Speaker 1: Okay, welcome to the podcast. I have one story in
Speaker 1: this episode. I got this email fairly recently, and it
Speaker 1: is a bigfoot encounter in near Cave Run Lake in Kentucky.
Speaker 1: Wasn't there a big story about a bigfoot sighting near
Speaker 1: a campground near Cave Run Lake. I'm trying to remember
Speaker 1: where Cave Rn I lived in that state for ten years.
Speaker 1: I can't remember exactly where it is. It seems like
Speaker 1: Cave Run is over in eastern Kentucky, but it might
Speaker 1: be it might be down around Mammo Springs. That's where Wait,
Speaker 1: is that the big Cave System. I don't know what
Speaker 1: I'm talking about. I've been to all these places. I
Speaker 1: fished Cave Run. I just can't remember where it is.
Speaker 1: I fished a bunch of lakes in that state. It's
Speaker 1: a different kind of fishing than I was raised on,
Speaker 1: but I enjoyed it. It was fun. Went muskie fishing
Speaker 1: one time. I think it was at Caveron Lake and
Speaker 1: the guy was with caught a musky. He said, he said,
Speaker 1: that's a fish of a thousand casts. I thought, dude,
Speaker 1: that's pretty cool. It wasn't a huge fish, but anyway,
Speaker 1: there must be kind of sparse. I don't know anyway
Speaker 1: back to the story. This is an exciting story, so
Speaker 1: hold on to the old weaves. Here we go. After
Speaker 1: forty five years of hunting and being in the woods
Speaker 1: and being successful and harvesting everything from coyotes, deer, turkey, bear,
Speaker 1: and other types of small game, I will be selling
Speaker 1: my guns, equipment and donating all my camo. I think
Speaker 1: I need some sort of therapy or medication to deal
Speaker 1: with what happened to me this past turkey season. I'm
Speaker 1: afraid to tell anyone, including my family and even my
Speaker 1: hunting buddies. I can't go to a shrink or tell
Speaker 1: my doctor because I'm afraid I'll be sent to the
Speaker 1: hospital for observation. I don't know for sure, but that
Speaker 1: might be a good thing to allow me time to
Speaker 1: sort this out in my head. I have opted to
Speaker 1: reach out to you and tell you my story and
Speaker 1: recount what happened to me the last weekend of April
Speaker 1: in the Cave Run Lake region of Kentucky, while hunting
Speaker 1: turkey by myself. I had already harvested one bird with
Speaker 1: a bow and called in several gobblers for my friends.
Speaker 1: So this was going to be my own time with
Speaker 1: mother nature and me having a battle of wits with
Speaker 1: an educated thunder chicken. It started like every other spring
Speaker 1: turkey hunt I have ever been on, in which I
Speaker 1: was up at four am, in the woods at five
Speaker 1: point thirty and at the top of a ridge. By
Speaker 1: six am, the birds, which had been quiet this year,
Speaker 1: roared to the rising sun, and I had my choice
Speaker 1: of five different directions to follow the gobbling. I knew
Speaker 1: my way around the area like I knew my own home,
Speaker 1: having hunted that region since I was thirteen, so I
Speaker 1: decided to take the ridge to a point that opened
Speaker 1: into a small clearing that dropped off on both sides
Speaker 1: and had a sawbriar thicket that ran adjacent to the backside.
Speaker 1: The bird was still in the tree when I set
Speaker 1: up one hundred and fifty yards away from it, and
Speaker 1: I increased the frequency of my calls, mixing in clucks
Speaker 1: and yelps and some very sexy cuts and cackles, and
Speaker 1: I had this bird fired up. I was cutting him off,
Speaker 1: and he was cutting me off with double and triple gobbles.
Speaker 1: So I knew I was going home early that day.
Speaker 1: As on many occasions, this bird wanted to stay on
Speaker 1: the roost until he got a visual confirmation that he
Speaker 1: was not being catfished by an ugly hen. I played
Speaker 1: the long distance love song for twenty minutes, and then
Speaker 1: he went silent. I realized the entire forest was still,
Speaker 1: but I knew this bird was coming. Sometimes birds in
Speaker 1: this area will do that. They'll stop gobbling and approach
Speaker 1: in silence. I had my shotgun on my knee and
Speaker 1: my call was in my mouth, and I was completely
Speaker 1: undetectable with my back against a large black oak that
Speaker 1: was almost as white as my shoulders. I tucked in
Speaker 1: the tree fifteen feet from the clearing, and my eyes
Speaker 1: looked for movement from this bird. I had been sitting
Speaker 1: there motionless for fifteen minutes when something reached around the
Speaker 1: tree from both directions, and with the top hand it
Speaker 1: grabbed my mouth and neck, pulling it back against the tree,
Speaker 1: and the other hand was around my waist, which also
Speaker 1: pulled my gun into my gut. I was unable to
Speaker 1: move anything other than my feet, and the more I kicked,
Speaker 1: the tighter its grip was on my waist until I
Speaker 1: stopped kicking. At that point, it relaxed its grip just
Speaker 1: a little. My eyes rolled wide, searching to see what
Speaker 1: had me in its grip. It was blurry, but I
Speaker 1: could see its hands and its arm as it held
Speaker 1: my face. It was a dark brown hair covered arm
Speaker 1: in areas where there was no hair, it was callous,
Speaker 1: dark gray skin, and thick fingers like a gorilla. I
Speaker 1: could not move my head, and I struggled to get
Speaker 1: air in the gaps between its fingers. If I kicked,
Speaker 1: the grip tightened, so I did my best to relax
Speaker 1: so that I could breathe. I focused on the sunlit
Speaker 1: fiel just outside the trees in front of me, and
Speaker 1: I tried to take in a measured breath. My heart
Speaker 1: rate began to drop just a little, and I relaxed
Speaker 1: just enough to think. When a doe walked out into
Speaker 1: the grass, I noticed her colors right away, that light
Speaker 1: brown tone that blazed in the sun against the new
Speaker 1: spring grass. I focused on her and I almost fell
Speaker 1: into a trance. She was panting and blowing after a minute,
Speaker 1: and then began to stomp, obviously trying to get us
Speaker 1: to move. They know when something is not right in
Speaker 1: the woods. A black streak shot across her and she
Speaker 1: went down. It was so fast that I almost missed it,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The creature
Speaker 1: that had me tightened its grips lightly and took my
Speaker 1: mind away from the show in front of us. Another
Speaker 1: creature came into view and hovered over the deer, which
Speaker 1: was only quivering now in its death rattle. It raised
Speaker 1: its head. It was a dog like head with ears erect,
Speaker 1: and it scanned the area, made a clicking sound that
Speaker 1: I had never heard, and it raised its muzzle into
Speaker 1: the air and lifted its front jaws and white things
Speaker 1: shone in the sun. They had to be three inches long.
Speaker 1: It howled, and it was answered immediately by another howl
Speaker 1: not too far away. Less than a minute later, there
Speaker 1: were two of these werewolves standing in the clearing, devouring
Speaker 1: the dough. I will never experience fear like that again,
Speaker 1: I'm sure of that. My thoughts went back to whatever
Speaker 1: had me pinned against the tree, and I knew I
Speaker 1: was next on the menu. In a matter of just
Speaker 1: a few minutes, the deer carcass was gone, with only
Speaker 1: a large bloody patch on the ground. As they bit
Speaker 1: through the meat and the bones, swallowing mouthfuls as if
Speaker 1: it were a race to see which beasts could consume
Speaker 1: the most meat, and as fast as it began, it
Speaker 1: was over, and both creatures turned toward the backside of
Speaker 1: the clearing and began to sniff the air, at which
Speaker 1: time my heart sank into my stomach and my fight
Speaker 1: or flight instincts were in overload. Had I not been captive,
Speaker 1: I would have been running at that point, which would
Speaker 1: have been the worst mistake I could make. The creature
Speaker 1: started to look in my direction, and I could tell
Speaker 1: that they knew something was out of place. The head
Speaker 1: of the monster that held me against the tree came
Speaker 1: briefly into my peripheral view, and it let out a
Speaker 1: tremendous roar, so loud that I lost my hearing in
Speaker 1: my right ear for the rest of that day. The
Speaker 1: pair of beasts in the field took one step toward
Speaker 1: my location. They had not moved afoot when several roars
Speaker 1: lit up the area. I don't know how many there were,
Speaker 1: but a few, maybe four or five, and they all
Speaker 1: roared at one time, and just like that, the two
Speaker 1: dog creatures turned and bolted out of view, followed by
Speaker 1: a massive explosion of movement around me as the second
Speaker 1: group burst into pursuit of the dog creatures, leaving me
Speaker 1: held against the tree by my captor. The hand that
Speaker 1: held my waist grabbed my gun and snatched it out
Speaker 1: of my hands and threw it into the trees, and
Speaker 1: then it released my mouth. It took me a minute
Speaker 1: to gather my senses, but I got to my feet
Speaker 1: and I started to run to my shotgun. I didn't
Speaker 1: see my captor anywhere. As I took the first few steps,
Speaker 1: I couldn't see the gun, but I knew which way
Speaker 1: he had thrown it. Like a flash, it was in
Speaker 1: front of me, blocking my way. One more step and
Speaker 1: I would have bounced off the mast of beast. It
Speaker 1: groaned and it pushed me back onto the ground. Until
Speaker 1: that moment, I assumed these things all looked the same,
Speaker 1: like dogs. But what stood before me was different. It
Speaker 1: was bigger, and it was thicker. It was more heavy set.
Speaker 1: The color was not black, maybe it was dark brown.
Speaker 1: It towered over, and it's deep inhales and exhales intimidated
Speaker 1: me to no end. I locked onto its face, and
Speaker 1: I could see emotion and thought in those large dark eyes.
Speaker 1: Its nose was almost flat against its face, and its
Speaker 1: mouth could have held an NFL football. I got up
Speaker 1: and I ran. I ran down that trail that I
Speaker 1: came in on. But what had taken me over forty
Speaker 1: five minutes to travel before only took me maybe ten
Speaker 1: minutes to get back to my truck. And when I
Speaker 1: got in the truck, I kept the fast pace going
Speaker 1: and I flew down that gravel road, pushing the limit
Speaker 1: on how hard I could drive without putting it up
Speaker 1: a tree or over a cliff. A week later, my
Speaker 1: gun is still on that ridge near Cave Run Lake,
Speaker 1: and I'm not going in there to get it. I
Speaker 1: cannot sleep. I have called off work three days and
Speaker 1: I was sent home another. Some got as I work
Speaker 1: with walked in the bathroom and while I was in
Speaker 1: the middle of a crying episode. It was one of
Speaker 1: many I've had since this happened to me. I don't
Speaker 1: know what it is. I'm not a crier, but when
Speaker 1: the memories fled back in detail, I burst into a
Speaker 1: crying fit. I can't control it. I don't think the
Speaker 1: bigfoot type creatures meant me any harm, but I do
Speaker 1: believe I would have been consumed by those dogs slash
Speaker 1: wolf creatures if the Bigfoot had not wrapped me up.
Speaker 1: This is not a death I would want to experience.
Speaker 1: Right now, I'm so afraid of the woods. And now
Speaker 1: I drive an additional twenty minutes each day to drive
Speaker 1: to work on busy highways instead of county rows. I
Speaker 1: refused to sit on the porch anymore, which is something
Speaker 1: that I had cherished, spending time with my wife on
Speaker 1: the port, swinging and sipping sweet tea and listening to
Speaker 1: birds sing. I've even hired the kid down the street
Speaker 1: to cut my grass. I won't even get that close
Speaker 1: to the woods. My questions are, what should I do?
Speaker 1: Is there help for people who have had these experiences? Well,
Speaker 1: I'll be able to get past this and enjoy all
Speaker 1: those things I dearly loved in my past life. And
Speaker 1: that's the end of a story. That's Kentucky. That's not
Speaker 1: too far from me. I don't okay, run If I
Speaker 1: could remember where it is, I want to say it's
Speaker 1: on the east side of Lexington. That's some hilly country
Speaker 1: and there's some thick woods in there, and I'm sure
Speaker 1: there are other encounters in that area. But to this
Speaker 1: man's question, I mean, who do you talk to if
Speaker 1: you're in a war? And you come back with some
Speaker 1: terrible images in your head or memories of things that
Speaker 1: you've done. You can you know, psychiatrists know how to
Speaker 1: deal with that. In the military and even in civilian life,
Speaker 1: people equiped to deal to help you deal with those things.
Speaker 1: But I don't know where you go. And people have
Speaker 1: sent me first. I've been accused of not caring about
Speaker 1: people who've had these experiences, but it's kind of like this.
Speaker 1: I've never had that kind of experience, so I don't
Speaker 1: know what they're going through. I mean, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of things that people go through that I have sympathy
Speaker 1: for that may not look like I have sympathy for
Speaker 1: it because I've just never been through anything like that.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can just pick anything, you know. And
Speaker 1: I may have said this before, but the first thing
Speaker 1: we all think is, man, I'm glad that didn't happen
Speaker 1: to me. You don't say it. You don't say it,
Speaker 1: but you're thinking it. That's kind of what I was
Speaker 1: thinking when I was reading this man. This guy he
Speaker 1: needs to talk to somebody, But who does he talk
Speaker 1: to without being committed to the mental or mental floor
Speaker 1: of the hospital. I don't know. I wish I knew
Speaker 1: what to tell him. Maybe you guys, maybe there's a
Speaker 1: Bigfoot support group, you know, like a like a AA
Speaker 1: for Bigfoot encounter somewhere. If there isn't, there probably ought
Speaker 1: to be, because these people claim to have serious memories
Speaker 1: of this stuff. And I can sympathize with that, but
Speaker 1: I can't. I can't identify with it because I've never
Speaker 1: been through anything like that. But if I ever do
Speaker 1: go through something like that, I'm gonna tell you all
Speaker 1: about it. But I don't think Bigfoot even is interested
Speaker 1: in me. People see Bigfoot everywhere, and they see bigfoot
Speaker 1: sign everywhere. I never see anything, nothing, nothing, no signs,
Speaker 1: no nothing. But I don't know. I feel like I'm
Speaker 1: talking kind of slow. Am I talking too slow? I'm
Speaker 1: not sure. Sounds like I'm talking slow anyway. I had
Speaker 1: a few minutes this afternoon I've been writing Steve Lilly.
Speaker 1: I needed to take a break. I had to do
Speaker 1: a little editing on this, so that was I don't
Speaker 1: really like to do that, but sometimes I'll jump into it,
Speaker 1: and uh, it's kind of cathartic. Is that a word?
Speaker 1: Cathartic therapeutic? I don't know. I'm not very smart I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't have a big vocabulary. Cathartic sounds right, but
Speaker 1: it was kind of that way to edit this and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, get the get everything presentable to read. But
Speaker 1: I enjoyed reading it. I feel for this guy. If
Speaker 1: you guys have any advice for him, give him a comment.
Speaker 1: Let him know I didn't get this too long ago,
Speaker 1: so he's probably still listening. All right, man, thanks for
Speaker 1: the story. I'm sorry you're dealing with all that, but
Speaker 1: we will see you guys on the next podcast. Thanks
Speaker 1: for joining me.