was shining on the other side of
Speaker 1: the mountain, and it cast a long shadow that made
Speaker 1: the whole area look like something out of a creepy movie.
Speaker 1: The dark forest ahead of us felt like it was
Speaker 1: swallowing us up, and I couldn't help being a little
Speaker 1: bit afraid. My stomach sank and I took a few
Speaker 1: big gulps of air, and I could feel my heart
Speaker 1: pounding in my chest. Somehow I knew we shouldn't be there.
Speaker 1: I told my friend that I didn't want to go
Speaker 1: in there. She said, oh, come on, we can't stop. Now,
Speaker 1: Let's go just a little bit further. I was uneasy
Speaker 1: with every step. Finally I convinced her it was time
Speaker 1: to turn back. I couldn't wait to get out of there.
Speaker 1: I had the sense that something was watching us, and
Speaker 1: I didn't know if it meant to harm us or
Speaker 1: what its intentions were. After a while, we got out
Speaker 1: of that area of the woods, and I felt a
Speaker 1: bit relieved. It was time to start heading straight back
Speaker 1: to the car. The woods had fallen darker, and I
Speaker 1: did not want to be lost out there. After the
Speaker 1: sun went down, we were still two hours from the car.
Speaker 1: We picked up the pace as we walked back. I
Speaker 1: admit that I felt a bit disappointed that we didn't
Speaker 1: have an encounter with the creature, and that thought didn't
Speaker 1: last for long. Five minutes later, we heard a loud
Speaker 1: popping sound of a boulder hitting another rock as it
Speaker 1: landed on the ground, and then it rolled twenty yards
Speaker 1: before coming to a stop. It had come from our
Speaker 1: left and behind us. There were no hills in that
Speaker 1: direction that it could have fallen from, and the landscape
Speaker 1: behind us was flat. I looked toward the sound to
Speaker 1: see what was going on, but we didn't see anything.
Speaker 1: But all of a sudden, I was excited, and it
Speaker 1: gripped me as I realized that something had to have
Speaker 1: thrown it. Maybe we had contact. Finally, this is what
Speaker 1: I had come for. I wasn't scared at this point.
Speaker 1: Suddenly I was thrilled. I picked up a handful of
Speaker 1: small rocks and I threw them back into the woods
Speaker 1: in an effort to communicate with whatever had thrown the boulder.
Speaker 1: We slowly moved down the trail, looking into the woods,
Speaker 1: hoping to see this thing, and a handful of small
Speaker 1: rocks soared through the air and landed behind us. We
Speaker 1: stopped and smiled. This was it. I picked up more
Speaker 1: rocks and I gently threw them in the forest, and
Speaker 1: we waited, and then more rocks came flying back to us.
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe this was happening. I was growing more
Speaker 1: excited by the minute. For the next forty five minutes.
Speaker 1: We walked the trail, tossing rocks into the woods, and
Speaker 1: back and forth it went. I never saw herd or
Speaker 1: smelled anything other than the rocks. But what animal was
Speaker 1: possibly capable of playfully throwing rocks back and forth? When
Speaker 1: we reached a point with a small pond on one
Speaker 1: side and thick woods on the other, I heard the
Speaker 1: sound of a tree creaking back and forth at a
Speaker 1: rapid pace. I'm not a stranger to the woods. I
Speaker 1: grew up in the country, and I spent most of
Speaker 1: my days playing and walking out there, and I know
Speaker 1: the sound of the wind blowing through creaky trees. This
Speaker 1: is not what that was. It sounded like someone was
Speaker 1: shaking the tree. My friend was now afraid, but I
Speaker 1: became more curious, and I begged her to let me
Speaker 1: inspect the sound a little closer. Against her better judgment,
Speaker 1: I stepped off the mark path and into the woods.
Speaker 1: That was my first mistake. My intuition was telling me
Speaker 1: not to go any further. The energy in the area
Speaker 1: was heavy and thick, and it took everything I had
Speaker 1: to move my legs forward. I looked down at my
Speaker 1: arms and the hair was standing straight up. I should
Speaker 1: have turned back right then, but I didn't. I picked
Speaker 1: up a large rock and I threw it as far
Speaker 1: into the woods as I could. I had a good
Speaker 1: throwing arm, and I sent it as deep into the
Speaker 1: darkness as it would go. The tree continued to shake
Speaker 1: one last rock. I thought, I'll just throw one last rock. Well,
Speaker 1: that was my second mistake, and it almost cost me
Speaker 1: my life. My friend walked up behind me with a
Speaker 1: rock in each hand. We must have looked like a
Speaker 1: couple of idiots creeping through the woods with those rocks.
Speaker 1: And I cranked my arm back and I began to throw.
Speaker 1: Upon my release, a rock the sides of a softball
Speaker 1: came buzzing past my head at incredible speed, and it
Speaker 1: missed me by half an inch. I felt the wind
Speaker 1: off of it as it hung by. Then it hit
Speaker 1: a tree behind us and it landed on the trail.
Speaker 1: I turned to my friend and shock, and I was
Speaker 1: hoping she was playing a joke on me. And all
Speaker 1: I could see was the fear in her eyes as
Speaker 1: she held up both of those rocks in her hands.
Speaker 1: She said, I brought one for you and me, but
Speaker 1: we didn't throw them. Let's get out of here. We
Speaker 1: both said at the same time. Somehow, unintentionally, we had
Speaker 1: made this creature angry, and if that rock had hit me,
Speaker 1: it would have killed me. If it was a person
Speaker 1: who'd thrown it, they would have had to be close
Speaker 1: enough that I would have seen them. We started beating
Speaker 1: feet out of the woods while more rocks were thrown
Speaker 1: at us. But this time it wasn't playful and they
Speaker 1: weren't small rocks. They were being thrown directly at us,
Speaker 1: and for the next forty minutes, as we headed out
Speaker 1: of the trail as fast as we could, we had
Speaker 1: to take cover several times from the rocks being flung
Speaker 1: at us. We were lucky. The rocks hit the leaves
Speaker 1: as they flew through the air and gave us a
Speaker 1: split second warning that they were coming. Again and again
Speaker 1: we had to duck to avoid being hit. These rocks
Speaker 1: kept coming at us until we were a half mile
Speaker 1: out of the trail. They were making sure that we
Speaker 1: were leaving. I should have never thrown that rock. It
Speaker 1: was a stupid move on my part. You know the
Speaker 1: old saying, it's all fun and games until someone loses
Speaker 1: an eye, right, There is no doubt in my mind
Speaker 1: that I was interacting with a big foot that day,
Speaker 1: and this is one of my favorite stories to tell
Speaker 1: those friends who won't laugh at me, and now I'm
Speaker 1: sharing it with you all. Thank you,