Speaker 1: Today, I want to tell you about a journey that
Speaker 1: I've been on for most of my life. Ever since
Speaker 1: I was a kid, I've heard tales of bigfoot and
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Speaker 1: my interest in encryptids and other things strange only deepened.
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Speaker 2: Now, what are your reporting? I got a screen going
Speaker 2: on here. Something just kid with my dog, something to
Speaker 2: kill your dog? My dog. We're flying through there over
Speaker 2: the tree. I don't know how it did it? Okay, damn,
Speaker 2: I'm really confused. All I saw was my dog coming
Speaker 2: over the fence and name was dead once you hit
Speaker 2: the grill. I didn't see any cars. All I saw
Speaker 2: was my dog coming over the fence. Sat, what are
Speaker 2: you reporting? We got some wonder or something crawling around
Speaker 2: out here? Did you see what it was? It was
Speaker 2: enough out here. Look, I'm near the window now and
Speaker 2: I don't need anything. I don't want to go outside.
Speaker 2: Its hello, hit the boddy out here? What quen? I'm
Speaker 2: out there? It's thought of a mention about text nine.
Speaker 2: I don't know easy, I'm out there. Yeah, I'm walking right, heady.
Speaker 1: My name's Bill, and I just retired after twenty five
Speaker 1: years with the Forest Service. Spent most of that time
Speaker 1: in the deep woods of the Pacific Northwest, but also
Speaker 1: worked assignments in Montana, Alaska, Colorado, and a few other places.
Speaker 1: I've seen a lot of things in those woods that
Speaker 1: most people never will Some of them I can explain. Others, well,
Speaker 1: let me tell you what happened, and you can decide
Speaker 1: for yourself. I'm telling these stories because I'm done worrying
Speaker 1: about what people think. I've got my pension, my cabin,
Speaker 1: and nothing left to prove. These things happened to me,
Speaker 1: all of them. And if you think I'm lying or crazy,
Speaker 1: that's your business. But I know what I saw and
Speaker 1: I know what I experienced. This was early in my career,
Speaker 1: maybe my second year on the job. I was stationed
Speaker 1: at a remote outpost on the Olympic Peninsula, one of
Speaker 1: those places where you might not see another person for weeks.
Speaker 1: The job was mostly firewatch and basic maintenance, but in
Speaker 1: late fall of seventy eight, I had an experience that
Speaker 1: changed how I looked at the forest. I was working
Speaker 1: a night shift, doing routine patrols on some of the
Speaker 1: back roads. It was around two a m. When I
Speaker 1: decided to check on a small ranger cabin about eight
Speaker 1: miles from the main station. The cabin was used by
Speaker 1: researchers sometimes, but it had been empty for weeks. When
Speaker 1: I got there, something felt wrong. The front door was
Speaker 1: standing wide open, which wasn't normal. I parked the truck
Speaker 1: and grabbed my flashlight and radio. The cabin looked fine
Speaker 1: from the outside, but when I stepped inside, I could
Speaker 1: smell something, not like garbage or decay, more like wet animal,
Speaker 1: strong and thick, like when you walk past at a
Speaker 1: zoo exhibit. I called out, thinking maybe someone had broken in.
Speaker 1: No answer. I checked all the rooms with my flashlight.
Speaker 1: Everything was where it should be, nothing missing or damaged.
Speaker 1: But the smell was getting stronger, and I started hearing
Speaker 1: something moving around outside. I went back to the front
Speaker 1: door and listened heavy footsteps, but not like boots, more
Speaker 1: like bare feet, but way too heavy for a person.
Speaker 1: The steps went around the cabin, slow and deliberate, like
Speaker 1: whatever it was was checking the place out. I stood
Speaker 1: in that doorway for maybe ten minutes, listening to those
Speaker 1: footsteps circle the building. Then they stopped right behind the cabin,
Speaker 1: and I heard a sound I'll never forget. It was
Speaker 1: like someone clearing their throat, but deeper, much deeper, and
Speaker 1: loud enough that I felt it in my chest. I
Speaker 1: decided to investigate. Stupid, probably, but I was young and
Speaker 1: thought I could handle anything. I walked around the back
Speaker 1: of the cabin with my flashlight, expecting to find a
Speaker 1: bear or maybe some drunk hiker. What I found was
Speaker 1: a set of footprints in the dirt behind the cabin.
Speaker 1: They were huge, had to be eighteen inches long, maybe more.
Speaker 1: They looked human, but the size was impossible. I could
Speaker 1: see tow impressions, the heel of the foot, everything, but
Speaker 1: they were deeper than any human print would be. Whatever
Speaker 1: made these definitely weighed way more than a person. I
Speaker 1: followed the trail for maybe twenty yards before it disappeared
Speaker 1: on rocky ground. But I'd seen enough. I went back
Speaker 1: to my truck and got out of there. Never filed
Speaker 1: a report about it, just marked the cabin as secure
Speaker 1: and moved on. But I went back the next week,
Speaker 1: had to see if those prints were still there. They were,
Speaker 1: and there were more of them. It looked like something
Speaker 1: had been visiting that cabin regularly, walking around it, maybe
Speaker 1: looking in the windows. I never spent another night alone
Speaker 1: at that outpost without thinking about those footprints, and I
Speaker 1: never went back to that cabin after dark. In nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty seven, I got assigned to a research project in Alaska.
Speaker 1: I was supposed to spend six weeks at a remote
Speaker 1: station helping with a wildlife survey. The station was about
Speaker 1: forty miles from the nearest road, supplied by helicopter once
Speaker 1: a month. Beautiful country, but isolated in a way that
Speaker 1: could get to you if you weren't careful. I was
Speaker 1: there alone most of the time, just me and all
Speaker 1: the monitoring equipment. Radio contact with the outside world twice
Speaker 1: a day, but otherwise complete silence. The work was routine,
Speaker 1: checking instruments, recording data, maintaining the equipment. About three weeks
Speaker 1: in I started noticing that my equipment was being moved,
Speaker 1: not damaged, just repositioned. I'd place a camera in one spot,
Speaker 1: come back a week later and find it twenty feet away,
Speaker 1: still functioning, still recording, just moved. At first I figured
Speaker 1: it was bears. They're curious animals, and I'll investigate anything
Speaker 1: new in their territory. But bears don't relocate equipment carefully.
Speaker 1: They knock it over, maybe chew on it, but they
Speaker 1: don't move it intact. I decided to review the footage
Speaker 1: from the cameras see if I could figure out what
Speaker 1: was moving them. What I found on those recordings still
Speaker 1: gives me chills. There was something out there, something big
Speaker 1: and covered in dark fur, walking upright like a person,
Speaker 1: but way too large to be human. The footage showed
Speaker 1: it approaching my cameras, sniffing them, picking them up, and
Speaker 1: examining them like a curious animal might. But what got
Speaker 1: to me was how careful it was. Bears will bat
Speaker 1: at things, knock them around. This creature handled my equipment
Speaker 1: like it understood it was fragile. It would pick up
Speaker 1: a camera, turn it over, smell it, then set it
Speaker 1: down somewhere else. Over the next two weeks, I captured
Speaker 1: more footage. The creature was around the station almost every night.
Speaker 1: It would investigate everything, my supply, cash, my equipment, even
Speaker 1: my WISTE disposal area, like it was trying to understand
Speaker 1: what I was doing there. The thing was massive. Even
Speaker 1: on the grainy footage, I could tell it had to
Speaker 1: be eight feet tall, maybe more. The shoulders were enormous
Speaker 1: and the arms hung down almost to its knees. But
Speaker 1: it moved quietly, carefully, like it was being deliberate about
Speaker 1: not damaging anything. I never felt directly threatened, but knowing
Speaker 1: something that large was watching me every night, studying my routines,
Speaker 1: that changed how I felt about being alone in the wilderness.
Speaker 1: I started keeping my rifle closer, even though I wasn't
Speaker 1: sure bullets would do much good against something that size.
Speaker 1: When my assignment ended, I packed up everything and never
Speaker 1: looked back. I kept copies of the footage, but I
Speaker 1: never showed them to anyone. The quality wasn't great, and
Speaker 1: most of it just showed a large, dark shape moving
Speaker 1: around in the darkness. I requested transfer back to the
Speaker 1: Lower forty eight after that assignment. Told my supervisors I
Speaker 1: didn't like the isolation, which was true, but not for
Speaker 1: the reasons they thought. In nineteen ninety five, I was
Speaker 1: working in the bitter Root National Forest in Montana, beautiful country,
Speaker 1: but remote and wild. I was doing a routine patrol
Speaker 1: in late October when I came across a hunting camp
Speaker 1: that had been abandoned in a hurry. The camp was
Speaker 1: set up properly, good location, well organized, all the right equipment,
Speaker 1: but everything was just left there, tents still standing, gear
Speaker 1: scattered around, food left out like the hunters had dropped
Speaker 1: everything and ran. I found the hunters about a mile away,
Speaker 1: holed up in their truck on a forest road. Three
Speaker 1: guys from back East experienced hunters, but new to the
Speaker 1: Western Mountains. They were pretty shaken up. Said they'd had
Speaker 1: to abandon their camp because of dangerous wildlife. It took
Speaker 1: some talking to get the full story out of them.
Speaker 1: They'd been camped in that spot for two days, having
Speaker 1: good luck with elk, but on their second night they
Speaker 1: started he hearing things that didn't belong, trees being broken,
Speaker 1: loud crashes echoing through the forest. The oldest hunter, a
Speaker 1: guy named Frank, said it sounded like someone was clearing
Speaker 1: land with heavy machinery, but they were eight miles from
Speaker 1: the nearest road, no way to get equipment into that area.
Speaker 1: When they investigated in the morning, they found trees that
Speaker 1: had been broken off about eight feet from the ground.
Speaker 1: Not cut down, broken snapped like twigs. These were mature furs,
Speaker 1: six and eight inches across. Whatever broke them had to
Speaker 1: be incredibly strong. Frank had been logging before he retired,
Speaker 1: and he said it would take a machine to break
Speaker 1: trees that size, but there were no tire tracks, no
Speaker 1: signs of machinery. The second night, they heard something moving
Speaker 1: around their camp. Heavy footsteps, but careful and deliberate, like
Speaker 1: something large was walking around their tents, checking them out.
Speaker 1: They stayed inside and waited for morning. When they emerged,
Speaker 1: they found footprints all around their camp. Frank showed me
Speaker 1: photos he'd taken with the disposable camera. The prints were enormous,
Speaker 1: clearly showing tow impressions and the shape of a human foot,
Speaker 1: but way too big for any person. But what really
Speaker 1: spooked them was what they found at their truck. They'd
Speaker 1: parked it about a quarter mile from camp, thinking it
Speaker 1: would be safer there. When they checked on it the
Speaker 1: next morning, something had been examining it. There were large
Speaker 1: handprints on the windows and body panels, like something had
Speaker 1: been pressing against the glass trying to see inside. Frank
Speaker 1: said the handprints were huge, much larger than human hands,
Speaker 1: but they showed finger impressions, thumbs, everything you'd expect from
Speaker 1: a hand, just impossibly large. The third night, they didn't
Speaker 1: wait around to see what would happen. They packed up
Speaker 1: their essential gear and hiked out to their truck in
Speaker 1: the dark, leaving most of their equipment behind. I went
Speaker 1: back to their campsite after talking to them. Everything was
Speaker 1: just as they described. Broken trees, footprints, gear left scattered around,
Speaker 1: and stay tuned for more Sasquatch ott to see We'll
Speaker 1: be right back. After these messages, the footprints were deep
Speaker 1: and clear, showing details that convinced me these weren't fake.
Speaker 1: I took some photos and measurements, but I never filed
Speaker 1: an official report. What was I going to say that
Speaker 1: some unknown creature had harassed hunters and left impossible footprints.
Speaker 1: I kept the documentation, but it stayed in my personal files.
Speaker 1: The hunters never came back to Montana. Frank sent me
Speaker 1: a letter a few months later saying they decided to
Speaker 1: stick to hunting closer to home. Can't say I blame them.
Speaker 1: I was doing a training assignment in Colorado in two
Speaker 1: thousand and three, working with rangers in the Roosevelt National Forest.
Speaker 1: That's where I met a family who'd had an experience
Speaker 1: that still bothers me when I think about it. They
Speaker 1: were from Denver, mother, father, teenage daughter, experienced campers who'd
Speaker 1: been visiting the now National Forests for years. They came
Speaker 1: to our office after a backcountry camping trip, asking if
Speaker 1: we'd had any reports of unusual wildlife activity in the
Speaker 1: area they'd been visiting. The father was an engineer, very
Speaker 1: methodical guy. He laid out their story like he was
Speaker 1: giving a technical presentation. They'd been camping near a remote
Speaker 1: lake three days and two nights in an area where
Speaker 1: they didn't see another person the whole time. First two
Speaker 1: days were perfect, good weather, nice fishing, saw the usual wildlife.
Speaker 1: The daughter was into photography and had been taking pictures constantly,
Speaker 1: documenting everything from wildflowers to wildlife. On their last night,
Speaker 1: they were sitting around the campfire when they heard something
Speaker 1: moving in the forest across the lake. Heavy sounds, like
Speaker 1: something large was walking through the trees, but not random
Speaker 1: like an animal foraging, more purposeful, like it was patrolling
Speaker 1: or searching for something. The father scanned the tree line
Speaker 1: with a flashlight but couldn't see anything. The sounds continued
Speaker 1: for maybe an hour, something moving through the forest, stopping occasionally,
Speaker 1: then moving again. Sometimes they could hear branches breaking, like
Speaker 1: whatever it was didn't care about moving quietly. Then they
Speaker 1: smelled it. The mother described it as like a zoo
Speaker 1: on a hot day, thick and musky. The smell got
Speaker 1: stronger as whatever was out there got closer to their camp.
Speaker 1: It was so strong it made them gag. The daughter
Speaker 1: had been experimenting with the night vision setting on her
Speaker 1: camera and she managed to get one shot of something
Speaker 1: standing at the tree line. The image showed a massive
Speaker 1: figure covered in dark hair, standing upright between two pine trees,
Speaker 1: maybe sixty yards from their camp. The thing was huge,
Speaker 1: had to be at least seven feet tall, with shoulders
Speaker 1: that looked impossibly broad. It was just standing there, and
Speaker 1: in the night vision image you could see it was
Speaker 1: looking toward their camp, not moving, just watching them. They
Speaker 1: hiked out that night five mi aisles of rough trail
Speaker 1: by flashlight. Said they'd rather risk getting lost than spend
Speaker 1: another hour in that place with something that size watching
Speaker 1: them from the darkness. The father brought the camera to
Speaker 1: our office and showed me the image. The night vision
Speaker 1: made everything look greenish, but you could clearly see it
Speaker 1: wasn't any normal animal. The proportions were all wrong, too tall,
Speaker 1: too broad, arms that hung down too far. What got
Speaker 1: to me was thinking about how long it might have
Speaker 1: been watching them before they noticed the way it was
Speaker 1: positioned in the trees, perfectly still just observing their camp
Speaker 1: like a predator studying prey, but without any apparent intention
Speaker 1: to attack. The family stopped backcountry camping after that experience.
Speaker 1: They still visit the National forests, but only in developed
Speaker 1: campgrounds where there are other people around. Can't say I
Speaker 1: blame them. I kept a copy of that photo. I
Speaker 1: look at it sometimes, trying to make sense of what
Speaker 1: I'm seeing. The quality isn't grey, but there's definitely something there,
Speaker 1: something that shouldn't exist. By twenty ten, I was working
Speaker 1: special assignments, and that summer I got sent to investigate
Speaker 1: complaints about aggressive wildlife in the North Cascades. A research
Speaker 1: station had been having problems with equipment being destroyed and
Speaker 1: researchers being intimidated by what they described as unusually large
Speaker 1: and bold bears. The station was only accessible by helicopter,
Speaker 1: about fifteen miles from the nearest trail. When I arrived,
Speaker 1: I could see why the researchers were concerned. Equipment had
Speaker 1: been damaged all around the facility, not randomly destroyed, but
Speaker 1: systematically dismantled. Solar panels had been ripped off their mounts,
Speaker 1: weather instruments had been pulled apart, and supply containers had
Speaker 1: been opened and their contents scattered. But this wasn't bear damage.
Speaker 1: Bears tear things apart looking for food, and they leave
Speaker 1: claw marks and bite marks. This looked more like something
Speaker 1: had been taking equipment apart, piece by piece, exam how
Speaker 1: it was constructed. I spent two weeks at the station
Speaker 1: documenting the damage and trying to establish patterns. The destruction
Speaker 1: always happened at night, and it was getting more aggressive.
Speaker 1: Whatever was doing this seemed to be escalating its behavior.
Speaker 1: On my third night, I found out why. Around two am,
Speaker 1: I heard something moving around outside the station. Heavy footsteps
Speaker 1: but too deliberate for a bear. I watched from the
Speaker 1: window as a massive figure approached the facility. It was enormous,
Speaker 1: easily eight feet tall, with a frame that looked like
Speaker 1: it could weigh five hundred pounds, covered in thick, dark hair,
Speaker 1: and moving with surprising agility for something so large, and
Speaker 1: it was clearly agitated about something. The creature went straight
Speaker 1: to the equipment I'd set up earlier that day, motion
Speaker 1: sensors and recording devices. It didn't just destroy them randomly.
Speaker 1: It systematically dismantled each piece, examining it briefly, then throwing
Speaker 1: the parts away with obvie frustration. I watched for over
Speaker 1: an hour as it methodically destroyed everything I'd brought to
Speaker 1: the station. But what scared me was the intelligence behind
Speaker 1: its actions. This wasn't random vandalism. It was targeted destruction
Speaker 1: of specific equipment, like it understood what each device was
Speaker 1: for and didn't want to be monitored. When it finished
Speaker 1: with my equipment, it turned its attention to the station itself.
Speaker 1: It began testing the structural supports, pushing against the walls,
Speaker 1: examining the roof attachments, like it was deciding whether to
Speaker 1: demolish the entire facility. That's when I realized what was happening.
Speaker 1: The research station had been built in this creature's territory,
Speaker 1: and it was trying to drive away the human intruders.
Speaker 1: The systematic equipment destruction wasn't random, it was a message.
Speaker 1: I packed up and left the next morning, recommending that
Speaker 1: the station be relocated. In my report, I cited unstable
Speaker 1: geological conditions as the reason for the recommendation. The real
Speaker 1: reas and would have gotten me laughed out of the
Speaker 1: Forest Service. The station was eventually abandoned after researchers continued
Speaker 1: to report equipment problems in what they described as intimidation
Speaker 1: behavior from local wildlife. Last I heard, the area had
Speaker 1: been designated as sensitive habitat and was off limits to
Speaker 1: research activities. Sometimes territorial animals will defend their space against
Speaker 1: human intrusion. Usually that means bears or mountain lions. But
Speaker 1: what I observed that night was something much larger and
Speaker 1: more intelligent, defending its territory the only way it knew how,
Speaker 1: by making human presence impossible to maintain. I was working
Speaker 1: a temporary assignment in Kentucky in twenty fifteen, helping with
Speaker 1: fire management planning in the Daniel Boone National Forest. That's
Speaker 1: where I met Tom, a state police officer who'd been
Speaker 1: patrolling the rural areas around the forest for over fifteen years.
Speaker 1: Tom came to our office one morning, looking like he
Speaker 1: hadn't slept. Said he needed to talk to someone about
Speaker 1: an incident from the night before, but he wasn't sure
Speaker 1: how to classify it. When I asked what kind of incident,
Speaker 1: he said I needed to hear the whole story before
Speaker 1: I'd believe it. He'd been patrolling State Route eighty, one
Speaker 1: of those winding mountain roads that cuts through some of
Speaker 1: the most remote areas of eastern Kentucky. It was around
Speaker 1: three a m. When his headlights caught something standing in
Speaker 1: the middle of the road about fifty yards ahead. At first,
Speaker 1: he thought it was a person, maybe someone whose car
Speaker 1: had broken down, but as he got closer he realized
Speaker 1: whatever it was was much too large to be human.
Speaker 1: It was standing upright on two legs, but it had
Speaker 1: to be at least eight feet tall, with shoulders that
Speaker 1: looked impossibly broad. Tom stopped his patrol car and turned
Speaker 1: on his spotlight. What he saw made him reach for
Speaker 1: his radio, but they were in a dead zone where
Speaker 1: the mountains blocked the signal. He was on his own.
Speaker 1: The thing in the road was covered in thick, dark
Speaker 1: hair and built like nothing he'd ever seen. The arms
Speaker 1: hung down almost to its knees, and the head was assive,
Speaker 1: much larger than a human head. But it was looking
Speaker 1: directly at his patrol car, studying it like it was
Speaker 1: trying to decide what to do. Tom said, the most
Speaker 1: unsettling thing was how intelligent it looked. This wasn't some
Speaker 1: mindless animal. It was clearly thinking, evaluating the situation, and
Speaker 1: it didn't seem afraid of the patrol car or the spotlight.
Speaker 1: For maybe five minutes, they just looked at each other,
Speaker 1: Tom sitting in his car, this massive creature standing in
Speaker 1: the road. Then it did something that convinced Tom he
Speaker 1: was dealing with something beyond his experience. It stepped to
Speaker 1: the side of the road and gestured for him to pass,
Speaker 1: not like a person would gesture, but a clear indication
Speaker 1: that it was moving out of the way. Tom drove
Speaker 1: passed slowly, and the creature watched him the entire time.
Speaker 1: In his rear view mirror, he could see it step
Speaker 1: back into the road after he'd passed. Tom drove to
Speaker 1: the nearest area with radio coverage and called for backup,
Speaker 1: but by the time another unit arrived, there was There's
Speaker 1: nothing there, no footprints on the asphalt, no evidence that
Speaker 1: anything had happened. But Tom knew what he'd seen. He'd
Speaker 1: been a police officer for fifteen years, trained to observe
Speaker 1: and evaluate threats. What he'd encountered wasn't a bear standing
Speaker 1: on its hind legs or a person in a costume.
Speaker 1: It was something that belonged in those mountains, something that
Speaker 1: understood human behavior well enough to recognize a police car
Speaker 1: and respond appropriately. The thing that bothered Tom most was
Speaker 1: how the creature had handled the encounter. No aggression, no fear,
Speaker 1: just calm evaluation and accommodation like it was used to
Speaker 1: dealing with humans and knew how to avoid conflict. Tom
Speaker 1: never patrolled that stretch of road alone again. He requested
Speaker 1: reassignment to areas closer to town, saying he preferred community
Speaker 1: policing to rural patrol work. But he told me the
Speaker 1: real reason he didn't want another encounter with something that
Speaker 1: was clearly more intelligent than any animal had a right
Speaker 1: to be. I kept in touch with Tom for a
Speaker 1: few years after that assignment. He eventually transferred to a
Speaker 1: different department, taking a job in urban law enforcement, where
Speaker 1: the biggest wildlife concern was stray dogs. Said he'd had
Speaker 1: enough of the mountains and whatever lived in them. During
Speaker 1: a training program in Michigan in twenty seventeen, I met
Speaker 1: a fishing guide named Mike who'd been working the remote
Speaker 1: lakes and rivers of the Upper Peninsula for over twenty years.
Speaker 1: Mike was the kind of guy who knew every creek
Speaker 1: in Beaver Pond within one hundred miles, someone who'd spent
Speaker 1: more nights alone in the wilderness than most people spend indoors.
Speaker 1: But Mike came to our office that summer with a
Speaker 1: story that had clearly shaken him. He'd been guiding clients
Speaker 1: on a multi day fishing trip in one of the
Speaker 1: most remote areas of the Ottawa National Forest when they'd
Speaker 1: encountered something that made him question everything he thought he
Speaker 1: knew about the local wildlife. The trip was supposed to
Speaker 1: be five days of fishing on a series of connected
Speaker 1: lakes that required a two day hike just to reach
Speaker 1: and stay tuned for more sasquatch ott to see we'll
Speaker 1: be right back after these messages. Mike had been using
Speaker 1: the area for years without incident. It was perfect for
Speaker 1: clients who wanted to fish waters that hadn't seen much
Speaker 1: pressure from other anglers. On their third night, they were
Speaker 1: camped on a small island in the middle of the
Speaker 1: largest lake. Mike had chosen the spot because it offered
Speaker 1: good fishing and natural protection from bears and other wildlife.
Speaker 1: What he didn't expect was something that could swim around. Midnight,
Speaker 1: Mike was awakened by the sound of something moving through
Speaker 1: the water around their island. At first, he thought it
Speaker 1: might be a moose. They're strong swimmers and not uncommon
Speaker 1: in that area, but the swimming pattern was too regular,
Speaker 1: too purposeful. Mike looked out from his tent and saw
Speaker 1: something in the water. A massive figure was swimming toward
Speaker 1: their island with powerful, steady strokes, too large to be human,
Speaker 1: but moving through the water with more skill than any
Speaker 1: animal he'd ever seen. The creature reached the shallow water
Speaker 1: around the island and stood up. Even in the poor light,
Speaker 1: Mike could see it was enormous, at least eight feet tall,
Speaker 1: with a frame that looked powerful enough to break trees.
Speaker 1: It was covered in thick, dark hair that seemed to
Speaker 1: shed water like an animal's coat. For the next hour,
Speaker 1: Mike watched as the creature explored their island. It moved
Speaker 1: around the perimeter, examining their equipment, checking their canoes. It
Speaker 1: was clearly curious about their presence, but it moved carefully, quietly,
Speaker 1: like it was trying not to wake them. The most
Speaker 1: unsettling moment came when the creature approached Mike's tent. He
Speaker 1: could see its shadow on the tent wall as it
Speaker 1: crouched down next to where he was lying. For several minutes,
Speaker 1: it stayed there so close that Mike could hear its breathing,
Speaker 1: deep steady breaths that were definitely not human. Then it
Speaker 1: made a sound, a low rumbling vocalization that Mike felt
Speaker 1: in his chest. Not aggressive, more like a question, like
Speaker 1: it was trying to communicate something but didn't know how.
Speaker 1: Mike's client was awake by then, and they both lay
Speaker 1: perfectly still until the creature moved away. They could hear
Speaker 1: it walking around the island for another hour, then the
Speaker 1: sound of it entering the water again. When Mike looked out,
Speaker 1: he could see it swimming back toward the main shore
Speaker 1: with the same powerful strokes. In the morning, they found
Speaker 1: evidence of the creature's visit everywhere, large footprints in the sand,
Speaker 1: impressions that showed clear toe structure and measured over eighteen
Speaker 1: inches in length. The creature had examined all their equipment,
Speaker 1: but nothing was damaged or moved. Mike and his client
Speaker 1: cut their trip short, packing up and hiking out that morning.
Speaker 1: The client was excited about what they'd witnessed, but Mike
Speaker 1: was deeply unsettled. In twenty years of guiding in that area,
Speaker 1: he'd never encountered anything that made him feel so completely
Speaker 1: outmatched in his own environment. The thing that bothered Mike
Speaker 1: most was how easily the creature had moved through the water,
Speaker 1: swimming between islands, approaching their camp from an angle he'd
Speaker 1: never considered. It suggested a level of adaptation to the
Speaker 1: wilderness that went far beyond anything he'd encountered. Mike sold
Speaker 1: Is guiding business two years later, saying he wanted to
Speaker 1: try something different, but he told me the real reason.
Speaker 1: The wilderness didn't feel empty anymore. It felt occupied by
Speaker 1: something that was watching, learning, and adapting to human presence
Speaker 1: in ways that made him uncomfortable. I spent twenty five
Speaker 1: years in the deep woods, and I saw things that
Speaker 1: don't fit into our normal understanding of what is supposed
Speaker 1: to live in North American forests. I'm not talking about
Speaker 1: mystical creatures or ancient legends. I'm talking about something real,
Speaker 1: something that's adapted to living in the wilderness better than
Speaker 1: we ever could. These creatures, whatever they are, aren't the
Speaker 1: gentle giants some people want to believe in their territorial
Speaker 1: intelligent and powerful enough to be dangerous when they want
Speaker 1: to be, but they also seem to understand that avoiding
Speaker 1: humans is usually the best strategy for survival. The encounters
Speaker 1: I've described happened to me and people I trusted over
Speaker 1: the course of my career. I documented what I could
Speaker 1: kept photos and measurements, but I never made it official.
Speaker 1: How do you file a report about something that officially
Speaker 1: doesn't exist. What connects all these stories is the behavior
Speaker 1: I observed. These aren't mindless animals acting on instinct. They're
Speaker 1: intelligent enough to evaluate situations, make decisions, and adapt their
Speaker 1: behavior based on circumstances. They understand human activity well enough
Speaker 1: to avoid detection most of the time, but they're also
Speaker 1: territorial enough to defend their space when they feel threatened.
Speaker 1: The systematic equipment destruction I witnessed in Washington wasn't random vandalism.
Speaker 1: It was targeted behavior designed to drive away human intrusion.
Speaker 1: I think there's a population of these creatures living in
Speaker 1: the most remote areas of North American foreststs. They've learned
Speaker 1: to avoid human contact, but they're also curious enough to
Speaker 1: study our behavior when they think they can do it safely.
Speaker 1: The intelligence I observed suggests they're much more than simple animals.
Speaker 1: They understand technology well enough to examine and manipulate it.
Speaker 1: They recognize vehicles and equipment. They can evaluate threats and
Speaker 1: respond appropriately. Now that I'm retired, I figure it's time
Speaker 1: to share what I experienced. Maybe it'll help other people
Speaker 1: understand that the wilderness isn't empty. It's occupied by something
Speaker 1: we don't fully understand, something that's been there longer than
Speaker 1: we have. I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything.
Speaker 1: I'm just telling you what happened to me during twenty
Speaker 1: five years of walking forest trails and spending nights alone
Speaker 1: in places where most people never go. You can believe
Speaker 1: it or not, that's up to you. But if you
Speaker 1: spend time in the deep woods, pay attention to things
Speaker 1: that don't quite fit, equipment that gets moved without explanation,
Speaker 1: signs of intelligence, and places where you don't expect to
Speaker 1: find it, and remember that you're not alone out there.
Speaker 1: The wilderness has rules, and the most important one is respect.
Speaker 1: Respect for the environment, respect for the wildlife, and respect
Speaker 1: for the things you might encounter that you don't understand.
Speaker 1: Because there are things in those forests that are bigger, stronger,
Speaker 1: and smarter than you are, and they've been watching us
Speaker 1: a lot longer than we may care to admit. They say,
Speaker 1: you don't gotta go home, but you can't stay.
Speaker 3: Out. The joy this job, that time, everything came right
Speaker 3: by poking back joy from me.
Speaker 4: Joy staying right you come in right away. Steps still
Speaker 4: step step step steps.
Speaker 1: Do not do
Speaker 4: Ussas state passing states BASS used these ps