Creepy experiences in the backcountry

[aclawrence]

There was a serial killer named Israel Keyes that would go into the backwoods and murder people all around Washington State, Oregon, Etc. I was listening to a podcast about him on my drive over when I went hunting opening day last year and I freaked myself out bigtime hiking in. Who knows, maybe one of you encountered him in the woods or maybe he was watching you.

That was a bad dude. He would just pick random victims just for the fun of it. He got caught trying to use a victims debit card.


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[Zdub02]

My contribution isn't backcountry related but here ya go:

Couple years ago it's the last day of deer season. My hunt club invited our neighboring club to come do some drives with us so we had a large group of guys on our property. For this drive the guys in our club were standers and the neighboring club were the drivers. I make my way to my stand on the edge of a swamp. It's a good spot and the deer loved to run the edge of it right by my stand. So the drive begins and I can hear the guys whooping as they are pushing toward my location. I hear something coming from the swamp in front of me so I direct my attention in that direction. Doesn't sound like a deer running but definitely hear footsteps getting closer. I then see a person walking in front me from my right to left. The odd part is he wasn't one of the guys from either club. No orange (gun season), no camo. The person was wearing a navy blue hoodie and blue jeans. They saw me, turned around, and left in the direction they came from. They seemed to walk right through the swamp which would be insane without waders that late in the season in subfreezing temps. Didn't hear them whooping or acting like one of the guys driving. Didn't have a weapon or any indication of being a hunter. Who knows what was going on with them but struck me as very odd.

 

[MightyMatt]

This isn't all that creepy, but more like weird and certainly, unexplainable, at least to me. Kinda follows Brancher's post above about a light.

This was just last week Wednesday during deer season at my farm in NE Missouri. It was around 5:30am, it was a super clear, cloudless sky with virtually no moon, just tons of stars. We had just pulled into a pasture area off an unlit gravel road a quarter mile or so from the ground blind we were going to hunt out of. We were at the back of my SUV with the hatchback closed, no lights on, and we were gathering our gear getting ready to start walking. All of a sudden there was this instant, gigantic flash of light right on us and around us, maybe literally only a fraction of a second in duration. It wasn't lightning, wasn't on the horizon or anything, just right ON us. As if an enormous camera flash was triggered on us. I'm not sure I've ever seen a light as bright and as quickly on and off as that was. We both looked at each other and said what the heck was that? Neither of us had or has any idea what that was. But I'm glad my buddy was there as a witness because I don't think anyone would believe it if I told them about it.

Any thoughts on what that could have been?

I hang my tail cams 10-12 foot high to avoid theft and I've been startled by my own cameras that I knew were there. Mine was IR so it was a bright red light but i froze not knowing what the hell just happened. It only took me a few seconds to figure it out but maybe an old flash type camera hung in the same manner???

 

[Fatcamp]

At around 2am last night in a 3 man Big Agnes the thunderstorm all the sudden sounded different. The wind was still whipping the tent around and the rain was falling just as hard, but it sounded like a freight train was coming across the plains. Like, roaring and vibrating.

IDK if it was a small tornado or straight line winds but it certainly got my attention.

 

[Fdh]

Quail hunting, west of El Paso, on the road to Columbus, NM. Out by myself, either day before or after Christmas. Chasing a covey up a hill. Came across a shoe. Nothing else was around it. Walked up to it and noticed something was inside of it. Got my knife out and popped out the foot/heel bone. The hairs went up and the adrenalin pumped. Immediately took the gun off of safety and looked around. Obviously it had been there a while. Called the sheriff. Met deputy and border patrol unit out there the next day. They conducted a brief search (couple of hrs) and could not locate any more remains. Chalked it up to a illegal alien trying to walk through. It was about 4 miles from the border.

 

[Skerhunter]

Not the cops, but local authorities? What came of the tweakers?

Tweakers are probably in tweaker heaven by now, they were older guys and this was a 20-30 years ago. I think they had probably already exceeded their life expectancy when this occurred.

 

[TonySkyline]

Quail hunting, west of El Paso, on the road to Columbus, NM. Out by myself, either day before or after Christmas. Chasing a covey up a hill. Came across a shoe. Nothing else was around it. Walked up to it and noticed something was inside of it. Got my knife out and popped out the foot/heel bone. The hairs went up and the adrenalin pumped. Immediately took the gun off of safety and looked around. Obviously it had been there a while. Called the sheriff. Met deputy and border patrol unit out there the next day. They conducted a brief search (couple of hrs) and could not locate any more remains. Chalked it up to a illegal alien trying to walk through. It was about 4 miles from the border.

A ton of people have walked until the bones were poking out of the skin on their feet. Missing 411 brings that up a bunch. Weird man

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[Felix1776]

What an epic thread!

I just stumbled up on this about a week ago and have slowly picked my way all the way through it. Not sure how I missed it for so long.

Fortunately or unfortunately (not sure which), I really don't have much to offer. I have also heard the noises of what sounds like big sticks or boards being smacked together in the woods. Like someone else pointed out, that noise always struck me as very odd because it very clearly is not the same noise as wind making limbs smack against each other and doesn't sound like limbs suddenly snapping. Never could quite figure out what would cause that noise but it never caused me much alarm the time or two I've heard it.

I would like reiterate as others have, the most dangerous animal in the woods is on two legs. When I go up into the national forests, BLM ground, etc., I stay strapped u[ primarily because of all the weirdos and creepos that seem to be so attracted to our public lands.

Keep the stories coming!!!

 

[Danomite]

Two experiences that were not really creepy, just weird:

1. My buddy and I were hunting Barbary sheep in a very remote area and had worked to a series of canyons 2 miles from the truck. We heard people talking in a normal conversational tone for about 30 seconds, but we could’t see them. We were sitting still glassing and should have seen anyone in the area. It was not an area hikers or backpackers would normally be.

2. My dad and I backpacked into the Pecos Wilderness in NM from an obscure spot off the highway where we had been dropped off. Not a trailhead or a campground. Two days later and well into the wilderness on trails we ran into a guy who immediately said, “So, came from x right?” We could have come from any number of trailheads but he nailed it. Regrettably, we didn’t ask how in the world he guessed/knew that.

The scariest thing that I’ve ever experienced was when I was about 20 years old and backpacking in a wilderness area in NM without spray or a pistol. I didn’t have a tent or even a bivy. I was lazy and left the dishes from dinner unwashed and slept about 10 feet from them. In the middle of the night I woke up to the sound of something rustling around in the cookware. I worked up the courage to shine the flashlight on the bear that about to maul me and two rabbits were engaged in conjugal activities or fighting or something.

 

[String&stick]

At around 2am last night in a 3 man Big Agnes the thunderstorm all the sudden sounded different. The wind was still whipping the tent around and the rain was falling just as hard, but it sounded like a freight train was coming across the plains. Like, roaring and vibrating.

IDK if it was a small tornado or straight line winds but it certainly got my attention.

Had a tornado come through Kearney Nebraska in the summer of 2008. Like an intelligent young man In college I first stood outside and watched then retreated to the safety of the living room behind the large bay window. When the neighbors 15ft tall maple snapped off and slid down the street, lodging against the stop sign I decided maybe I should take cover. . . It was one of the only times I've been scared during a storm in my life, shortly after I get into the basement under the stair case, there was a defining roar like a freight train right beside you! Our house was fine but many buildings near us including the main fairgrounds building were destroyed. If it sounded like a train there is a good chance it was a small tornado.

 

[FlyGuy]

Could have been. It didn't totally creep me out but I just found it really strange and haven't been able to explain it. The direction on the trail the light was headed would have had to be a few miles to the next parking area and there was no public in the direction the light came from. Most hunters who are strictly hunting private would not be on this trail as they would have better access and even if they did use it for access it would have made more sense to park on the road by my truck. It won't stop me from hunting there in the future but just odd.

Maybe the hiker/hunter/biker just decided to turn around and head back to the parking area?


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[Rick M.]

This thread kept me up until 3:30am and sent me down a 411 rabbit hole

 

[FlyGuy]

I’ll go.

This was about 35 years ago back in central Louisiana. I was 14-15 years old and my Dad and I hunted on a really shitty whitetail lease with very few deer. I’d been hunting on my own for several years by this point, but the truth is I still hated walking alone in the dark with just that flashlight. I was old enough to know better but still young enough to freak myself out, so every trek was a mental battle with myself.

We didn’t have any wild hogs on our place back then, but there were always tales of them in the general vicinity and about how vicious and violent they were. Just as soon gore you as look at you, or at least that’s how I imagined them to be - Especially if you were alone and unluckily stumbled into a whole troop of them in the dark….

Then There was also reportedly a cougar in the area. I’d never seen it. Never one to sit still I’d covered lots of ground at that place over the years and I’d never even seen a track, but several folks told authentic sounding stories of hearing it “screaming at night just like a woman getting murdered”. I have No idea if any of that was true or not but I believed it like gospel at the time and it damn sure crept into my mind every time I was walking into my stand in the early morning darkness. I’d stop every 20 yards or so and listen, then whip around with that light just to make sure that big cat wasn’t stalking up behind me.

One afternoon I (illegally) drove my old Honda 125 3-wheeler down the blacktop road a few miles from camp, turned down a logging road, and drove it back another mile or two to the area I planned to hunt. It was an area I hadn’t tried before but wanted to check out. These were the days long before cell phones or even those clunky handheld GPS. I used a compass is the most rudimentary way. Before stepping off the logging road I’d get a bearing on my intended direction, then when it was time to come back all I had to do was walk in the direction that was 180° opposite of that reading. Worked every time. But on this day I forgot to get that bearing while standing in the road. Instead, I remembered it after I’d already walked in a couple 100 yards off that road thru a thicket . I Didn’t want to turn and go back, so I reasoned That since I hadn’t gone too far I was most likely still heading in the same direction as when I’d started (wrong). so, to save time and effort I just took a bearing right there and forged ahead.

Like usual, no deer were seen that evening. I’d stayed in my spot until legal light had expired so it was full dark. I used my compass to get my (incorrect) bearing and started walking. About 30 min later I’m thinking “Man, that logging road HAS to be right here?”, but it’s not. The area doesn’t look right and it doesn’t feel right. Trigger the “bad butterflies” in my gut. An hour into this and I’m fighting to keep the panic at bay and I’m actually managing it better than I expected to. I’m aware that I have some “guardrails” with the logging road and the blacktop and that if I just keep going sooner or later I’ll hit one of them…. But in the back of my mind there is this lingering doubt…. And, of course, cougars.

Around this time the woods open up a little bit beneath some big old oaks and I suddenly see something directly in front of me that just doesn’t look right…. It froze me in my tracks and I probably stood there for a good 30 seconds staring at this shape, but for the life of me I can not make sense of what I am seeing. My mind is struggling to put a label on it but I’m just at a total loss. It looks sort of like a stump, but it’s definitely not a stump. I just can’t think of anything else it could be. It’s like this “shape” kind of fits in with the surroundings, but at the same time it definitely does not fit in and I know it shouldn’t be here. It looks to be a couple of feet tall, maybe 10” across and it almost looks… camouflaged? Idk if anyone knows what I’m talking about but it’s such a creepy and utterly confusing feeling when you are looking at something right in front of you but your brain just absolutely can not makes sense of what it is seeing.

It’s close, but not quite close enough to touch it with my rifle barrel, which is what I decide that I’m going to do next. But just As I cautiously start that next step closer, the top 1/3 of the “stump” suddenly moves! Holy Shit I was not expecting that! All the air goes out of lungs and time slows down to an absolute crawl where a heartbeat seems to last for minutes. I still don’t know what this is but I damn sure did not think it was alive!! I am now extremely aware that I am WAY TOO CLOSE but I’ve already committed to that step and gravity is working against me. My brain is screaming “GET! BACK!” and I’m fighting the foreword momentum by lurching my body backwards as my feet slide forward and out from underneath me.

Now stump has eyes. Giant eyes. Giant, yellow eyes in my memory. The pair of giant yellow eyes disturbingly, almost robotically, rotating around to face me just like in that scene from the exorcist.

Then, just as I came to rest nearly defenseless and flat on my backside, the shape shifting demon creature at my feet literally EXPLODES in a violent blur of leaves and feathers and powerful wingbeats that seem deafeningly loud, quickly disappearing from the flashlight’s glow and into the dark canopy above….

I probably laid there for a full minute making weird noises, catching my breath and letting the adrenaline surge resolve. Cussing myself and that damn owl. I have no idea what kind of owl it was or why it let me walk right up on it like that. Maybe it was sick or maybe the flashlight had it frozen with night blindness for a few moments? Whatever it was I’ve never had anything like that happen again.

Eventually I found my way out to that blacktop road, followed it to the logging road and hiked another mile or so to my bike. I arrived back at camp several hours late and just in time to stop the search party that was assembling, as everyone assumed that I needed help following a blood trail. They all got a great laugh out of my story that evening around the campfire, and not many times in my life sense then have I walked alone through the dark without thinking of that night.


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[long hunter]

Perhaps not creepy but a bit disturbing, years ago my regular hunting buddy and I was in WVA hunting deer, well we started out before day light too our pre hunting spots a big bowl in the mountains I hunted one side and he went too the long end of the bowl, the plan was unless one of us killed a deer we would meet about the middle of the bowl around two in the afternoon and go too a different spot for the evening part of the hunt, well all went as planned as we met it started too snow so we deided thet he would make a big circle around me and we would meet back at the cabin (actually a shack) I got back to camp about a hour after last shooting light no lights so I got the wood stove going and thought he would soon show up, the snow was really coming down with about 6-8- in. on the ground bye now still no buddy, I START TOO PUT THINGS TOGETHER FOR A RESCUE MISSION. Thermos of hot coffee, heavey blanket , hand axe, rope ,first aid kit, fire starting kit that kind of stuff ( This was well before cell phones and we were out in the boonies) sling on the pack strap on the side arm grab the flash light. reach for the door and hear stomping on the front porch and there he was looked like snow man, ask him where the hell you been, he said too me he began the agreed loop came across a old rail road tunnel and decided too cut through the tunnel and make his way back too the camp, got turned around out of the tunnel and did not know where he was. so cut a straight path as best as he could, came too a old road and started walking, luck would have it another hunter came bye in a truck picked him up and brought him back too the lane that came too the camp. After he thawed out we talked about it and he said he was not really lost just a bit confused.

 

[Ryhole]

Don't you mean Vitamin R?

I still say Rain beers or vitamin R haha

 

[BLEE]

The first time I saw three or four small dots of light on my tent at night. I never had fireflies light on my tent in the middle of the night, after years of camping. I thought I was being pranked, but I wasn't camping with anyone. Went out a pistol and... fireflies!

 

[mike.adams.467]

I love this thread, I've read through all the pages so far and there's some interesting stories for sure. The most unexplained thing that has happened to me was two September's ago in central Idaho during archery elk. On two separate occasions I heard distinct wood on wood knocking sounds. One time I was by myself and the sound seemed like it was coming from across the other side of a drainage and I'm almost positive no one was there because I was parked at the end of the road and I hadn't seen any other vehicles. The other time was about a mile or two away in the same general area about a week later with my hunting buddy, that day it was raining real bad and we hadn't seen any other cars around or signs of people either. We both heard it this time and agreed that it sounded like someone was hitting a chunk of wood against another. It was loud and sharp sounding, it didn't have a pattern, anywhere from about 15 seconds to a minute apart and went on for probably 30-45 minutes or so both times. It definitely didn't sound like two trees being blown together by the wind.

You probably heard a bull elk “glunking” to his cows.


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[2ski]

I wonder how many have heard the whistle thing whitetails do in the middle of the night and wondered if it was something else. I let my dog out at 4 this morning and we spooked one and it continued to make noise for at least 5 minutes.

 

[S7even]

You probably heard a bull elk “glunking” to his cows.


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I’ve heard bulls glunk before and it didn’t sound anything like that. Also it was across a pretty big canyon and you could tell it was a lot louder sound then glunking is.

 

[oldman]

I was turkey hunting in Kansas with my back against a tree. Right behind me I hear this horrible really ;loud scream, I thought for a moment the devil was there to claim me. I shook for an hour. I finally realized it was a mountain lion after I got it on a game camera that afternoon.