Speaker 1: While I was in elementary school, my family lived in Lancaster, California,
Speaker 1: in the Mahave Desert. I loved that desert and spent
Speaker 1: a lot of time on my own, exploring and riding
Speaker 1: horses there all by myself. In the summer of nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty seven, once I finished sixth grade, we moved north
Speaker 1: to Bishop, California, on the eastern side of the Sierra
Speaker 1: Nevada Mountain Range. This is where my father grew up.
Speaker 1: He had family who lived in nearby Lone Pine, and
Speaker 1: they still did. Dad made the decision to move as
Speaker 1: a result of a deal with his partner, wherein they
Speaker 1: split the business geographically and Dad took over the northern half.
Speaker 1: In Lancaster, we spent a lot of time outdoors in
Speaker 1: the desert, and this didn't change when we moved to Bishop.
Speaker 1: It was an absolutely gorgeous place to live, and my
Speaker 1: love of nature grew as I was afforded the same
Speaker 1: freedom to roam and explore with my horse. As a family,
Speaker 1: we often traveled via our Willis jeep to remote spots
Speaker 1: where Dad taught us all about camping and how to
Speaker 1: fish and shoot rifles. One weekend, my mom and Dad
Speaker 1: me and four of my five siblings went on one
Speaker 1: of those camping trips to the mountains. Remote camping is
Speaker 1: exactly what it sounds like. There was no campground, no showers,
Speaker 1: and no playground for kids. It was just us in
Speaker 1: nature with no one else around for miles and miles.
Speaker 1: We set up camp at the end of the long
Speaker 1: clearing that had a nice fire burning as night fell.
Speaker 1: I loved camping back then. There just wasn't anything like
Speaker 1: sitting around the fire with my family and taking in
Speaker 1: all the feelings and sounds of the great outdoors. Eventually
Speaker 1: I needed to answer nature's call, and I had it
Speaker 1: away from the firelight along one side of the clearing.
Speaker 1: Once I felt I was far enough away from the camp,
Speaker 1: I squatted down behind a bush to empty my bladder.
Speaker 1: Our camp was to my right. As I stared straight
Speaker 1: across the clearing, suddenly I saw a large creature step
Speaker 1: out of the brush on the other side of the
Speaker 1: clearing about my one o'clock. It made no sound, as
Speaker 1: if it were trying to be quiet. I was immediately
Speaker 1: gripped with fear at the sight of something I had
Speaker 1: never seen before. I processed every possibility through my mind,
Speaker 1: but I could not identify it. I checked the bears
Speaker 1: off my list. This thing was big, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: shape quite right. Plus it looked too natural walking on
Speaker 1: two legs. I decided it had to be some kind
Speaker 1: of ape, not a chimp, gorilla, or orangutan. It was
Speaker 1: six feet tall and had a coat of medium length
Speaker 1: hair that looked golden or rusty. The full moon in
Speaker 1: the glow of the campfire provided more than enough light
Speaker 1: to allow me to see it incredibly well. I was terrified,
Speaker 1: but I was also an awe and more than a
Speaker 1: little curious. I sat perfectly still and made absolutely no
Speaker 1: sound as I watched it walk along the edge of
Speaker 1: the clearing away from the camp. Once it got to
Speaker 1: about my ten o'clock, it stepped back into the woodline
Speaker 1: and continued on its way. I held my position as
Speaker 1: I listened to its footfalls in the forest until I
Speaker 1: couldn't hear it anymore. Only then did I stand up,
Speaker 1: pull up my jeans, and head back to camp. As
Speaker 1: a young girl trying to analyze and understand what I
Speaker 1: had just witnessed, the thought occurred to me that it
Speaker 1: might be a member of my family messing with me.
Speaker 1: But I could see everyone sitting around the fire at
Speaker 1: the opposite end of the clearing from where this thing
Speaker 1: had slipped back into the woods. It had to be
Speaker 1: a real animal. There was just no way someone could
Speaker 1: be wearing a costume. Nevertheless, I made up my mind
Speaker 1: not to mention it to anyone, just in case. I
Speaker 1: figured if someone was messing with me, eventually they would
Speaker 1: be unable to resist saying something, so I kept my
Speaker 1: mouth shut and the subject never came up. That seemed
Speaker 1: to solidify my analysis that it had to be a
Speaker 1: real animal. My parents had been struggling with the business
Speaker 1: in their marriage as well. That next summer, they closed
Speaker 1: a business up north and sold our house in that
Speaker 1: beautiful place. We moved back down below, as we called
Speaker 1: southern California, back then to Riverside near Los Angeles, where
Speaker 1: my dad got a new job. A few months later,
Speaker 1: my parents divorced nineteen seventy two, Mom remarried, and we
Speaker 1: moved to Texas. I never told a soul about my
Speaker 1: encounter for years. Initially I didn't want to cause it
Speaker 1: any additional stress on my parents, who were having their
Speaker 1: own problems at the time. And then life went on
Speaker 1: and I pushed it to the back of my mind.
Speaker 1: Sometime in the nineteen nineties, I ended up sharing the
Speaker 1: entire experience with my husband. He is an open mind
Speaker 1: and trust me to be a person of integrity, and
Speaker 1: therefore he accepted my story as real. We've since spent
Speaker 1: a great deal of time analyzing my encounter, and he
Speaker 1: has had some excellent thoughts about it. First, since what
Speaker 1: I saw wasn't a giant of over seven feet tall
Speaker 1: like so many others have reported, he suggested that perhaps
Speaker 1: it was an adolescent. He also thought that its young
Speaker 1: age might have predisposed it toward curiosity about the strange
Speaker 1: creatures that had entered the remote territory. Also, the young
Speaker 1: sisquatch might have become alarmed when I left the campsite
Speaker 1: and headed closer to his observation point. My husband thinks
Speaker 1: it remained close to the edge of the clearing to
Speaker 1: reduce noise in the possibility of being seen. Finally, he
Speaker 1: posed the theory that the fact that it never made
Speaker 1: eye contact with me or even looked in my direction
Speaker 1: could be indicative of an animal behavior, and that they
Speaker 1: think if they can't see you, you can't see them.
Speaker 1: These thoughts all seemed feasible to me. I cannot describe
Speaker 1: the creature's facial features because I saw only the profile.
Speaker 1: I did not notice any bad odors, but I might
Speaker 1: have been upwind. Nor did I hear any sounds other
Speaker 1: than when it exited the clearing back into the brush.
Speaker 1: Around two thousand and eight, I finally mentioned my experience
Speaker 1: to my two sisters. I don't recall any reaction from
Speaker 1: my younger sister, but my older sister responded by laughingly
Speaker 1: saying that I must have seen a bear. I mentioned
Speaker 1: this because I want others who have had been ridiculed
Speaker 1: that I know how it feels. My advice is to
Speaker 1: not worry worry about what others think. Trust yourself to
Speaker 1: know what you saw. Well, it may seem incredible. I
Speaker 1: do know what I saw. I grew up to be
Speaker 1: a wife and a mother of three, a Girl Scout leader,
Speaker 1: a Sunday school teacher and a Little League team mom,
Speaker 1: a room mom at my kid's school, and a licensed,
Speaker 1: successful self employed realtor in Houston, Texas. Then I returned
Speaker 1: to university and became a registered nurse, and I retired
Speaker 1: after twenty five years. I'm sixty three years old now
Speaker 1: and enjoying my retirement in Costa Rica with my dear husband.
Speaker 1: I'm not a believer in Sasquatch, i am an observer
Speaker 1: of Sasquatch. And then she signs off, peace and love, Celeste.
Speaker 1: It was a weekend of my wife's Baby Steps five
Speaker 1: K Memorial Run at Tannehill State Park in Alabama. A
Speaker 1: couple of our friends founded the run to raise money
Speaker 1: for the Amelia Center division of Children's Hospital of Birmingham.
Speaker 1: The Amelia Sinner helps grieving parents who have lost children
Speaker 1: cope with the loss and learn how to go on
Speaker 1: with their lives. Abby and I, unfortunately know firsthand how
Speaker 1: consuming and unforgettable such a loss can be. We lost
Speaker 1: our twin boys, Brady and Brody, to pre term labor
Speaker 1: at five months. They weren't able to survive the delivery.
Speaker 1: This is hard to type and even think about, even
Speaker 1: thirteen years later, but God has blessed us with three
Speaker 1: handsome and fun loving boys. Bryant is eight years old
Speaker 1: we call him bub Bub. Barrett, who we call bear Bear,
Speaker 1: is three, and our two year old, whose real name
Speaker 1: is Brandon, we call Bobby. In addition to our sons,
Speaker 1: my nephew Nick or Nick Nick has lived with us
Speaker 1: as our own son all his life. I know what
Speaker 1: you're thinking, why Bobby, Well, we thought it was because
Speaker 1: Bear Bear, who was one when Bobby was born, was
Speaker 1: trying to save baby when we realized he could save
Speaker 1: baby just fine, So we figured we just wanted his
Speaker 1: brother to be called Bobby, and we went with it.
Speaker 1: We always stay in an old time cabin at Tannehill
Speaker 1: for three or four days of the week of the
Speaker 1: five k run, and this year was no different. We
Speaker 1: loved being in nature, and we especially love hiking, so naturally,
Speaker 1: after the run was over and Abby and the little
Speaker 1: ones were taking a nap, Nick, Bryant and I grabbed
Speaker 1: our walking sticks and we hit the trails. We had
Speaker 1: previously asked the rangers and the other park employees which
Speaker 1: trail would be the longest and least occupied. We'd been
Speaker 1: coming here the same month every year for the past
Speaker 1: eleven years, so we'd already been down roughly ninety percent
Speaker 1: of the hiking trails. Everyone suggested the same trails we'd
Speaker 1: already won, except for the maintenance man. He said we
Speaker 1: should follow the creek that runs through most of the park,
Speaker 1: but to be careful because it connected to privately owned
Speaker 1: land that is nothing but acres and acres of woods.
Speaker 1: The no trespassing signs have all fallen over the years,
Speaker 1: but if we stayed with the creek, we would be okay.
Speaker 1: We followed the maintenance man's instructions and had been walking
Speaker 1: the creek bank for a little over two hours, stopping
Speaker 1: to examine every bug, rock, and stick the boys found interesting.
Speaker 1: When we came to a fork in the trail, we
Speaker 1: stayed true to our course, but the creek trail soon ended.
Speaker 1: We weren't willing to call it a day yet, so
Speaker 1: we headed back to the fork and took the other
Speaker 1: trail to see where it went. It led us uphill
Speaker 1: away from the water, and we hiked another forty five
Speaker 1: minutes when it brought us back down to what must
Speaker 1: have been the wildest, deepest section of the creek. It
Speaker 1: was a peaceful, serene southern landscape that made me want
Speaker 1: to sit down on the bank and watch the clouds
Speaker 1: as the setting sun turned the sky to evening hughes.
Speaker 1: We were relaxing while I was letting Bryant beat me
Speaker 1: at tic tac toe because I'm a dad and that's
Speaker 1: what dads do. When Nick pointed out the fact that
Speaker 1: everything had gone silent. There were no bugs chirping or
Speaker 1: birds singing at all. Even the wind had gone silent,
Speaker 1: secretly reveling in Bryant's glee at each momentary lack of
Speaker 1: reason that would lead another victory for him. I glanced
Speaker 1: over at Nick and realized he was sitting there frozen
Speaker 1: in a shivering, frightened state. I jumped up and went
Speaker 1: over to him, with Bryant holding onto my belt loop.
Speaker 1: As we approached, we all saw movement in the thick
Speaker 1: brush on the opposite side of the creek, and then
Speaker 1: it happened, to our surprise, a massive rock the size
Speaker 1: of two tree truck tires stacked together, came flying out
Speaker 1: of that brush at an impossibly high arc and then
Speaker 1: splashed down in the creek, sending water up in the
Speaker 1: air like a geyser, with ripples in every direction. I
Speaker 1: was stunned for a minute or so, but I managed
Speaker 1: to come around, and then I grabbed Brian and literally
Speaker 1: had to shake Nick back to reality. Nick, you take
Speaker 1: the lead, I said, laying out our exit strategy. Bryan,
Speaker 1: stay in the middle and hold Nick's walking stick in
Speaker 1: one hand in mine in the other. I'll follow in
Speaker 1: the rear, and that'll keep us joined together and still
Speaker 1: give us room for fast walking. I had barely finished
Speaker 1: my instructions when a rain of small rocks came flying
Speaker 1: across the creek, some hitting the water, but most hitting
Speaker 1: the bank at our feet. We didn't wait another minute.
Speaker 1: We took off, heading towards the main trail and back
Speaker 1: to our cabin. Once we made it out of the
Speaker 1: woods and safely back to cabin, we sat on the
Speaker 1: porch and pondered what had happened. Nick would not, actually
Speaker 1: could not talk about what he saw that had frightened
Speaker 1: him into a near catatonic state. Brian only saw the
Speaker 1: rocks being thrown. I don't know what to think, but
Speaker 1: I can assure you I didn't see a catapult set
Speaker 1: up across the creek, nor any other mechanism that could
Speaker 1: throw a two hundred pound rock that high and that far.
Speaker 1: It made me think though about how far it could
Speaker 1: throw me. I am one hundred and seventy five pounds,
Speaker 1: so I know I could be thrown as far as
Speaker 1: the rock, and Brian is only about sixty five pounds.
Speaker 1: He'd land a mile away. It was eerie and weird,
Speaker 1: and I replay it in my mind frequently. The scariest
Speaker 1: thing to me was the lack of sound from the woods.
Speaker 1: What would make birds, squirrels, deer, frogs, and even the
Speaker 1: breeze stop. I'd love to hear your thought and the
Speaker 1: thoughts of your other listeners. I still have trouble coming
Speaker 1: to a conclusion about the events of that day. It's
Speaker 1: like I know what it was, but my mind won't
Speaker 1: accept it. Oh and by the way, on our way out,
Speaker 1: we realize we'd strayed thirty minutes outside of the park's
Speaker 1: borders into the neighboring woods. Well, Gary, first, let me
Speaker 1: say I'm really sorry that you and your wife lost
Speaker 1: your twin babies. That's heartbreaking. I've had some friends lose
Speaker 1: some kids and and there's no way for any of
Speaker 1: us who haven't to know how that feels. But all
Speaker 1: we can do is have some sort of non experience
Speaker 1: empathy for you. It just must be horrible, I mean,
Speaker 1: good grief. I just lost a dog about a month
Speaker 1: ago and it just kills me every day. But moving on,
Speaker 1: What a great dad you are and mom, what great
Speaker 1: parents you are to take your kids on these trips
Speaker 1: and to organize that five k run. What a great
Speaker 1: way to give back and use your path to do
Speaker 1: something good with But taking your kids on hikes, man,
Speaker 1: that's a great idea. These boys must be rare to
Speaker 1: go all the time. And I don't really know what
Speaker 1: to think about your experience. I mean, I cannot imagine
Speaker 1: anything that's natural in the woods that could throw a
Speaker 1: two hundred pound rock as big as two truck tires
Speaker 1: off of a bank and into the middle of a
Speaker 1: creek and blow water up in the air and then
Speaker 1: throw rocks at you and things like that. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: would have got out too, but I think if it
Speaker 1: was me, I would have trouble accepting it too. But
Speaker 1: you just have to realize that these things are probably there,
Speaker 1: and they don't like us in their habitat. They've been
Speaker 1: pushed out of so much habitat already, although we still
Speaker 1: have millions and millions and millions of acres for these
Speaker 1: things to live. I mean, if you travel across the
Speaker 1: United States, we haven't encroached that much, at least with
Speaker 1: urban development. Maybe with the farming and the agriculture we've ruined,
Speaker 1: not really ruined, but we've transformed the land to suit
Speaker 1: us and to benefit us and to provide for us,
Speaker 1: and that does push them out. But you know, there
Speaker 1: are so many sightings and so many experiences like this
Speaker 1: that apparently the population is doing okay, because based on
Speaker 1: the encounters, if you just took every story that I've
Speaker 1: done up to this date and you counted in, assuming
Speaker 1: every one of them is a separate entity or a
Speaker 1: separate being or Bigfoot, We've got hundreds and hundreds of
Speaker 1: these things in the United States and they're all over
Speaker 1: the place. They're in Canada, Alaska, the continental United States.
Speaker 1: Haven't heard anything from Hawaii yet, but even internationally, we've
Speaker 1: got stories from Europe and different places, the Philippines and
Speaker 1: Indonesia and different Australia is a place where we get
Speaker 1: a lot of stories. And so, you know, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of contradicting what I say. I don't know that that
Speaker 1: encroachment on their habitat is that big a deal, because
Speaker 1: there seems to be a lot I'm around. But again
Speaker 1: I'm just rambling saying whatever comes to my mind. But Carrie,
Speaker 1: I really appreciate the story, and again, best wishes to
Speaker 1: your family and I appreciate what you're doing. Thanks Carrie.