Nickofthewoods
WKR
If you're going to bump this thread you better be adding a creepy story. Don't just bump it hoping for spooky handouts. I'm tired of seeing this thread near the top without new material.
In order to not be a hypocrite I'll add a story from a long time ago, May of 2003 I believe . I can't remember what my two idiot friends and I were trying to accomplish that day but we attempted to hike into the backcountry and it was one of those days where we made it a few miles just walking on top of the snow drifts but once it warmed up we were post-holing and it became a bad scenario for teenagers wearing skate shoes or whatever and generally being unprepared. Instead of going back the way we came due to our predicament we decided to drop straight downhill to get out of the deeper snow and just planned to hitchhike back to the car from whatever road we came to first. Great plan! After slogging down this steep north facing mountain for at least an hour or two we unexpectedly ended up at an old cabin on the edge of the wilderness which we were not expecting. I've since looked at the map on my onx and this is literally the only dwelling within many miles and seems to be a private inholding that pre-dates the wilderness designation. I remember hoping that it was an unoccupied summer cabin but we saw smoke coming from the chimney and knew someone was home and we were suddenly aware that we were trespassing. The road leading to the cabin was unplowed with no vehicle tracks leading in or out which we all though was strange given the isolated location. I remember some type of quick discussion taking place amongst us. Something akin to "hey let's get the hell out of here". As we start walking down the road out of nowhere is just this old man with a long white beard wearing a tattered grey robe and carrying what I can best describe as a long sicle like the grim reaper carries. For a minute we all thought we were about to be murdered. Turns out the guy lived on his own up there and didn't own a vehicle. He said he rides his bike into town once every couple of weeks during the summer and stocks up on supplies for winter. He said we were the first people he had seen or talked to since November (it was early May). We apologized for trespassing but he clearly didn't care. It took us several hours of walking down his road and then finally getting a ride from someone back to our car. Looking back on this I actually really admire the guy. He's probably passed away by now but there can't be too many people left like him living alone at 10,000 ft all winter.
In order to not be a hypocrite I'll add a story from a long time ago, May of 2003 I believe . I can't remember what my two idiot friends and I were trying to accomplish that day but we attempted to hike into the backcountry and it was one of those days where we made it a few miles just walking on top of the snow drifts but once it warmed up we were post-holing and it became a bad scenario for teenagers wearing skate shoes or whatever and generally being unprepared. Instead of going back the way we came due to our predicament we decided to drop straight downhill to get out of the deeper snow and just planned to hitchhike back to the car from whatever road we came to first. Great plan! After slogging down this steep north facing mountain for at least an hour or two we unexpectedly ended up at an old cabin on the edge of the wilderness which we were not expecting. I've since looked at the map on my onx and this is literally the only dwelling within many miles and seems to be a private inholding that pre-dates the wilderness designation. I remember hoping that it was an unoccupied summer cabin but we saw smoke coming from the chimney and knew someone was home and we were suddenly aware that we were trespassing. The road leading to the cabin was unplowed with no vehicle tracks leading in or out which we all though was strange given the isolated location. I remember some type of quick discussion taking place amongst us. Something akin to "hey let's get the hell out of here". As we start walking down the road out of nowhere is just this old man with a long white beard wearing a tattered grey robe and carrying what I can best describe as a long sicle like the grim reaper carries. For a minute we all thought we were about to be murdered. Turns out the guy lived on his own up there and didn't own a vehicle. He said he rides his bike into town once every couple of weeks during the summer and stocks up on supplies for winter. He said we were the first people he had seen or talked to since November (it was early May). We apologized for trespassing but he clearly didn't care. It took us several hours of walking down his road and then finally getting a ride from someone back to our car. Looking back on this I actually really admire the guy. He's probably passed away by now but there can't be too many people left like him living alone at 10,000 ft all winter.
