Scary Reddit Stories vol. 4

 r/backwoodscreepy is exactly what it sounds like. And this week, we're reading the stories that creeped us out the most. Laughing in the woods, sudden silence, and tales from a former SAR. Prepare to never want to venture into the woods again. 

Have an eerie PNW encounter of your own? send it to eerilybelovedpodcast@gmail.com

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Intro music by Don Edwards

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Okay, welcome back to the podcast. And early beloved, we are gathering here today with Morgan.

SPEAKER_02 0:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 0:08

And G Edwards.

SPEAKER_01 0:10

And today, and we're gonna be reading another round of Reddit stories.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Yay.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

And most of these are from R slash backwoods creepy.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

Let's get into it. I'm excited.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

Okay, we've got the lights off. We've got the candles on. The mood is set. Okay, laughing in the woods is what the title of this one is.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

And this is from R slash Let's Not Meet. Exactly. Decided to make a Reddit account so I could post this story that happened about five years ago. I went camping with three of my buddies, John, Bennett, and Kyle. We do this every year, kind of a bro trip to reconnect with each other. We were all fresh out of college and decided to go on our yearly camping trip in August. We were from Oregon and ended up camping in the woods there like we usually do at the exact same spot. The first day was great. We set up our spot, explored the area, and by the time the sun was setting, we set up a campfire and made dinner. After a few too many beers and some s'mores. That's cute that they're doing. That's so cute. We decided to go to sleep. It was a perfect end to a perfect day. Our second day was basically the same thing. Yeah, my story is similar. As we finished the rest of the beers, we were wrestling around with each other like guys do. Then John stopped messing around and froze. Everyone was confused, but John claimed he heard something nearby. I told him it was most likely a squirrel, and he said no, it was most definitely not. He was scaring me at this point, so I decided to resume the tackling session and I took him down. We forgot about this whole thing until about ten minutes later. We were tired from wrestling and joking around, so we decided to put out the fire and head into the tent. We had a six-person tent for anybody wondering, so we were all in one tent.

SPEAKER_02 2:25

They're having a slumber party.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

Just as our only light source, besides our flashlights, went out. I heard a slight cackle. I assumed it was one of the boys because we were all clearly a bit buzzed, so everything's funny. I wanted to see what was so funny, so I turned the flashlight directly into Bennett's face. I thought he was the one laughing. Bennett's face was as white as a ghost. He looked at me and said, Did you guys hear that? I said, The laughing? And Kyle said, Wait, that wasn't you. We were all shaken and decided to get into the tent. As we got into the tent, I pulled out an axe that I used to cut the wood. It was the only source of protection we had. I was at the very end of the tent with Kyle and John in the middle and Bennett on the other end. We were all silent, but I knew we were all wide awake after hearing the laughing. We weren't exactly at an actual campsite where there were other people around. We just walked into the woods, found an open spot, and set up camp there. We were about a mile from our car with barely any cell signal, so I guess you could say we weren't exactly in the safest position if there was a crazy maniac running around. I got so tired I eventually dozed off. I have no idea how long I was sleeping before I heard laughing again. It's hard to describe other than it sounded menacing. I was frozen, I didn't move, I didn't even try to look over to see if my buddies were awake. The axe was under my pillow. As I mustered up the strength to move to get the axe, I saw what looked like someone's finger pressed up against the tent, just circling around the tent. Someone was definitely outside walking around our tent, laughing. No. You no I didn't read through this.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Wait, with the the finger like tracing around the tent.

SPEAKER_01 4:10

I imagine the sound like dragging against this the tent too. Why aren't they like, what's going on? I wonder if the other guys are awake.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:18

When they got to the front part of the tent where the entrance was, they stopped. About five seconds went by before the person ferociously took shook the tent and screamed, boogity boogity. That's what I knew. My buddies were awake as well because Kyle screamed like a little girl after. No. Whoever was behind it laughed again and walked off. We lay there the rest of the night, wide awake and definitely sober. We didn't want to move out of pure fear that whoever was out there was still there. When the sun came up, we packed everything and walked back to the car. We still go camping every year, but make sure it's a legit camping site. And I bring a gun with me and just not and not just an axe. Whoever was outside our campsite could have been a deranged homeless person, psychopath, serial killer, meth head, or just an asshole playing a prank on us. But I sure as hell won't camp in a rural place anymore. Stay safe out there.

SPEAKER_03 5:12

What's he gonna do? Urban camping?

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Well, they're in the middle of nowhere. Where is the where were they camping?

SPEAKER_01 5:18

They just said in the woods. They walked in or they parked somewhere, they walked a mile into the woods and set up camp.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

What? See, I was starting to think it was fake, and then they said that. Like, oh, I just we all just like laughed it off, went to bed, and like tried not to move. Yeah, it's pretty real.

SPEAKER_02 5:35

You think so? You think in that in that scenario that you would just be frozen and you wouldn't Yeah. If you had a group of friends with you, you wouldn't do anything?

SPEAKER_03 5:44

Oh, actually, yeah, a group of friends, I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 5:46

Cause I mean, there's what is it, four dudes?

SPEAKER_03 5:49

Yeah, like grown men. They're all like sweaty and like exhausted from wrestling all night, though. Tell me okay, tell me that isn't written by a girl. Oh yeah, just dudes being dudes like wrestling.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 6:03

Do dudes do they they really do do that?

SPEAKER_01 6:06

Because I I mean probably.

SPEAKER_03 6:08

They really do. After after making s'mores and having a perfect match.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Right, right. Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:13

Getting their shower caps on.

SPEAKER_02 6:14

Yeah. Aww.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

That's so I thought I had a follow-up story. Hold on, I'm trying to find the boogity boogity boogity.

SPEAKER_03 6:25

That's the part where I was like, ah, it's fake.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

It's it's like somebody playing a prank. I want to know where this was because it's very vague. Because I could see like somebody just being like an asshole, like just going up and going, oh, people are camping over here. I'm gonna play a prank on them. Like it'd be kind of funny.

SPEAKER_03 6:46

Yeah, it'd be kind of funny, but what wouldn't be funny is if you were the one playing the prank and all of a sudden a bullet comes out of the channel.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

I was just gonna say, there's also that. Right.

SPEAKER_03 6:56

It's an expensive camping trip all of a sudden, lawyer fees and regardless, weird. Maybe he was like camping like in Gresham, like a mile up the road?

SPEAKER_02 7:04

Like on somebody's property. Like where did you yeah, like where did you park your car and like go? Parked at McDonald's, wash. You walked a mile to go camping in the woods?

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Maybe it was like one of those pull-offs. I don't know. You know, sometimes there's like a gravel pull-off on the back roads. Yeah. And people, if there's a a creek or something or a river, they'll go fishing or I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 7:31

Yeah, but they didn't say anything about that. They just said that they also in the woods in Oregon, you're building a fire and nobody's somebody could have seen that and like on the investigate.

SPEAKER_01 7:42

Right. Oh, that's even creepier though.

SPEAKER_02 7:46

But they didn't hear any cars, it was just foot traffic, basically. Like just somebody's just walking up there.

SPEAKER_01 7:52

Yeah, and they didn't hear anyone walking.

SPEAKER_02 7:56

And laughing like in the distance?

SPEAKER_01 7:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

I want to know like time frame too. Like they said that they heard it not the first night, just the second night.

SPEAKER_03 8:06

Second night after wrestling.

SPEAKER_02 8:07

And also he said that he's heard this story before.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

That's the thing. Yeah, he was watching a video before this trip, and it was about laughter.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

But but he was not the only person that like heard them. Everybody else had heard it too, both times.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Here's my theory. Here's my theory.

SPEAKER_01 8:27

Someone was playing the video.

SPEAKER_02 8:28

Somebody, no, he brought it up to somebody, said, Oh my gosh, have you heard of this? Like people laughing in the woods. I'm kind of scared, I'm going camping this weekend. One of their other friends that didn't get invited on this trip sneaks out of the woods and plays a prank on them. Knows they don't have any like weapons, you know what I mean? Like knows that they don't have any guns or anything. They have an axe. They have an they have an axe, but you'd have to get pretty close to the person. So if like it they recognize them.

SPEAKER_03 8:59

I don't know. Maybe like a Bluetooth speaker, and the guy was playing the video. Right. And then they just all imagine like something. Or he dreamt it. Yeah. But it could have been like a lucid dream too, like he was half awake.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Maybe. Oh my gosh. So I think I I feel like I've talked about this before. There was a Reddit story where this guy wasn't invited to like his girlfriend's family's camping trip, but he knew it was happening. And so he was like, Okay, babe, go have fun, like talk to you in a few days.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

Wait, I think you told me about this. Okay, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 9:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 9:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:35

And he bought a Bigfoot costume. I'm pretty sure it was a Bigfoot costume. And I need I need to find this story. And he went to where they were camping because he knew where they were camping and scared them on purpose. Like waited in the woods. No, it's weird. It's really don't laugh. He waited in the woods to terrify her family. And like that's weirdo behavior. People just drove to the campsite. You waited until it was dark.

SPEAKER_03 10:09

I mean, that was kind of funny.

SPEAKER_02 10:11

No, it's so weird. It's like read the room. Like it's not. There are there are people that think that that's okay, but in reality, it's like, okay, that's kind of messed up.

SPEAKER_01 10:25

Okay. This is from R slash Backwoods Creepy, and it's in response to someone asking if they had any stories in Washington. This person says, I grew up in Monroe, about 45 45 miles northeast of Seattle. Small, quiet town with mostly woods and forests around it. I grew up and my mom and my cousins used to always tell me a story about a man they called grocery bag man. The name is exactly what it sounds like. A creepy man in a trench coat always carrying around one bag in each hand. This wouldn't be scary except for the fact that all of our houses were spread deep in the backwoods, miles from downtown where you would normally get groceries. Every single one of my family members would see him around their respective homes, usually in the early mornings. I never believed in this guy and I thought it was a joke. When I turned 16 and I could drive, I would always spend time with friends in and around the backwoods of Monroe. One night I was driving to my friend's house who lives about 10 miles out of town in a deeply secluded area. It's hilly, there's no sidewalks, and you never see people walking that way. In order to get to his house, you had to drive into town from my house and then back up another back road. As I drove down around 11 o'clock at night, I finally see grocery bagman, one bag in each hand, trench coat, long and creepy disheveled hair. When I passed him, I swear he looked at me and stared into my soul. I sped to my buddy's house for a little party, and I'm telling my friends about what I saw and the story my family used to tell me. Of course I'm being made fun of because nobody believes me and thinks I'm a total I eventually say F it and stop trying to prove to them that they're this creepy dude haunting the old roads. At about 2 a.m. we decide to drive into town to get some jack in the box food as high school boys do. We all pile into my buddy's truck and start driving out of his neighborhood development. As we hit the stop sign and turn onto the main roads, I shit you not, grocery bag man slowly walks past our car and continues down into the abyss. We all freaked out and I screamed, I told you. Maybe I'm overreacting, but it just didn't make sense why he would be out in the rural areas just for kicks. I still maintain it's a ghost traveling the backwoods of Monroe, Washington. Okay. To see him at 11 o'clock at night carrying grocery bags. Yeah. And then later also see him at two o'clock in the morning, also carrying grocery bags still.

SPEAKER_02 12:51

Right.

SPEAKER_01 12:52

Where are you going?

SPEAKER_02 12:53

What year is this? When is this from? Recent?

SPEAKER_01 12:57

Four years ago.

SPEAKER_02 12:58

Okay. What kind of grocery bags? Plastic or paper? And what store were they from? Do they care about the environment? Yeah, seriously. How do we really know it's a PW? But like it's gotta be paper bags, right? Is it traders?

SPEAKER_01 13:14

I imagine like the roads to independence or something.

SPEAKER_02 13:16

The roads to independent like the Kirby. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:19

Like there's no there's no bike lane, you know, it there's no space at all for someone to walk. Right. That's that's what I imagine this is like. Like in the dark, you're driving, you turn the corner, and all of a sudden you see a guy with grocery bags.

SPEAKER_02 13:33

He said he was like staring.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

He was staring into their soul. And people have been seeing him for years.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

In Washington. Like no one's walking to get groceries in Washington.

SPEAKER_02 13:46

Nobody's walking in general.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

Right.

SPEAKER_02 13:49

Nobody's walking in general. And I've always said that. Nobody walks these days. And guess what? We went on a walk. We didn't today.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

Garrett, you have no thoughts about this? We forgot to ring creepy level unbelievability.

SPEAKER_02 14:00

Oh, we can do that.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Of the first one. Yeah. And this one.

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Yeah. Um, this is giving this is giving bandageman. This is giving that type of vibe. I'm not saying that they did see it, but.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

Yeah. Does it act does it look at at a glance in his hand? Or like his hands look like bags? Could it be a bandageman situation? Like that's what I'm saying. It's not they're not actually very trench coat.

SPEAKER_03 14:30

So two kids stacked up in a trench coat. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 14:33

Right. Absolutely. Yeah. It's okay. Creepiness and believability.

SPEAKER_02 14:37

I mean, obviously it's creepy. Are we doing scale? What are we doing? Yeah, one to one to ten. One to ten. Um, probably like six, seven. Uh believability, I don't I mean, I would say leaning like lower, like three or four, maybe. Like, maybe sure they saw something, but I don't know. It also like he put that in their heads, and so they saw somebody on the side of the road and just imagined that it was him. I don't know. Bizarre.

SPEAKER_03 15:06

Mm-hmm. Garrett. I feel like it's like the first one. What do you mean? The guy watched a video before, and so he just Oh, that one? Yeah. I don't. Like you just put it in his own head?

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Yeah, maybe. I don't but he saw it twice. You know, like.

SPEAKER_03 15:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Okay, Gary, give it a score.

SPEAKER_03 15:22

Um, creepy, I'll give it a three. Believability, I'll give it a five, maybe. I believe you saw, but not sure. I believe it's what he thinks it is. No.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

This next one is from also Back What's Creepy, and it was posted one year ago. It's titled SAR Stories. I volunteered with a search and rescue group, and we were frequently dispatched to remote areas looking for missing people, recoveries, and occasionally crime scene searches. We were called out one day after a logging company had unearthed a backpack belonging to a man who'd been missing for over 20 years. The initial search for the man had been massive. Hundreds of people, dogs, a massive community effort. Nothing was ever found. Not a single clue. It took us over an hour to crawl our team to an unmaintained logging road. The area had wild horses which I had never even heard of in our area. It was remote. From the jump we had some weird technical issues. My teammates' brand new dodge truck stalled out on the logging road. I carry a litany of tools, jumbo cable jumper cables, tow rope, etc., and the Dodge was dead dead. I don't remember if we towed it to the side or what we did, but there was no fixing the issue. The truck wouldn't turn on, no lights, no electrical, but the battery was fine. My rigs fog lights suddenly went out as well. They never came back on. I chucked up to the extremely rough terrain, knocking them loose. A few pieces of clothing as we got further down the creek at the bottom. We found a mandible and then the top part of a skull within the first ten to fifteen minutes. The clothing matched the description of the missing man on the bolo flyers that we had been given. One of my teammates sat down for a break and picked up a rib that was next to him. We had been up and down the hill we had sat on and hadn't even noticed. The human ribs were scattered up the hillside. That was odd.

SPEAKER_02 17:20

Like he just exploded or like an angel of the floor.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

We were all trained a grid search and had done so. Had we merely overlooked five plus ribs that were laying plainly on the ground? Maybe. The clothing and bones were out in the open. Our old maps from the original search show this area was searched before. Like during the original. The original search is 20 plus years before. It happens, maybe the guy was on the move and these weren't here during the initial search. I drove out to the scene to grab a sheriff who's going to guard the scene overnight. We'd flagged every fork we took with fluorescent flagging tape as the logging rods were not marked, were missing the number sign that usually sat at every fork and not well maintained. We were at least an hour off of any paved road. I don't know the direction that we had took on every fork, the way in, right, left, left, right, etc. I was thankful I had. Our flagging markers were all gone. I usually stayed out at sites overnight as I didn't have children at the time. I chose not to stay at this site. It just felt off. On another search for a lost hunter, we stumbled across hanging figures in the trees made of twigs, moss, and lashed together with tall grass or vines. Straight up Blair Witch style. This would have been years after Blair Witch project came out. The team was used to seeing weird stuff in the woods, but these were unsettling. We camped overnight at that spot as we hadn't found the person. We slept in a circle with a small campfire in the middle. It was fall headed into winter and very cold. We had only sleep sacks, no tents or tarps. When we woke up, there's a small bundle of twigs lashed together with vines by our fire. We initially blamed our team clown who was only pulling pranks. The look on his face told us it was not him. No clue what slash who it was. Many of the old timers swore that they had seen, heard, or smelled Bigfoot. These were tough men. Many had military or law enforcement experience, and they weren't the kind of guys to get scared. And this was in um this was in like rural Oregon, Washington. So the first story of them finding the bones and stuff after the area had already been searched, Garrett someone commented and said, so much of this sounds like a missing 411 case. I always called those case oddities, they just don't make sense. Regarding the first case, the fact that there were hundreds of searches initially and nothing was found until 20 years later. Then your team didn't see any remains on your initial search, and then they were sitting right next to them. This was a commonality, and majorly on a majority of these cases, it's uncanny.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

It's interesting though that his remains were found twenty years and they were on top of the ground. And right. It's like you'd think that they'd be buried under like literally anything. It's like somebody went out and just tossed things around.

SPEAKER_03 20:10

Yeah. You know? And he explained like the guy was on the move, like he was just losing losing ribs every second. Right.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

Yeah. Well, I mean, I guess that could be explained animals, maybe. But the fact that they had already searched that area just like very shortly before. Right. And hadn't found anything, and that's why they had like sat down there, and then he like looked over and just picked something up. Weird. Yeah. And their markers. Yeah. Since there were no like road signs or anything. Not there. Ooh. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:44

No, no, no. The energy there is interesting. Yeah, he's a smart one for sure if you're not spending the night. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

Someone said, okay, but can you please give me more info on what finding a bundle of twigs slash sticks by your tent means?

SPEAKER_04 20:57

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

And then they kind of went on to their own experience that happened in Texas. And someone said, It's a protection charm used by witches and spiritualists. And the original poster responded said, That's fascinating. I wonder if something slash someone was trying to keep us safe.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

I mean, it worked. He's love.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:15

I mean, yeah. Yeah, because all I could think, I'm not thinking Bigfoot. I'm not thinking like that kind of a thing. I'm thinking like that.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

I think that might have been just a separate, like, oh, and by the way, like some of these guys had also said that they had experiences with this as well. Okay. Believability and creepy of that one.

SPEAKER_02 21:34

I believe that it happened. So I would say probably like eight. And creepy, I would say same eight. Really creepy.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

That was that was pretty creep. That was a creepy one.

SPEAKER_02 21:49

It was creepy. I wonder if there's like a weird uh energy in that area. You know how you talked about like the crooked house and like there's like a really weird, like free. I wonder do we know why the original man went missing? Was it just he was hiking and he just got lost? I wonder if he got disoriented and like, I don't know, died there and then the spirits of some sort like sprinkled this.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

Maybe, but to your point, if it was so long ago, why were they just like on top of the grass? I don't know, that is Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:23

Well, I feel like if it's disorienting, then that could explain why they didn't see it the first time.

SPEAKER_01 22:29

Oh, you mean oh you mean the space itself? Like the space itself is disoriented.

SPEAKER_02 22:33

And then they couldn't find their markers. So like, not that they were moved, but that they couldn't find their way back because of the area was so disorienting. Like they were like, I think I've been here before. Where's my marker at? And then they're finding all these different things.

SPEAKER_01 22:47

Like I feel like something else is Or maybe just something doesn't want them to find what you're looking for. There's also that too. Something doesn't want them to find their way out.

SPEAKER_02 22:56

Similar to what this person could be.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

Could be.

SPEAKER_02 23:00

Somebody's living in the wood. It's probably the person that was cackling in the first story.

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Maybe.

SPEAKER_03 23:05

Who's also the witch that gives the protection charm.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

I didn't know that those were considered protection charms, but that's yeah, maybe something instead of it being like maybe we should look into that. Scary that it was in the middle of their circle for a reason. Yeah. Garrett, what do you think? Believability and creepiness level?

SPEAKER_03 23:24

I'll give it an eight for believability and a nine for creepy.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 23:28

The woods are scary.

SPEAKER_01 23:29

The woods are scary. I need to do like a total a whole episode on like search and rescue stories because those are I can just go down a huge rabbit hole of those for and scare myself.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

Seriously, and never go into the woods ever.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

No, like the stairs in the woods, like the uh-uh. Yeah, I gotta look into those. Okay. And that was posted a year ago. So that wasn't like a from a Reddit archive.

SPEAKER_02 23:56

Is there a story about the remains being found and like that kind of thing?

SPEAKER_01 24:00

He he didn't he didn't say who who it was specifically, but I wonder who it was. Me too. Or like more details surrounding the disappearance. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:10

I just figure out if he's like Yeah, I'd want to know too.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 24:15

Like, was he an experienced? Because they're always like that. They're very experienced in the woods, and then they go missing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Well that's yeah, that's like the episode that Garrett and I did. It's all these people who are they go hiking every weekend, they're doing these days-long hikes on survival type and then they go missing on like a silver falls type hike, just 30 minutes out and back.

SPEAKER_03 24:38

And it only makes you think that it's an outside something that caused very that one old guy got got like on his way back from the hot springs.

SPEAKER_01 24:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:47

And he went all the time.

SPEAKER_01 24:49

Mm-hmm. Yeah, he'd went all the time. He had gone all the time and he was just coming back by himself. No one ever saw him again.

SPEAKER_03 24:57

Got swooped. Dude. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:59

If you haven't listened, go listen to the Missing 411 theory Olympic National Park episode we did.

SPEAKER_03 25:05

Almost as cool as Mount Thunder King.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

Mount Storm King.

SPEAKER_03 25:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:09

From the Lake Crescent.

SPEAKER_03 25:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:11

Which is also a ponification. Mm-hmm. Which is also in the Olympic National Park.

SPEAKER_02 25:16

So gross.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:18

Ugh.

SPEAKER_01 25:19

I know.

SPEAKER_02 25:20

Weird things happen in the forest.

SPEAKER_01 25:21

Weird things happen in the forest.

SPEAKER_03 25:23

Mm-hmm. And it is a hundred percent a choice to go.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

So this is also from Arsosh Backwoods Creepy three years ago. Army Ranger and Deafening Silence of Dread. I'm a former longtime airborne ranger, having served for many years in Washington State. After my service, I was a Forest Service firefighter and disaster response contractor. Suffice to say, I'm very experienced outdoorsman and professionally trained. In 2009, I was hiking in the Forest Reserve near Offoot Lake in western Washington. The preserve was adjacent to the home of a buddy's father, and before setting off into the lumber preserve, his father had implored me not to go hiking in there alone, as it was a very dangerous area, a very frightening area. He had lived there for over 30 years and refused to let his kids ever step foot into the forest. Being a young, competent ranger, I laughed off his superstition and headed out into the forest. It was an unusually hot and humid day in late spring, and I was armed with a Glock 19 and feeling very capable and competent. I had made it about three miles into the forest and came to a massive bowl section of perfectly manicured pine forest with no undergrowth, just tan spruce pine needle bed as far as I could see, and it looked like I was stepping down into a forest bowl the size of a modern football stadium. I got about halfway down the bowl, and literally every sound in the forest became totally deafening deafeningly silent. All in an instant. It was as though I had stepped into a soundproof studio room in one step. No bugs, no wind, no ambient sound, nothing. By this time I had been to combat twice and graduated ranger school and was a pretty salty individual, but I am not ashamed to admit I was overcome with a feeling of fear, dread, and deep guttural, paralyzing fear. I gathered myself together and turned around and practically ran the entire way back to my friend's father's house, got on my truck, left, and have never been back. I've spent years thinking about what happened in this woods and to this day have no answers. I was completely sober, fully aware of my surroundings, and in good spirits and health at the time of this incident, with no mental mental, physical, or psychological issues. I cannot say what the incident was caused by, but I have never been so deeply in fear of my life. Even thinking about it now over a decade later makes me feel uneasy, as though whatever that was in the forest is still there. All this I swear in my soul to be true.

SPEAKER_03 27:54

You know what the moral of that story is? If old Buck's worried about something, best take it serious.

SPEAKER_02 28:00

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 28:00

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 28:01

Yeah, why did he say that it was creepy? Like what happened? I would want to know why he thought that.

SPEAKER_01 28:07

Wait, someone someone commented you should take a look at this post, and in it the people find a strange circular clearing that perfectly matches your description and also fills them with dread. I speculate that these clearings are connected to Bigfoot and are possibly a part of their territory that they have marked.

SPEAKER_03 28:23

Brother What is this guy stinks? Wait what Bigfoot's territory?

SPEAKER_01 28:30

Someone commented someone commented and said, No matter what the story is, if Sasquatch is truly a gigantic ape family member, it does not explain the silence it creates when it's nearby or the pure frozen adrenaline fear in every account from a hiker. Most cases say squatch are predators that are the same that in the same sense as humans, often having primal screens, throwing rocks, breaking branches, and moving around a perimeter of the hikers to scare them away. Some say it has evolved night vision, lives in caves, blah blah blah blah blah. Either way, in this day and age, I don't think they're from this universe or state of existence in the same way as us.

SPEAKER_03 29:05

Okay, rather. Now we're talking about We gotta back it up. Multiverse.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

Okay. You know, but that comes up a lot, like the portal theory. Like if these things are so big, how do they how are they moving without people seeing them more often? Beyond like the blurry pictures. Also, we have iPhone 17s. Why is every picture of Bigfoot blurry?

SPEAKER_03 29:30

Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

Zoomed in 17 eggs.

SPEAKER_03 29:32

Whoa, is Apple paying you, dude?

SPEAKER_01 29:34

No. I'm just saying that.

SPEAKER_03 29:36

Starting to sound like that guy, my dodge truck, my ball back.

SPEAKER_01 29:39

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_02 29:39

It's it's just one of those things like We've podcasts is sponsored by please. We're making it.

SPEAKER_01 29:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:49

It's so funny.

SPEAKER_01 29:49

It's just interesting that I would love to see a clear picture of Bigfoot, a clear video of Bigfoot. Something that was filmed on a camera that exists today instead of like a VHS recorder. Right. Obviously, we're gonna do an episode about Bigfoot one day, but one day.

SPEAKER_03 30:05

Do you guys think the FBI is hiding them?

SPEAKER_01 30:07

Someone says this means an alpha predator is near if all animals are quiet. I believe I heard it on a nature show sometime before.

SPEAKER_03 30:14

I mean, Google's a thing, Doug. You could have Googled that before you posted. They called him the squatch. There's a whole species of them.

unknown 30:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:24

Okay, Believability and Creepy Level. What's that one?

SPEAKER_03 30:28

I mean, it would have been higher before the squatch. Interdimensional portals.

SPEAKER_01 30:36

I was just, I was just adding to what.

SPEAKER_03 30:39

I feel like a boomer listening to that.

SPEAKER_01 30:42

I didn't explain it well. There was another story that I was going to read about a person's hiking experience, and they claimed that they had gone through a portal. And then they backed up.

SPEAKER_03 30:53

Put the shrooms down.

SPEAKER_02 30:56

They're just on a trip.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

Obviously, you can't read everything that's posted on the internet, but sometimes like I do want to believe that some of these are maybe a little bit true.

SPEAKER_02 31:07

But I I feel like well, he also said he he stepped into like a bowl like thing. If you go into think about it, you're at like the skate park or whatever, you're in like a bowl, like a lower thing. You're not gonna, there's no wind, there's no dropping in. He's dropping in. Like he's just yeah, yeah. He's not gonna be able to hear. So yeah, obviously the sounds, the sounds are gonna get, didn't he say it was louder? Didn't he say it was louder in there?

SPEAKER_01 31:33

No, it was quiet.

SPEAKER_02 31:34

It was quiet. So, I mean, I feel like that would explain it a little bit, but it depends on how low, because all I'm thinking about is like a skate park, like a bull.

SPEAKER_01 31:48

Okay, someone says sounds like a defaloid. I'm I'm probably not saying spell that D-E-F-I-L-A-D-E.

SPEAKER_03 31:56

How you spell forest bowl?

SPEAKER_02 31:58

Dude, go ahead and look up forest bowl because you can't find it.

SPEAKER_03 32:02

That's not what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_02 32:02

It's just a cereal bowl with trees in it, bro.

SPEAKER_03 32:07

Dude, somebody said like a miniature DIY terrarium.

SPEAKER_01 32:11

That's literally all I was getting on Google. I imagine it's like an inverted, not a mountain, but like an inverted hill.

SPEAKER_02 32:20

Definitely. So it's a military term.

SPEAKER_01 32:24

So someone said we use this term a lot to describe defensive battle positions, but I've been in a few large natural terrain depressions or bowls where all exterior sounds are blocked from terrain masking. They can be early quiet, especially given the additional sound masking effect of the evergreen tree canopy. Still doesn't explain the feeling of fear or dread, though. Creepy.

SPEAKER_02 32:43

Well, I mean, think about it. When you're yeah, like you know, when you're outside and it's snowing and it's just dead silent, it's kind of creepy. Like it's like the sound. You cannot hear a single thing. Yeah, no, I think it like gives you like a weird, like you're you're like hyper aware of everything going on around you. So especially when you're alone and you're walking and somebody just told you that this forest area is dangerous, or whatever he said, it's creepy, it's frightening, or whatever he said, like you'd have a heightened sense of like, yeah, I'm scared to be here.

SPEAKER_01 33:21

Someone had even said, I wonder, had you not been told it's a very frightening area prior to your hike, would you have had the same experience?

SPEAKER_02 33:28

Yeah, like you already have that in your brain, and your brain's just telling you to like notice every little thing. But yeah, I would agree that if no sound was happening, I'd be terrified, especially if someone was like, Hey, by the way, it's scary out there.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

Like I would want to know what the dad knows. If he has any stories or personal experiences or things that he's heard to make it so he wouldn't allow his kids out there, right, you know, I think that's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 33:55

Going back to like the predator thing, like being in the area. If that forest area is not traveled, like he's walking into there, all of the animals are gonna be hyper aware of this person. And so they're gonna shut up. Because they're like, we don't know. But also, like cougars and stuff, yeah. Those are really like even in where my parents live, they've had a cougar like go through their property.

SPEAKER_00 34:27

Scary, scary, scary.

SPEAKER_02 34:28

So like yeah. I mean things get really again if you're hyperaware. Okay, wait.

SPEAKER_01 34:36

What real quick. Yeah. Not to talk about laughing again, but this is also under this same post. One of my favorite things about living in Washington is the eeriness of the forest. I, female 28, have had a few weird experiences here, but one of the creepiest happened an hour away from Ovat Lake in Covington, Washington. You got me with the Wirehouser because I always pass Wirehouse Avenue on the way home to the guy I'm seeing. Weyerhauser was like the reserve name of where this guy was. It was 3 a.m. and we were outside with a dog, letting her conduct a business transaction on smoking a cigarette.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

Oh wait, that's funny.

SPEAKER_01 35:15

I started this routine because I'd have a hard time sleeping at his house. He would come outside with me most of the time, but if he didn't, I would be okay alone on the front porch with the dog. My ex-boyfriend walks over to the other side of the driveway towards the trash cans, and I'm trying to get the dog to the grass. She will not move a muscle and is shaking and looking straight ahead. I stop and look in the same direct at the same time, we hear a loud laugh, unlike any I've heard before. The best way I could describe it is if you imagine this laugh was a source of all evil, like it's mocking you, but it's more disturbing than that because it even sounds inhuman and it was deep. The length of the laugh was like ha ha ha and abruptly stopped. We freeze and look at each other trying to comprehend what we just heard. It echoed as if the sky was the source of this horrible sound. We never heard anything like it again, but I feel once was too much. We were sober and aware at the time. If I was alone, it would be easier to brush off with my imagination. The fact that the dog reacted a second before it happened and knew the direction, and my ex-boyfriend had a similar reaction as me to the sound re reinforces the reality. The disturbing laugh did occur. Washington can get weird. Not with the laughing again. Not the laughing, just like full circle moment. Okay, but creepiness and believability of the forest bull.

SPEAKER_03 36:39

Mini terrarium.

SPEAKER_02 36:43

A serial bull. I mean, I believe that there could be a bull in the forest. And I believe that it was silent. But I don't know if it's obviously it's creepy, so I would say probably like eight, nine, and then believability. I mean, I would say same. I'm sure you did have that experience. Why he had that experience.

SPEAKER_01 37:08

Yeah, it it could potentially be explained by other phenomenon. What about you?

SPEAKER_03 37:17

Believability, I'll go with uh I'll go with a five. I feel like it would have been higher, but he said he's like an army ranger, been deployed twice, no mental problems. I dude. You ain't fooling anyone.

SPEAKER_01 37:33

Well, and then he said, like before this had happened.

SPEAKER_03 37:35

You ain't fooling anyone? So two deployments, no mental issues. Come on now.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

Okay, there's more creepiness?

SPEAKER_03 37:47

Probably an eight. Me personally would not love to be walking through the forest and all of a sudden it's deaf, like I'm just deaf, no thanks.

SPEAKER_01 37:57

I would be scared that I would be having like a Yeah, I would definitely do a finger snap or two. Yeah, yeah. You just like jazz snapping in the room.

SPEAKER_02 38:07

You're like going like this, like, can I hear okay? Um, it also says that nature goes quiet when there's a storm that's about to happen. Oh, because animals can sense that.

SPEAKER_03 38:18

So that could be that's almost worse than a squash predator.

SPEAKER_01 38:25

I I think it could be a combination of multiple things. I think it could be like there was a cougar or bear nearby, and also because he was like descending into something that the sound probably traveled a little bit different.

SPEAKER_03 38:40

Okay, well at least your DeWalt flashlight. All right, and your dodge truck, and my iPhone, and my and my my Apple iPhone 17 Pro.

SPEAKER_00 38:48

No, no, no, no, no, no. My iPad.

SPEAKER_03 38:51

My iPad, the iPad, my Tim Brooke Apple iPhone 17 Pro Max Coco Melody full volume.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

My headphones on so I don't hear anything weird.

SPEAKER_03 39:01

My beats headphones.

SPEAKER_01 39:02

Yeah. Beats. Thank you for listening to this podcast. If you have any stories you would like us to look into, true crime, paranormal, anything like that, please send me an email. Early belovedpodcast at gmail.com. First person who sends me an email after this gets a high five mentally. Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, Early Beloved Podcast, and click the notification button or the follow button on whatever app you choose to get notified when new episodes come out, which is every Thursday. Okay, see you next week. Bye.