Creepy experiences in the backcountry

i had a pine marten keep me up all night as he stole some moose. he made the damndest noises- grunting and whimpering all night. had me pretty worried it was 20 wolves or a pair of griz.
 
I have two stories:
First one was 2 years ago on my birthday. Duck hunting a swamp in SW Wisconsin solo on a misty and cold day in October. The water was really high at the time and the woods were pretty flooded. Knew a clearing in the woods that wood ducks were working near so snuck in and set up. After 3 hours of not getting any shots I heard something splashing through the water about 75 yards ahead of me to my left. Expecting to see some deer I start scanning and caught a glimpse of something jet black ahead of me. It was all marsh grass so I could see pretty clearly and what I saw looked like a head above the marsh grass working towards the only 3 trees. It got to the trees about 60 yards ahead of me and then I never saw it again. The grass was only about three feet tall and I thought bear at first but never saw it’s back and didn’t see pronounced ears on top of its head. It was almost as if a person was crouched walking slowly left to right to hide behind the trees. My eyes didn’t leave those trees for about 10 minutes and it became dead silent. Like no wind and no more birds. I picked up my stuff and high tailed it out of there. Bears are also pretty rare in that part of the state and I think about that experience almost daily because I just don’t know what I saw.

Second story was this past September in SD near the badlands antelope hunting. We were scouting a high top area near camp and found 3 big distinct circles of rocks and thought they were old, big fire pits. That night the wind is blowing pretty good in the tent. But we could hear a low drumming or banging noise. Then as I’m about to fall asleep my buddy jumps up and says there’s someone here. He saw a bright light outside the tent door and he thought someone was going through our camp. He unzipped the tent and no one there. We woke up the next day and a local farmer who grazed cattle on that piece of BLM land gave us a visit. Told us there were 3 old teepee circles up above our camp. I got goosebumps hearing that and we came to the conclusion that we were hearing drums the night before and possibly got visited by an Indian spirit or something. Kind of a cool, but creepy experience.
 
All of your stories and talks of the 411 book are making me glad I'm not into solo backpacking trips. This has been a great thread to read through.
 
I was on a solo deer scouting trip on some private land. It was a quick overnight trip, so I decided to sleep in the back of my FJ cruiser. I drove about a mile deep from the highway and parked for the night in some spotty juniper. I went to bed around 9:30, I cracked the car windows a few inches to let the summer breeze in. Around 2AM I heard a weird noise outside the car. I didn’t recognize the noise, but it sounded like a whisper saying “HASHTAH HESHTEH”. I laid there trying to figure out what the noise was and how far away it was. It continued to get closer until it sounded like it was right outside the driver’s side door. I grabbed my SIG P320 9mm but I was too scared to sit up and look outside the window to see what it was. I would guess my heartrate was around 200 bpm (nearly beating out of my chest), meanwhile my body lay their petrified. After about 15 seconds I decided to sack up and reach into the front seat to honk the horn. The sounds stopped after that. I turned the car on to see if I could see anything with the headlights, nothing. I somehow was able to fall back asleep, relying on the door locks to protect me from the evil demon. The next morning, I didn’t see any tracks around the car or any deer on my hike. I’m not really a believer in the supernatural so my rational guess is that it was maybe a cat?

This is what the sound sounded like:
 
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Not a backcountry story, but creepy non the less. My dad lives about 4 miles town. He lives on a sand road. And by town, I mean small (less than 100). Never have worried about locking the doors. He came home from work one evening and went to cook supper. Seen he had left a skillet on the stove from the evening before. But confused him since he ALWAYS cleans everything up. He opened up the dishwasher to put the skillet in. AND there was a dirty plate, fork, mixing bowl, spoon, drinking cup and spatula in there. Now he is thinking WTF. He emptied the dishwasher the evening before. So he started thinking one us kids came down for some reason.


The more he was around the house the more things he noticed weren't right. In the kitchen trash was a ice cream sandwich wrapper. He just bought the box and hadn't opened it yet. The TV remote wasn't were he ALWAYS left it. When he was going to his bedroom to get ready for bed. He noticed a empty yogurt container in his bathroom trash. He never puts anything in his bathroom trash but thing from the bathroom.


That night he didn't sleep good. Got up early the next morning and looked the whole house over. Nothing touched. Not the guns leaned up the corner. Not the glass jar with change and cash in it. No odd tire tracks in the driveway. BUT, about 100ft from the house on the grader ridge. There was 2 sets of boot tracks. One coming onto and leaving his place. Never did have it happen again, or hear of it happening to anyone else.

He just figured it was someone down on their luck needing a meal. Best part is. They cooked pancakes with syrup, eggs, sausage links, poured a glass of milk(even put chocolate syrup in it) had a yogurt and ice cream. And dad had to do the dishes.
 
KsRancher said:
Not a backcountry story, but creepy non the less. My dad lives about 4 miles town. He lives on a sand road. And by town, I mean small (less than 100). Never have worried about locking the doors. He came home from work one evening and went to cook supper. Seen he had left a skillet on the stove from the evening before. But confused him since he ALWAYS cleans everything up. He opened up the dishwasher to put the skillet in. AND there was a dirty plate, fork, mixing bowl, spoon, drinking cup and spatula in there. Now he is thinking WTF. He emptied the dishwasher the evening before. So he started thinking one us kids came down for some reason.


The more he was around the house the more things he noticed weren't right. In the kitchen trash was a ice cream sandwich wrapper. He just bought the box and hadn't opened it yet. The TV remote wasn't were he ALWAYS left it. When he was going to his bedroom to get ready for bed. He noticed a empty yogurt container in his bathroom trash. He never puts anything in his bathroom trash but thing from the bathroom.


That night he didn't sleep good. Got up early the next morning and looked the whole house over. Nothing touched. Not the guns leaned up the corner. Not the glass jar with change and cash in it. No odd tire tracks in the driveway. BUT, about 100ft from the house on the grader ridge. There was 2 sets of boot tracks. One coming onto and leaving his place. Never did have it happen again, or hear of it happening to anyone else.

He just figured it was someone down on their luck needing a meal. Best part is. They cooked pancakes with syrup, eggs, sausage links, poured a glass of milk(even put chocolate syrup in it) had a yogurt and ice cream. And dad had to do the dishes.
Click to expand...
That’s nuts. Makes me wonder if this person had been watching the house enough to know that he didn’t lock the doors, or whether the person goes door to door just looking for one that’s unlocked.
 
[sigh...] I guess I’ll play. 2019 archery. We arrived at the edge of the wilderness area and set off for camp at maybe 8:00pm. We had scouted it before and partner had several camp spots to choose if the first one or two were occupied. We weren’t concerned about finding camp in the dark. I remember it rained right before we got there and everything was wet. We got about 3 miles in (camp was almost 4 mi) and were stopped taking a water break standing on a steep grassy hill. We looked back down and noticed a light in the patch of dark timber. At first I thought it was maybe a lantern being carried by an outfitter on horseback. I was moving around kind of side to side and I think coming sort of our direction. Then I realized it was much too high off the ground to be carried by someone, it moved in a way that was not someone’s headlamp, it didn’t have a beam like a flashlight (more glowing about the size of a softball or grapefruit), and there was no trail over there. I still can’t explain what I saw. At the time we were both just like, “huh, I wonder what that is”. It is a grueling hike in to camp and for some reason it didn’t freak us out. I’ve never seen anything like it since. Most nights it’s well after dark getting back.


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^^ I don’t know, I do a lot of hiking through the woods at night and in the morning where there are no trails on the way in to my spot. I’ve watched people come down mountains at night with their headlamps on, in big country in the dark without being able to see a reference as to where they are your mind can play some games on you for sure.
 
def90 said:
^^ I don’t know, I do a lot of hiking through the woods at night and in the morning where there are no trails on the way in to my spot. I’ve watched people come down mountains at night with their headlamps on, in big country in the dark without being able to see a reference as to where they are your mind can play some games on you for sure.
Click to expand...

No doubt, could have been something like that for sure. Just weird though.


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KsRancher said:
Not a backcountry story, but creepy non the less. My dad lives about 4 miles town. He lives on a sand road. And by town, I mean small (less than 100). Never have worried about locking the doors. He came home from work one evening and went to cook supper. Seen he had left a skillet on the stove from the evening before. But confused him since he ALWAYS cleans everything up. He opened up the dishwasher to put the skillet in. AND there was a dirty plate, fork, mixing bowl, spoon, drinking cup and spatula in there. Now he is thinking WTF. He emptied the dishwasher the evening before. So he started thinking one us kids came down for some reason.


The more he was around the house the more things he noticed weren't right. In the kitchen trash was a ice cream sandwich wrapper. He just bought the box and hadn't opened it yet. The TV remote wasn't were he ALWAYS left it. When he was going to his bedroom to get ready for bed. He noticed a empty yogurt container in his bathroom trash. He never puts anything in his bathroom trash but thing from the bathroom.


That night he didn't sleep good. Got up early the next morning and looked the whole house over. Nothing touched. Not the guns leaned up the corner. Not the glass jar with change and cash in it. No odd tire tracks in the driveway. BUT, about 100ft from the house on the grader ridge. There was 2 sets of boot tracks. One coming onto and leaving his place. Never did have it happen again, or hear of it happening to anyone else.

He just figured it was someone down on their luck needing a meal. Best part is. They cooked pancakes with syrup, eggs, sausage links, poured a glass of milk(even put chocolate syrup in it) had a yogurt and ice cream. And dad had to do the dishes.
Click to expand...

I had two similar stories from my childhood.

I grew up in rural WV - town population was 436 - the kind of place where everyone knows everyone and their business. We lived at the end of a dirt road with no more houses pst us, but just some mixed pasture and big timber forests. Our parcel was just a few acres.

One day, I was sitting on our porch and all of a sudden, a middle-aged woman walked out of the woods next to our house without acknowledging me, strolled out onto the dirt road, and walked out of sight. She was not from our town and would’ve been miles from the nearest road to get to that patch of timber. I don’t believe in ghosts, but this was very blare witch.

We also had one of those cheap above ground pools growing up. At this point, the landowner past our house had moved a mobile home in for his ex-con nephew. One morning, we woke up to go swimming and our pool water was all rust colored - pretty opaque. For days, we couldn’t come up with an explanation. Then we heard that the nephew next door had engaged in some criminal activity, got stabbed, and fled from the police. They didn’t find him for a few days even though they scoured the property and mobile home next door. Then it hit us, that dude hid out in our pool from the police, bleeding into the water all night.

P.S. We never locked our house, garage, or cars. Keys were always in the ignition. Same for everyone in town.
 
My story isn't nearly as good as some of these others but here you go.
Some years ago I was staying at my uncle's house for a few days to do some whitetail hunting. Just for some context, the property is only a few acres with the house, two connected barn/garage buildings and a small cabin (about 12x12) about a hundred yards down the hill. There was fresh snow and a full moon and my uncle and I were down in the cabin with AR's and a coyote call till about midnight. The entire time I had this feeling like we were being watched. Just kind of a cold feeling. I just kind of shrugged it off and didn't say anything. (I was 13 or 14 at the time and didn't want to seem like a sissy) For some reason we decided not to go deer hunting in the morning. We were cooking breakfast in the house when my uncle looked out the window and noticed that the man-door to the barn was open. He was kind of confused as he was sure that he had locked the previous morning. I pulled on boots and went to go shut the door and make sure no chickens were in the barn or anything. As I got closer to the barn, I noticed tracks in the snow. I immediately went on high alert. Neither of us had come up from the cabin this way and it had snowed yesterday afternoon. As soon as I got to the door, I could see a single boot print on the face of the door which was now hanging at a slight angle. Someone had evidently kicked it open. I checked the door to the other barn and found that the lock had been pried off. I began to follow the tracks around the side of the house. All of the sudden I heard "freeze!". I did. The voice then said to "turn around slowly with my hands in the air". I then heard "S**t..Didn't realize it was you". A man stepped out from behind the brush, lowering his glock. I recognized Tom the neighbor from the next property over. We had only met a few times, but he recognized my face. He then told me to run get my uncle, there was someone out here and he had been robbed. I told him about the barn and showed him the tracks then ran to get my uncle. It took us a few minutes to get back outside because my uncle had to wake up my aunt and grab a pistol for her. (she stayed in the house with my cousins who were still sleeping. Right as we were getting out the door, this guy came running up the driveway (quickly identifying himself as Tom's friend). He started yelling that "We got'im!" "Tom has him over in the back". By the time the three of us got over there, the cops had arrived and had a guy in custody. (as we walked up they were pulling two Taurus 9mm's out of his bibs pockets. Tom had caught the guy circling back to try and escape on his Harley. When the first officer came running up, Tom had the guy face down in the snow with a gun to the back of his head. (They released the body cam footage later and you can hear the cop joking "Why'd you even call us? Looks like you've got everything covered!". Around this time the last neighbor came running up. (this guy was the definition of redneck, long gray hair, lived in a trailer in the woods, shotgun in hand). Tom and my uncle had to hold him back as he charged the guy in cuffs. He was yelling that the guy had tried to break into his house. (later we went to his trailer and could see a pitchfork stuck all the way through the door) The guy ended up having two firearms, a dagger, various drugs, and other miscellaneous items on his person. Here's where we get to the creepy part. We retraced the dudes tracks to see where he came from and found that he had come from back towards the cabin. When we got down there with one of the officers we saw his tracks on the porch of the cabin where he had stood and looked into the windows. (the same cabin we had been in while coyote hunting) Continuing along the tracks, we discovered that he had come from the woods in front of the cabin. His tracks were all over the place. We even found where it looked like he got down and crawled up to the edge of the woods. At that point I had an idea. I ran over to a trail camera that we had placed over a deer trail. Like I thought, in two of he videos you could see a dark figure moving in the trees. In the third video, you could clearly see the guy ducking from tree to tree. The time stamp of that video was 10:50. That cam wasn't 75 yards from the cabin. Turns out I should have trusted my gut the night before.
 
mstei4 said:
Three days ago a bit north of Idaho Falls was out driving with my wife through the dessert, came to the end of a little dirt road and decided to hope out to hike a bit. Saw what looked like a pattern in the dirt made of rocks, and when I looked closer it was like 8 or so concentric rings of rocks, the biggest probably 100 feet across, clearly took someone a good long while to make it. Started getting that "something isn't right feeling" but ignored it and started walking closer. There was a path lined with rocks to the center, and at the entrance to it two skulls, looked like cattle at first glance, but at that point I wasn't getting any closer. Real quick we headed out from there and found somewhere else to hike. Definitely not was I was expecting to find out there and my wife is still getting weird feelings about that place.
Click to expand...

Was this near R mountain outside Rexburg? I know of one exactly like that there.


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Idk if it was a prank or not but I was with my friends as a teenager and we were messing around in the woods and we heard a awful scream, needless to say we didn’t stay long
 
Many years ago me and a friend were traveling a county road at around 2am coming home from fishing when we see a weird looking guy walking right near what we know to be a cemetery. We drive past and chuckle about zombies etc and finally decided to turn around & make sure he wasn't broke down or something. The road we were on runs along a river with no pull off for a couple miles so we drive a mile or two up to the next place to turn around & as we get the truck turned around and pulling out to go the other way the headlights shine and the same guy is standing on the road in front of the truck not waving but just standing there! No way a guy could cover that distance on foot in such a short amount of time!

My buddy goes into freakout and drives around the guy without stopping & we are back going the original direction. The whole time we are talking trying to figure out what just happened. We agree to turn around and go back and have to go a few miles along the river again to a turn around. We turn around, drive about 100 yards and the same guy is walking down the road and waving at us a few miles from where we just saw him. My buddy slows down & we creep up with my window down. My buddy starts going into freakout "That dude has no face!" I look and see skin and zero facial features and we take off again. Now we are going the opposite direction we need to go so have to turn around again. We go a few miles, turn around, and head back our original direction and don't see the guy. We start talking about what the heck we are seeing. 6mi later we see the same guy walking down the road....we didn't stop.
 
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