Well here in California it was a very nice day today, so I fired up the grill. It wasnt long before the neighbors were asking what was for dinner, and that led to some very interesting BF stories as we waited for the Tri-tip's to finish cooking.

I asked if any of them wanted to go camping this spring, when one of the neighbors told me he would love to since he was just given a bunch of camping gear, and a couple of rifles by one of his friends. He went on to tell us that the guy came over and gave him everything saying he will never go camping ever again.

He says that his friends went camping on the backside of a lake, and just after dark they were sitting around the fire drinking coffee, when all of a sudden this big hairy man looking thing jumped off the side of the hill right into the middle of them nearly landing in the campfire. It looked at them like it wanted them to leave, then made a deep growl and took off running into the dark.

He says that his friends girlfriend was so freaked out she couldnt talk for hours afterward, and is getting psychiatric help to this day. That is how he acquired all this camping gear. That really got my goosebumps going the way he described how it growled. Then the neighbor from across the street and his wife started telling their experience. I thought oh man this is too good LOL. I never met anyone besides myself and the friend that was with me that ever had an experience.

The guy and his wife says they were backpacking in the wilderness with her father fishing the high country creeks and lakes. One night they were also sitting around the campfire when they start hearing what they described as sounding like a woman being killed. They could hear the woman screaming, and also a deep growling, and says it was the most awful sounds, sounding like the woman was being ripped apart. They both have been backpacking for years and have run across most everything you could run into including bear and mountain lion. They say the growls were to deep and long to be anything they have ever heard.

This lasted a few minutes then all of a sudden it went quiet, then just as sudden something let out the longest, loudest scream they have ever heard, and have not heard since. They said the father was raised in the mountains and worked cattle in the high country for years. He said that it was sasquatch they heard killing a deer or something, and they didnt have to worry about anything because it would leave them alone. This happened just this last summer on their last 4 day hike/fishing trip, and it wont stop them from going again this coming summer.

Well to say the least this was by far one of the best BBQ's I have ever had, and you know I had to share my sighting with them. Now we are all planning a trip into the high country soon as they open the gates to look for our big furry local sasquatch.

Hi

Sounds like a good time, Bet you had a grin ear to ear

Peace
Tim

That's awesome. I have talked to a few people and heard some pretty cool experinces. One is from a contractor I have worked for off and on for quite a few years. He told me that while building a vacation/hunting cabin over in eastern OR he and the guy working for him had a really unnerving experience one night. They were staying in a small travel trailer about 200 yrds from the cabin. One night Tom the worker stepped out to take a leak. It was pitch black and he couldn't see his hand in front of his face. He could however hear something breathing as if only feet away. At this point he had fortunately finished and was nervously agitated. He slowly backed his way up the hill and into the trailer. Sie ( my contractor friend) said he could tell something was wrong. So he inquired, Tom told him something was out there. Nothing more was said. But, as they laid in there beds gripping there firearms they could here something breathing and walking around the trailer. Sie said they laid awake for about an hour before finally falling asleep.

Coincidentally, Sie (who I didn't even remember being there) reminded me of a time when we were working out in the woods and had a sighting. It was winter and we were out in the McCay Mt. wilderness burning brush piles. It was dark by the time we finished and the hills were semi lit up from all the burning piles. On the way out of the unit one of the crew noticed something and said to stop. We all looked down the hill to see something standing about 10 to 15 feet from a burning brush pile. We watched for maybe 30 seconds when the driver said he was ready to leave. What ever it was was huge as it appeared stand nearly as tall as the flames coming from the fire. I would say we were about a hundred yards uphill. The subject never moved that we could tell. Others suggested that it must have been a dead snag or something. The problem with that is we weren't allowed to build brush piles within 50 feet of any trees, alive or not. The dead ones were to be left as animal habitat. Anyway, that was one of my sitings.

Well a good friend decided he should tell us his story because none of us will think he is crazy. He thought he was the only one that had any experience with something in the woods, until the neighbor was telling him about the BBQ he missed. I do understand though, because the friend that was with me carried his sighting to the grave without talking to anyone but me because of fear of being called crazy.

This story is about 4 years old and happened only a few miles from where I saw BF. He says he and two friends went out deer hunting, and decided to take a boat to a campground only reachable by boat. They set up camp, and did an afternoon hunt. During dinner they decided that since the water level was going down, someone had to sleep with the boat so they could keep it in the water. He was chosen to be the one the first night, which happened to be the last night LOL.

He says once he was all snuggled in, something started hollering on the shore across from him. He said it was loud and scary sounding, and went on for about 20 minutes. then something answered the hollering with it's own hollering on his side of the lake. Now this scared him pretty bad, so he pushed off with the boat and went out into the middle of the lake to get away from the shore. He says he didnt sleep a wink because these things hollered all night long with long loud screams.

Just before daybreak the hollering stopped, and he went back to shore. His two friends were waiting for him and were scared, mad, and ready to leave. They told him that they sat back to back all night freakin out! The first thing they did was go looking for him, and he had left them, they were mortified because the screams were extremely loud, and moving all around them. He says they left never to return to that place again. On the way home they decided not to tell anyone because it sounded crazy even to them.

These guys live in the woods and are avid hunters. He told me later on that there is a few more stories he could tell me, and although he has never set eyes on one, he knows that BF was makin those screams that night. Nothing could scream that loud, or long, that he has ever heard of.

Interesting stories. I love reading things like this. Heck, come to think of it, someone ought to start a thread on 2nd, 3rd, or even 4th hand stories. I always find them interesting. It's amazing the things you hear when you start talking to other people about experiences you've had.

Here's my second hand story....



So I grew up and still live in Central Connecticut right on the line of Litchfield County. Unlike lots of portrayals you see of Connecicut on television it's really a place with lots of forest and lots of swamps. I guess the difference between here and the PNW or the vaster areas of teh SOuth is pretty much just how we would define "remote". While there is probably not as many untouched tracts of land here as in other parts there are plentyof places that are real hard to reach or off the beaten track. So much so that in a Sate Forest here while hiking way off trail I came across a rather flourishing weed farm a couple eyars back. It was not miles from society either just in aplace that is ahrd to reach and there is no real reason to go there.



Anyway, when I was kid I used to hang out in Winsted alot with my cousin who is now a forest ranger up in Maine. One day he told me a story about how he and his brother were down playing near a creek in the American Legion State Forest as it was and still is a popular place for camping and picnics and such.



Anyway, they heard grunts and such and then they saw a hairy manbeast picking berries off a bush on the other side of the creek and it started throwing rocks at them and howling. Of course, being 11 at the time, they ran back to their campsite terrified and they told my uncle but he just wrote it off as a bear despite their insistance that it was a monster.



Bears, by the way, were nowhere near as common in Connecticut back then as they are now.



Anyway, they never once called the critter Bigfoot. They always called it "The Berry Monster". It's one of the first stories I ever heard when I was a kid and one of those like the Boggy creek movie that sort of lefty a lasting impression on me when I was akid.

Ha, heard some freaky sounds in the woods on a few occasions myself! I hate to admit it, but I've slept in the truck more than once as the tent or on the ground wasn't "get'n it" for me...and when I've waaaay back in the woods with no vehicle I've made some pretty big camp fires to scare away the boogey man, LOL!

I love that part of the country. Let me ask you a question that has nothing to do with B/F. Is LL Bean 'big' up there?? I love Bean and have always bought clothes, and gear from them. Rarely have I been disappointed. I guess I'm curious what the 'locals' think of their products since it's located in Maine. Dumb question I know, but I'm just curious.

I have a story that happened around 1981 in and around Klamath Falls Or.

The whole weekend starting with the friday night before the big weekend hunting trip, with lots of family and camping. That friday night we went into Klamath Falls for a steak dinner. As we were driving into town the city's power was blacking out sections of town. We could see whole sections go off and come back on as we were coming into town. Thought it looked pretty neat.

In the restaurant the power would go off, and the waiter would go around lighting candles, it would come back on and he would blow them out. The third time he said the heck with it and left them lit LOL. We got a good laugh at the guy afterward. On the way out to the campsite we were listening to the radio, and they say that their was a ufo sighting, and that they think it was the cause of the power problems. Thought that was pretty funny too.

The weather was a light rain all day, and remained that way through the night into next day. That night I woke up with light rain hitting my face. When I opened my eyes I was lookin at the clouds thinking the air smelled really fresh, then realized I was supposed to be in a tent! I looked around and the tent was gone except for the floor. I woke my wife up and we crawled into her parents tent. The next morning we looked for the rest of the tent, and could not find it anywhere. We were confounded because there were 3 other tents and we were in the middle of them, and our tent was gone. We decided to go ahead and make the morning hunt.

When we returned my mother inlaw was throwing stuff into the truck as fast as she could. When asked what she was doing she said she seen BF standing 20 ft a way as she was, um, watering the weeds. We sat down and had some good fun with that for a few minutes. Got her pretty fuming until we agreed to leave LOL. When all of a sudden here comes an uncle with his two boys crying because they have to leave. This guy starts throwing stuff in his truck just like the mother inlaw, and my father inlaw jokingly says ...whats a matter you see a BF? Everyone started laughing at that one, but he says no he saw a ufo....that was it we were rolling now. Funny or not we left.

That night we asked the the uncle what he actually saw? He says that he was standing on the top of the ridge when he notices right above him a ufo right at tree top level. It is moving real slow towards a small valley he is overlooking. It skimmed the trees all the way into the valley, hovered for a couple minutes, then started coming back up to him. That is when he started making tracks back to the camp, and was leaving in a hurry. He didnt wait around to see where the ufo was, he was leaving.

My mother inlaw did tell us that she was looking right in the face of an at least 9 or 10 ft tall BF. He was just staring at her, and she, um, couldnt even water the weeds. She decided after a 2 minute stare down to move first, and as she stood up the BF quickly turned and walked away. She said she ran back, and was leaving immediately. To this day she will deny to your face that never happened, gets a laugh everytime. LOL.

I have often wondered if all those incidents were coincidental, or all connected?

I dunno what the general New England consensus is on LL Bean. I think we all get their catalogsin the mail but they do not seem to be near as beloved as other local favorites like Ben and Jerry's the Red Sox and talking about weather.

I hear ya. I am a Bo Socks fan myself, not to mention a huge Celtics fan.

ll bean, over priced and overrated.

I definitely think they are a little pricey. At one time I felt like that, I believe it was after they changed ownership. It seemed they went down hill for awhile. But, some of the nicest stuff I've bought has been from them. Especially jackets & boots

I agree totally, plus it whiles away the time until we can get back out in the field.

For general camping needs, I go to dicks, then go to see if it's half the price at walmart, if not, I get general camping stuff at dicks, for more wintery or specialty stuff we have EMS Sports which is good for snow shoeing, kayaking and rock climbing, but their camping stuff is over priced as well.

We have a Dicks here for about 5 yrs or so. I've been in there only once, but I was impressed. i didn't get to look into the clothes at all. I don't think I've ever heard of EFS Sports. Where do you live?

EMS Sports is a New england outfit, they are an outfitter for kayakers, rock climbers etc in the summer, snow shoers, skiers and the like in the winter, camping is secondary to them

While this is not a neighbor's story im about to relate, it is a relative that finally told me about his sighting near Klamath Falls Oregon.

I have been trying to get him to tell me about his sighting for a few years now, and he would tell me he never saw one. But last week he was down here visiting the family, and I got him to tell me what he saw. He didnt go into as many details as I would have liked, but am sure he will tell me more in the future because I didnt ridicule him. Seems that is the reason he wouldnt not tell me about his sighting, he doesnt like to be made fun of.

He told me he was deer hunting a few years ago, and was sitting where he could see a large expanse of open terrain, and the top of the hill across from where he was sitting. He scoped the area out, and noted there was a funny looking burnt stump on the hill across from where he was sitting. Said it looked like a stump, but there was something about it that made him study it through his scope. After a few minutes he decided it was just a stump, and left it at that.

After about 30 minutes he saw the stump stand up and start walking to his right across the top of the hill. He quickly raised his rifle so he could get a good look through the scope. He says it walked casually, and said it looked as if it was human looking the way it walked. He watched it for a few minutes, and it never looked his way. It finally went over the other side of the hill out of view.

He says he told his brother and a few friends, and they told him he saw a bear, and then began to make fun. That is when he decided to keep his sighting to himself. He also says he knows what he saw, and it was no bear because he got a real good look at it through the scope.

I wish he had given me more, but am satisfied that he at least told me about his sighting. Now if we could get his wife to tell about her sighting LOL. Hers was a close encounter, like 10' away from her. But she wont say a peep because of the fear of ridicule. Sure is a shame about the ridicule part, because I think there would be lots more sightings we could read about if it wasnt for this.

Right or wrong, I've always considered LL Bean to be outdoor clothing for people who have no intention of spending time outdoors. Seems like The North Face is getting that way too.