Scary Camping Encounters in the Woods | Paranormal Stories

Pull up a lantern and settle in for a collection of strange, eerie, and unsettling camping stories.

This week, we explore paranormal encounters from the woods: a mysterious woman on a forest road, a haunted pond with something waiting in the dark, strange screams outside a tent, a possible Bigfoot encounter, a ghostly warning near a truck, night walkers, and even what may have been a portal in the trees.

Some stories feel like ghost stories. Others feel like folklore, cryptid encounters, or glitches in reality. But they all share one thing: the feeling that, sometimes, the woods are not as empty as they seem.

New episodes released regularly.

Join Paranormal Mystery Author Terri Reid and researcher Andrew T. Reid as they explore ghosts, cryptids, alien encounters, and other unexplained mysteries.

If you'd like to share your opinion, thoughts, or your own paranormal experience with us, please contact us at vftattic@gmail.com. 

Transcript

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I was driving through the Coconino National Forest last week on the way to the Grand Canyon with my boyfriend. It was about 12, 1 a.m. and I was just chillaxing, playing the switch while he drove us through the forest. Suddenly he jumps and yells, What the freak? Clearly, very startled. I asked what was wrong, and he said he saw a lady standing on the side of the road, pointing to the other side. Without contemplating it too much, I looked at where he said the woman was pointing, and out of the bushes steps a massive bull elk with a few females behind him, and we had to swerve hard to dodge him in time. Had I just been playing the switch and not seen them, we likely would have smashed right into what might as well have been a brick wall. So then I started to think about it and realized we were deep in a part of the forest where there's no marked campsites and no inhabited dwellings. And while it's not entirely impossible to assume that someone on the road is a camper, the way she just apparently appeared out of nowhere and was deliberately pointing to where the hidden elk were, to the only car likely within 30 miles, just seemed strange. Listen closely as the old walls still speak. Some things are hidden, not to be forgotten, but to be kept. The old house remembers what others forget. What is remembered is as true. Listen closely, and you too may just hear Voices from the Attic. I am Andrew T. Reed. I am an editor, researcher, paranormal enthusiast, and a son, as well as a big old giant nerd. I love that. Hi, I'm Terry Reid, author, mom, um, podcaster, researcher, um, lover of strange and unusual things. You should meet my family. Had to say that. It's accurate. We're we're strange and unusual. And you know, sometimes people consider us things. Sorry. It's okay. Thing one and thing two. So it is um just after um Memorial Day, and we decided we were gonna ruin everyone's summer. You excited for a summer vacation? Well, it's too bad. We're gonna freak you out. Oh, camping. We're telling creepy camping stories. So um, yeah, it's gonna be fun. So, you know, pull up your lantern, get your s'mores ready, and uh let's do some fun, scary camping stories. But before we get to that, thank you to those people who have subscribed and liked and followed and done all of those things. We love you. And if you haven't done it, excuse us, why not? Are we not good enough for your for your subscription or for your follow or for your comment? Huh? Have we not sweat and cried and bled enough for you? I'm sorry, that I'm laying it on real thick. Uh, we appreciate you just being here uh and watching, but also we would appreciate you more if you followed or subscribed, depending on whichever platform you are listening or watching. I love this. I have taught him guilt, and he's not even a parent yet. So wow, go you. That was that was pretty good. We're not just going on camping trips. You didn't say, you didn't say the oh, sorry, yeah. Fine, you don't have to subscribe. No, no, no. We're we're saving that for later on. Okay, okay, yeah, yeah. As we continue going through. Um, but no, I was gonna say because it's the there was there's a pun at the end of the sentence. We're not just going on a camping trip, we're going on a guilt trip. No, that was very good. Thank you, thank you. And if you don't subscribe, we're gonna turn this car around, right? Hey, thanks for and and the comments. Yes, I am just enjoying those so much. Thank you for the fun comments. As well as some, I mean, just in general, overall, we've we've appreciated everyone who even are saying things like, I don't have a story, I just wanted to comment. We appreciate that. Please, even if you don't have a story of your own, please reach out to us, comment, or email us. We we're more we're more than okay with receiving emails from people who don't feel like they have a story to share. Um, we'd love to hear your stories, whether it's through comments or through our email or yeah, our email, VFTAtic, uh, voices from the attic, vt addict at gmail.com. Um, but we just want to hear from you guys. We want to hear what things you liked, what things you you know didn't, what things you want to hear more about. Um, we are already working on a Bigfoot episode later on down the road because of a comment that somebody said they, you know, they love Bigfoot and they want to hear more about it. It's not gonna be this podcast, though. We do have some Bigfoot stories, I'm sure, because camping, you know. Right, and outside and big hairy things. Yeah. I mean, you also described a lot of campers, I think being outside, being big hairy things. That's true. Uh, myself sometimes included. Uh I I will admit, uh, let me ask before before we start diving into the scary stories, I gotta ask you. Do you uh what's your preferred method of camping? Are you a camper? Are you a glamper? Are you a backpacker? What do you what do you prefer? Okay, I think it's changed over the years. So that makes sense. Yeah, because you know the body has changed over the years. When when you guys were little, my favorite thing, we would pack everybody up, you know, because this was, you know, when you have seven kids, you look for vacations that are budget friendly. Yeah. So we would pack everybody up. We'd have tents, we'd have um the outdoor stove, and um, we'd go up to National Forest, and the coolest thing was seeing you guys come out of the tent in your little um feet pajamas. Because and you guys thought that was cool. It's like, hey, look, we're in our pajamas, and we're outside. And and then um there's nothing like being outside on a because the mornings are usually cold, especially up in northern Wisconsin. Yeah, yeah. Smelling bacon cooking first thing in the morning. Oh, there's just there's just yes. So I love that. And and the sound of loons. If I could get like a we're talking the birds, the birds. Uh, we don't want to hear the sounds of lunatics in the area. That'd be that'd be terrifying to hear that as you wake up. Smell of bacon and eggs frying, and then you know, that'd be bad. So I assume that's what that's what they would probably sound like. Um once again, we've done such a professional job. I will I will admit, I I don't know if I've actually met a lunatic in person. Um that was from when I was living in LA. I did see a lot of people who um they're ready for us to be demonetized. Just keep going. Yeah, uh with the that that cancel button. Yeah, where we have that that that uh hands hovering shake it over the cancel button. What is it gonna say? Well, no, I mean there was unfortunately a lot of people who, you know, um um uh were addicted to various things, and usually those people were the ones who were they they sh yelled some crazy things at you. Um loons are lovely little water animals, the water birds who have like this haunting sound. If you haven't heard, um there's a bunch of people on YouTube on Facebook who actually record loons. It it's a beautiful sound. And so so so that was cool. When you guys were little, that was my favorite camping to to tent camp. Then when you got old enough, um we would go up to um Porcupine Mountain State Park and we would backpack, and that was cool because Porcupine Mountain State Park, it's in the UP of Michigan, right on Lake Superior, and it is like walking into the Lord of the Rings area. I it's so great. And so yeah, we would we would move, and I remember backpacking and um camping by a river and getting up in the morning and seeing wolf prints by right outside of our tent because the wolves had gone to the creek to to drink water late at night. That's cool. That was it was way cool. Now uh at my age, I still I I think I like cabins, running waters, flush toilets. So you're you're you've transitioned to a bit of a glamper. I don't know if I I mean I don't need well glamping is just I mean I consider glamping anywhere from an RV to a cabin. Uh we if you if you like the idea of camping but you don't want to sleep on the ground in a tent, um that's me. I'm also I also prefer glamping. I love I love the idea, and I don't even know, I mean, I'll be honest, I don't know if this is considered camping even. I love the idea of going to like um going to uh uh a log cabin or something near like Yellowstone or some other national park forest uh and being close to an area with a bunch of walking trails, but then being able to go back home and sleep indoors. Or if I honestly, let's be real, if I go, if I'm gonna go glamping with my friends, I'm I'm probably gonna dedicate some time to hiking. I'm probably gonna dedicate more time to staying in the cabin and playing a bunch of board games with my friends because uh you could do that at home, but I could also do it in a beautiful log cabin somewhere else. Especially if I'm I mean, some of the friends that I have, they're they're not close to here, you know? Right. Okay, so it's a get together. Yeah, exactly. It'd be a get together. I've got some friends uh who live in, you know, Idaho, some friends live in Tennessee, some friends live in other places. Um I would love to go on like a log cabin trip somewhere and just you know have have it be this beautiful. You can go hike if you want to, or go fishing, or go do other things, but you could also spend as much time as you want playing board games. Because I am a board gamer. You probably haven't. There's a movie called On Golden Pond. I have not seen it. And it has Catherine Hepburn and um Ash. Why can't I think of his name? And um I can see his face. Douglas, Douglas Henry Fonda. Henry Henry Fonda, maybe, is the husband in On Golden Pond. You guys correct me. You guys correct me. I know on Golden Pond because uh Bernstein did the music for. Oh, okay. It's it was I did it in marching band. Okay, oh, okay. And that voice you just heard was Ash, our Knower of All Things. Knower of all things, as well as our sound producer and just you know except who's in, you know, on Golden Pond. I didn't know that. Yes. But I bet you guys could comment uh who that actor is. Go ahead and let us know in the comments down below. We won't know now, but uh we'll yeah we'll we'll trust your judgment. So um Nicolas Cage or something. Just no. I I want you guys to say a bunch of random actors' names, uh, and then we'll have to decide which one we believe the most. So it was about this older couple who had this cabin right on a lake, golden pond. Okay, and their family would come. It was it a pond or a lake? It was a pond lake. It was a pond lake. I don't think those exist. It was it was more like a lake, but they called it a pond. It was big. Okay, you could boat on it. I mean, but boat like a rowboat, not okay. Okay. So I actually don't know what the difference between a pond and a lake is. Anyway, but I bet our audience does. Let us know down. We're putting a lot of pressure on you. I don't want to I want to pressure you too much. Anyway, but this cabin that they had opened right up into this lake. So they had and I thought that I would love to find it on Golden Pond place. That would be perfect. Yep. You could stay in and do your board games and exactly. Yep. That honestly, I I like that idea. I know Wisconsin is uh just filled with lakes. Um, Michigan also's got a bunch of lakes. Minnesota, land of lakes. Yeah. Who is it? I was wrong. It wasn't Bernstein who did the music. Oh. It was actually uh hang on. Hans Zimmer. No, you wish. I do. I have. We're not going into Hans Zimmer. Dave uh Drave uh uh Grusen, Grusin. Bless you. Okay, he also did the music for the Goonies. Oh really? Oh for some reason I always figured that was John Williams because it was Steven Spielberg. I just assumed but starring Catherine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Jane Fonda. Okay. Oh, the Fondas. Yes, were Fonda and Fonda. Oh, uh sorry, Doug McKeon. Okay, uh Dabney Coleman. You were right with Doug, William Lantau. So it was Henry Fonda. And and they were Catherine Hepburn and Henry Fonda were this aging couple who were like the the grandparents of the whole, and and they were dealing with stuff. It was a drama, but it was just a beautiful place. So that that would be my and this is just random. Like we never have anything. This is random, random. Today, so you'll know when we filmed this, uh, Glacier National Park. Somebody was killed by a grizzly bear. That's two in one week. So if you are camping, be aware that uh the it's it's been a crazy because the winter wasn't as harsh. Yeah. And this is um so they're they're a little uh cranky. They they woke up on the wrong side of the cage. I think that some of them got up early. I don't know if this now at this point it's probably not early. It's like us when we get woken up by our dog at three in the morning and we just can't go back to sleep. And so the rest of the day is just ruined, except for them is the entire season. Well, uh, you know, somebody was saying today that 150,000 more people every year go in into places like Glacier and Yellowstone. And and a lot of these people don't realize um that these are wild places, these are this is these are national parks, not national zoos. And and these big, hairy, scary things will bite you and will run you over. And you know, don't pet the hairy cow. That's not a good thing. No, you know, so um if you you know, if if you get inspired to go camping, remember that you're in their neighborhood. And if you're talking if the big hairy cow you're talking about are the buffaloes like in Yellowstone bison, yeah. Um in Yellowstone and those kinds of places, also keep in mind that you can't run from them, they look sluggish, they will they can go zero to thirty-five thirty-five miles an hour real quick. And uh, and so if you're in a car, that's fine, unless you're in a car in a national park where there's it's bumper to bumper, and they can destroy your car, um, depending on the kind of car you're in. Um most cars won't stand up to a bison. It's amazing. I've driven through national parks where you know you pause because the bison are crossing the road, and they are huge, they are muscular and they are just enormous. They're scary, and yeah, and and I I can't imagine, and there's there's always pictures of people going up to take a selfie, and it's like, why would you do that? Living on the edge. Yeah, but the grizzlies are too much on the edge. What's going on? And I don't know if this was the case this time, but what you've got is mamas and cubs, and in a lot of these trails, there's corners, and if you turn a corner and you surprise a grizzly, they're not good about surprises. No, and they're really not good about they're thinking that you're threatening their cubs. They're really bad at Christmas time, they just don't like surprises. That's why they sleep through Christmas time. That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah, but no, uh yeah, I mean, that's in the previous episode we talked about, you kind of want to make some human noises as you're going through places so you don't surprise any animals. And that's just I think a general case for all national parks. If there's a way for you to make a noise that doesn't upset the wildlife or others uh around you, just for your own safety. Um but if if you notice lots of tracks, then it's time to turn around and go back and not take that trail that day. It's their trail. Yeah. They get to play that way. Especially if you're by yourself or or with Oh, and don't go by yourself. Yeah, don't first of all, don't go by yourself. Second of all, if you're with a group of five people or less, um and you come across across all those tracks and everything, yeah. That though those are no longer your just like she said, they're those that's no longer your path. Those are no longer your woods. Go and find another place. National forests are chalk full of different paths you can take. Yeah. Um for your safety. For yeah, yeah. Okay, sorry, I did I did segue and I I uh apologize for that. But so we are gonna talk about um camping camping experiences that people have. And um and um can I start? Go for it, yeah. Okay, yeah. All right, so this one I had heard, it's from 2015. Astonishing legends did it. It was their episode 16. Um so it's kind of a retelling. Uh, this yes, I remember this episode, he was the one who told the story himself. So, like they it was a phone interview. Yeah, it was the first time they had a listener um interviewed because this guy who his name is Dr. Yes, Dr. Richard J. Goldstein, and he was an E retired ER doctor. That's awesome. And he lived in New Mexico near Albuquerque at the time, and so what he would do is he would go backpacking into you know into the mountains and things like that when he was off duty. And so by himself by himself, by himself, but he was an experienced backpacker, right? And so um this experience and maybe we can once I tell it, let's chat about it just a little bit, because like what what was it? So um he said, so he got he got a late start. This this happened, so the episode was recorded 11 years ago. This experience happened to him 30 years before that. So it's been then about 401 years, yeah, since it since it happened. So he was he was backpacking and he had he looked and it was the the Hainous Mountains near Albuquerque. I hope I'm saying that lot right. I mean, if it is Heinous, is uh I know that's a kind of yeah, what a what a mountain range to go hiking by yourself in. And the he saw that there was a a trail along a creek and he thought, well, that's great, because then I've got water because you know it's kind of an arid area. So he decided he would take that. And he he had one of those days where nothing uh ended up going well. So he got We've all had one of those days every day and and so he got there a lot later than he thought he was going to. So he gets there, it's late afternoon, um, and he's thinking, well, I'm just gonna go as far as I can. He's a backpacker, and I'll just set up camp and then I'll continue the next day. So he's leaving, he's got a really cool antique pickup truck, and um, and we'll we'll put the link in because Astonishing Legends actually has a picture of his pickup truck on it. So it's way cooler. And I will say, we're we're gonna do a summary of the episode. If this if this sounds interesting and you want to actually hear it from the um the mount the guys themselves, yeah, yeah, then please go go check it out. Yeah. Uh I think I think we said this before. It's it's odd to tell you guys to go check out Astonishing Legends because they are just so massive. And um, but we're still gonna do it anyway, just in case some of you might not have heard of them. Yeah, highly recommend. Anyway, go ahead. They're awesome. Yeah, okay. So he's got his water bottle and he thought. About putting water in, but he's thinking, I'm hiking by a creek. So and he's got those little pills that go into the water bottle that kill all of the germs. So he's he's he's because he's late, he just puts on, he's got an old culty backpack, he puts it on and he starts going down this trail. He parks his his truck like by the trailhead and he gets on. He says first thing he noticed was the trail was muddy and slippery. So it's a little bit harder getting down. See, basically it's about twilight, and um he the trail opens up to this meadow, and he thinks, well, cool, I'll just camp here in this meadow. So then there's a fire ring in the middle of the meadow. So he goes over there and um he took his pack off and he's got his water bottle and he looks in the fire ring, and next to the fire ring is a bunch of um pine branches, so he can start a fire. And he's thinking, this is this is really cool. It's pretty much set up for me. But in the middle of the fire ring is a glob of greenish stuff. He says it's got a moldy, musty smell to it, and he says it's like eight inches across, and he can't scoop it out, so he can't use the fire ring. You know, he it it's like he doesn't it's like a jello y kind of blob, but not um something that you could like just scoop. He said he so it's like plant matter almost, but it was like globby, globby and green and fungal, which honestly, if if it's a if it's a piece of plant matter or any kind of organic matter that you don't recognize, I think that's a smart thing. Don't burn it, don't put your stick your hands in it. Like let's taste this. Yeah, it's yeah, I wonder I wonder what that happens if I put this inside of my body. So he he sets up another fire ring, you know, to the side of it, and he's tries to burn it. And he said, you know, he's done this over and over and over. He's an experienced camper. He's lighting this fire, and the fire keeps going out. And he said, There's no wind. And he says, but I could not get a fire started, no matter what I was doing. I could not get a fire started. He said it was like something kept blowing it out. But again, there's no wind. So finally he's really frustrated, and and now he's really thirsty. So he's right by the creek. So he gets his water bottle and he goes to fill his water bottle at the creek. He can't get to the creek. It it's, you know, there's either a marshy area or there's like I I'm thinking in my mind, stinging nettle, but there's plants you don't want to go through to get, and try as he might, he cannot get to the creek to get water. And he it and it's starting to get darker and darker. So then he goes back and he gets his flashlight. And he's walking back to the creek to try again, and he trips, and he drops his flashlight, and his flashlight breaks. And so he can't he can't get the fire started, he can't get water, his flashlight is now broken, so he has no light. No light. He said, Well, I brought an apple, so I thought, you know, I'm not gonna die of thirst, you know, overnight. I'm just gonna eat my apple. Which apple also has juices in it, so you get a little bit of water. And he said, Then I'm gonna go to sleep. Then he gets hit by this feeling of peril. He said, Peril and dread were the words he used. He said, Um, he he knows I I can't sleep here. He is just feeling like this place does not want me here. And immediately I've got to get out of here. So he puts on his backpack and now it's dark. And he's 30 to 40 minutes. Well, it took him 30 to 40 minutes in the light coming in. Now he's got to go back to his car in the dark on a slippery trail. And what he has are strike anywhere matches. So he's like striking a match, holding it up so he could kind of see what's ahead of him in the trail, and then walking that far, striking another match. And he he so he's he's you know, and the trail is twisty, so he he can only go so far, strike another match, only go so far, strike another match. And um he says in retrospect, he probably, if he had just stood there for a while, his eyes might have gotten accustomed to the dark, and he could have seen, but he felt like he needed to hurry. He didn't have time to panic. He didn't have time to just he used the terms he was being herded out of the, you know, and um and he went as fast as he could, and then he started hearing noises around him. Nope, that's not good. And it's like the trees are making noise, the leaves. He says, crunching and munching were the words that he was using all around him. And there's that's I know it sounds like a cereal. No, that's there's a uh um uh the black cauldron who's a character, the crunches and the munchies. That'd be Gurgee. Gurgee, thank you. They're all Welsh names. I can never remember the names. Thank you. It was Gurge. Uh he he talks about the crunchies and the munchies, but these are not good crunchies and munchies. These are these are he's feeling like something, some things are surrounding him and again hurting him out. And he said, Um, then they started touching him. No, yep. And um he said things are hitting his pack, things are trailing on his neck and his head, touching, they're tapping at his pack, and he says, I'd whirl around and and there would be nothing. But again, he's in the dark, yeah, and this is happening to him. And he said he couldn't slow down. Uh because these are things that are, but they're not grabbing at him. They're they're just touching him. They're annoying, they're poking bother, bother, baby. Yeah, yeah. They're it's almost like, come on, hurry up, keep going, go faster, go faster. Exactly, exactly. Interesting. And he said it really, he he kept, he went as fast as he possibly could. He said, I realized I ignored the warnings that this place was not for him. And uh, you know, he realized it. And so he said, So then he finally shouted at them, I'm going as fast as I can. He said, It made it worse. Oh, it they did not like that. Well, no, no, dumb mouth off to us, buddy. Yes, yeah. Oh, are you going as fast as you can? He I I took the notes. He he yelled, I can only go so fast. And they said, Bet. Yeah, challenge. Hold my beer, hold my forced beer. And he said, His hands were shaking. He's trying to light these matches, and his hands are shaking. And again, he's an ER doctor. Yeah, and it's not like he's this wimpy guy, you know, and he said, It seemed like forever, and finally he came out and there was his truck. And he said, He was shaking. He said, It's the most scared I have ever been. But as soon as he touched the steel of his truck, it stopped. The fear went away and was like he he said, I quickly got in the truck, threw my backpack, you know, in the back, got in the truck, and he said, It was like I was insulated from the terror. I was safe. And um he said he doesn't think that the place is haunted. He just thinks it was that place, that time, that moment that caused that to happen. Yeah. And so wrong place, wrong time. Yeah. And so um then, you know, they'll go Forrest and um Burgess will talk about Forrest and Scott. Thank you. Yeah, I think Burgess is one of the last names. Last names. They will they will talk about this more about what they think. Yeah. But it was such an interesting story to me. It's such a scary, spooky, you're not wanted here. And and I have to say, and I might have said this before. So we have um we have five acres, and I'm thinking an acre or two is woods. And there have been times, and you know, it's it's not this is the Midwest, it's not like a deep, dark woods, but but I will say uh there are, I mean, our woods, our forested area, they can get pretty dark. That's that's true. And there have been times, especially around twilight and the summer where I will be like close to the woods, and I will know that that is not my place to be, that I am not welcome in the woods at this time. And so, you know, so what is it? Is it the Fae? Was it aliens? Was it you know, it just Yeah. I mean, I will say the the detail about him touching steel and it going, I I don't know if iron is in steel. Yes, okay, okay. And I know that there are people who talk about how it's cold iron, but I mean there are also other interpretations that it's you know in my books. I use steel. Yeah, I mean, there there are plenty of interpretations that it's just iron in general. Right. Did you have were you gonna say something? Okay, okay. Um, but yeah, so I I I don't know if that's the reason, but I mean, if it is, he would be, especially if it's a classic car, he'd be isolated from anything in that, like, but I think just in general, it could also just be that he is now in transportation, good. Lock doors, yeah, go away. We didn't want you here. He said he he said he was really thirsty still, but he said, Yeah, I'm not getting water here. And he drove down a couple miles, stopped at another, like a forest area that had water available, and he drank the water and he slept in his truck. So there, I mean, I do also have another um story. I'm gonna mute, uh put this on silent real quick. I don't know if you guys heard. Um, I'm outing myself. I didn't put my phone on silence. I know I'm the worst. Um, but um there's another story that I have later on. Okay. But I I I will save it for a little bit later. Okay. Um, but it's another one of those you're not supposed to be here. Yes. And you should probably leave now. Um, I mean, honestly, there's even another uh episode of Astonishing Legends. I I'm it's it's a more recent one. It's one of their um user-submitted stories where people email them and then just kind of read it. I won't I won't go into those specifics because I I want you guys to go and check out that episode, but it's it's another one of those things, except it's more of a they saw something that they both felt off about and they both felt like they should continue moving on. And then they when they came back to that spot in the trail later on, he was looking out specifically for that thing to see if there was a reason why. Because sometimes, like your inst intuition, your instincts just tell you, hey, there's a predator here. Right, and uh that was gone. Ooh, the the entire out I feel bad. I might you might as well just tell us I'll spoil it a little bit, but it's told really, really well. The tree is gone. The tree. The tree is gone. They saw this tree, they felt really weird about it, they felt bad vibes, they left, they kept on going down the trail, they came back. This is around COVID-19 time. They came back, and the tree was gone. Was it an ant? It just moved ahead. Or, or it was, you know, I mean, there are so many different theories. It could be, it could be a walking tree that's weird, but also, I know I'm trying, I keep trying to keep an open mind. Whatever it could be, it could be something that we just can't fully understand, and so it was kind of like that. Was the way that their brain interpreted it because it's just something that we can't comprehend. It could also be a slip into another place. I know Yogi bear dressed like a tree, so he could steal picnic baskets. He planted it down, and the the spooky that they felt was actually him going, You have a picnic basket? Please give me that'd be a terrifying, scary movie. I'm not gonna lie. Like you're you're walking down the trail and just hear, I want your uh picnic basket. Right. Start running. Don't run from me. Give me your picnic basket. We'll say, and he can't run because he's got a tree on him. That well, yeah. I mean, this is this is just a completely different idea. So yeah, yeah. Uh, don't steal that idea from me. Um that one's one that I'm gonna do personally. The Picnic Marauder by Andrew Reed. Uh Yogi Bear. Yogi Bear. Yogi Bear Massacre. Yeah. Um, I was gonna say something else. Yeah. Just and then I'll give it time to you because yeah. Um Missing 411 came up a lot. Yes. We're gonna do an episode on Missing 411. We're not gonna include it in this because that is like a totally different, way cool phenomena that we want to talk about. Though we also want, we probably, and you might not know this, we probably do want to. If we do 411, we probably need to be cautious. Uh, there have been other YouTubers who have tried to talk, and I we're not technically YouTubers or podcasters, but there have been other people who tried to cover missing 411, and that author is very particular about people covering his stories. Interesting. Um, we're like they he has tried to um loss lawsuit various different things. He's trying to trademark his 401. That'd be awesome. I mean, hopefully we get air conditioning in the attic by that point. We'll do it in the fall so he won't die. Okay, that works. That works. I mean, I feel bad though, because I'm missing 411 would be like that's that's prime summer, you know. That's prime summer because it's it's all about national forests and national parks. But people go to those in the farm, too. That's true. In their fall in the fall. Gorgeous in the fall. That is true. Okay, Andrew. Yes, turning it over to you for a story. So this is this one is uh a longer one. It's not as long as a previous story that I've told, but this one is a longer story that I found that I found really intriguing. But don't worry, we'll interrupt and make it even longer. Absolutely. Yeah, that's because that's what we do. That's um, it's it's about uh an encounter at Braille Pond. I'm assuming I'm I'm pronouncing that correctly. B-R-A-L-E-Y. Okay. Braille Pond. And if I'm not pronouncing it correctly, just you know, correct me in the comments. Um so uh a lot of the information that I got from this story is from uh thedrt.com, um spelled d-y-r-t.com. Okay. Uh, but there's also an entire nine-episode podcast about it, also called the Brairly Pond Podcast. So if this story seems intriguing to you, it's all about like the events, the events that's covered here. I'm assuming about things before and after as well, but but uh yeah, it's a nine part nine episode podcast all about Brady Pond. So um I haven't listened to the podcast. So if it if this is something you want to go check out, um, and if it's good, then you're welcome. And if it's bad, then um it's not my fault. Um so not even uh I'm sorry, it's just it's not my fault. It's not my fault. I mean, you you took you took a risk, you took a gamble. Are we gonna include the link? Um we can. Okay. Yeah, I can make a note of that. Um I okay, go ahead. Yeah. Uh include. I won't include the link to the to the article. No, just the but the podcast. I I can include link to the podcast. Okay. Um and we will include the Astonishing Legends link. Of course, yeah. I might need to get a new pen. Can we pause briefly or I'll just edit this part out. I just need to get it. No, it's okay. I have a pen that I would use anyway. Why thank you, my dear. What's the what's the time? Yeah. So include link. Um yeah, so I I it will be included in the description. So if you are interested in it, link is down below. But again, it's not verified. So just take that into account. Um anyway, so in the George Washington and Jefferson National Forest in West Augusta, Virginia, there is a campground called Braley Pond. It's considered one of the most haunted locations in the United States. I mean, it's definitely considered one of the most haunted locations in Virginia, and as we know, Virginia is one of the most haunted states in the United States, just because of the vast amount of history that's there. So, um, and it's it's known for just having a bunch of different reports. Uh, the article that I read specifically mentioned reports um about things like laughing child or children laughing, spirits hovering over the creek, and a paranormal investigator going insane after camping there overnight. Ooh. I don't know exactly what that tale is. I wasn't able to find that specifically, but they say that those accounts have been reported, yeah, all over the internet. And it's I should the the campground is called, I I think I said the Braille Pond Campground. So anyway, so um, because of how much craziness happens, um, it should it should come as no surprise that ghost investigation teams um have been interested in the area, but um not everyone has had luck, I guess, when it comes to finding things. Um, but there was one person, Shay Willis, and her friend, who experienced some unexplainable things on October 25th, 2003. However, I will say her account probably can't be considered lucky. Uh she saw some, she she was able to experience some paranormal things. I don't know if there it was uh a lucky situation. Okay. So could be bad lucky. Yeah, that's true. It was bad luck. Okay. Um I also think it's important to mention that on May 22nd of the same year, 2003, uh, there was an unfortunate and brutal murder of a 19-year-old uh by the name of Christopher S. Kennedy. I don't want to go into the specifics of that. Okay. Um, but that tragic incident, as well as all the other crazy reports that she's heard about um or that that happened there, uh are what led Willis to being interested in this um Oh, I see. That's what you were looking at. We had a little bit of a uh podcast visitor. It was a spider, I think. Anyway. He was just coming down to listen. Yeah, yeah, he wanted to check it out. Sorry. Um, no, you're good. Uh, but yeah, so so those so that incident as well as all the other, you know, reports and incidents led Willis um brought this place to her attention. Now, Willis is a paranormal researcher. Okay, I wondered about that. And and path. Oh, ooh, okay. And so uh after she heard a little bit about it, she she tried to avoid hearing anymore because she wanted to go there with a with a c clean slate. So she went, um, like I said on October 25th, she went with a group of of people. Um the first time. So she does return later on, but the first visit uh was at 4 30 in the afternoon, and it was with a group uh of her and it sounds like her, her friend, and then sounds like some teenagers as well were coming to check this place out. Um and so they there's a a bridge there, and so they walk to the bridge, and it sounds like the bridge leads to the dam that makes the pond. Okay. Um, and so the moment she set foot on the bridge, uh she just got a strong, she said a strong sense of uh what happened there. I'm assuming she probably experienced the the the panic of what happened there. Uh she she says, quote, it was so heavy as to be almost palatable. And I knew immediately that this feeling was not my own. I was feeling something that belonged to someone else. As they continued down, they they got closer to the dam, um, two of the of the teenagers became physically sick and they began to panic. They sat down near the edge of of the woods, so they they were able to get off the bridge, I'm assuming, and they they went to um they went to the edge of the woods. They sat down and they were trying to, you know, catch their breath. Um and but by that point, Willis was also feeling nauseous and also unsettled and a little frightened. She said, I was surprised by my reaction to it. It was definitely The strongest reaction I've ever had, and I've gone on thousands of investigations in some really strange places. I've been into places that you know six foot 250-pound men won't go to. Or won't go. That was the full quote I added. Anyway, so they as a group decided that they needed to leave. Uh, but Willis and Arnold also decided, uh, sorry, Arn Arnold, Chris Arnold is the name of the friend. It's not the the the real name, it's okay for you know anonymity person purposes. He wanted to um not have his name revealed. So they go so he goes by Chris Arnold. I call him Arnold because that's his last name. Okay. Um but they also decided they needed to come back later that evening. And so they did at 11 30 p.m. Um and Willis recalls when they got there, I felt as though it was waiting for us. Which is never a good thing. No, then you get back in the car. Yeah, yeah. It's one thing to to go to somewhere that like you're not supposed to be. It's another one to know that you're it feels like you're kind of walking, I won't say into a trap, but also kind of into a trap. If it's waiting for you, maybe it's not with good intentions, but you know, what do I know? What was that commander so-and-so that you used to be? Uh General Akbar. That's it. It's a trap. There you go. Thank you. I feel much better now. Um, so they got to the bridge and and they made it to the place where she experienced that first strong reaction before. She said, I sensed another presence behind the original one. This one didn't feel like the others. In fact, it didn't even feel human. Um, and so they continued and they reached the top of the dam when they heard something move in the water. They were listening to this, but then Arnold grabbed Willis's attention. Uh he saw something and she Hey, pointed. And she said in the very top of this tall pine tree was this kind of green, glowing, orb-shaped thing. It wasn't like it was a pinpoint of light that you had to blink hard to see. This thing was huge. She continued, roughly 30 or 40 feet in the air, looking as though it were nestled in the branches of one of the big pines that flanked the opening to the path was a brightly glowing fluorescent green light. Um, so as they were observing it, it began to shrink. And so she pulled out a picture, and there's actually a picture of uh of this orb, but it's a lot smaller because by that point in time, you know, she had to fish it out and she was trying to get it all ready, and it and it was pretty small by the time she took a picture. But still, when you look at it, it's like darkness and this and this orb, which tells me that it was still pretty bright since the the camera kind of had to focus on the light, had to kind of light balance a little bit. Um she later goes on to say there was no mistaking it. It sounded like there was a person in the water flail flailing and kicking. So now they're they're hearing sorry. Okay, they they after this happened, they started hearing noises in the water again. But this time it seemed like it was a lot more violent. And so, yeah, that now she's saying, uh, there was no mistaking it. It sounded like there was a person in the water flailing and kicking. It was loud enough to have been the size of a full grown person. And they're sure it wasn't like a real person standing there drowning. I mean, you would hope that if somebody was drowning, they they would at least have tried to call out. Right. Or, you know, and and they were the only people there. They didn't see any other flashlights or anything like that. Um I don't know. So it's paranormal. It's probably paranormal. All right. Or it could be an animal. I mean, it it it is alligator. Um, well, no Virginia. Yeah, Virginia, yeah. But it could be a it could be some uh aggressive fish or duck. River river otter. River river otter probably is a lot makes a lot more sense than a duck. Um beaver, if they have that. I yeah, yeah. Okay, it could be other things, but they they thought it sounded like a human. It sounded, yeah, it sounded like a human kicking very violently. Um, and she also said there was no mistaking it as well. So I mean, um, but it was around this time that they both got the impression that something was coming right at them and fast. And so they just they both turned around, they started booking it back to the car. Um but so Arnold was in front and Willis was behind us. So she watched as Willis, or sorry, she watched as as Arnold was um knocked it. Well, they the the article says they fell, but her her report says, I don't know how to explain it, except he literally flew upwards and to the left as if something had hit him right in the middle of his back, like using his forward momentum, and he went off the side of the bridge into the water. So he was the water. At that point, she did stop. She kind of crouched down to make sure that he was okay. He said he was fine, but he was also like, Go, keep going. And at this point, she stands up, but as she stands up, something lands on her back. Something landed on her back. And the way that she describes it makes it almost seem like sh it was like a giant worm, or she describes it as a tentacle. Okay, like an octopus's tentacle. Right, right, right, exactly. She also uses the word psychic jelly as it moved from arm to arm from like it just it moved all kind of across her back. And I I I wasn't able to, as I read it, I wasn't able to get the sense of how big it was, but it seemed like it was pretty large. Yeah, like like I don't know if it was shoulder to shoulder, um, but it's it seemed like it could make that distance pretty quickly. Exactly. Exactly. Um, and it it was moving like a giant inch worm. Um yeah. Uh and so sh she kept running. Um, and as she got back to the truck, um, she was screaming, there's something on me, there's something on me. And Arnold had got into the truck as well. Arnold, he he looked all around, he wasn't able to find anything. She didn't believe him, but there was, you know, but she just couldn't find anything there. Um, and so after that, they packed up, they drove back. But unfortunately, that didn't end their troubles. Um, she reported vivid nightmares and strange incidents that happened for weeks after the treat after the trip. She says, quote, it was like a communication with whatever this thing was. Like little bits and pieces of it were still stuck with me. Slimed. Well, so it's it's weird. You know those like those uh paranormal movies where like a kid is like drawing and a spooky. She drew pictures of tentacle blobs while she was at work. Um, and she also said that she felt out of it, she just did not feel like herself. Wow. Um But you know, as they they did end up she felt drawn to go back, and so they they did go back, it sounds like once or twice. Um, and she uh she actually says, so here's here's what the this is a quote directly from the article. Um Willis and Arnold made additional trips to Brayhee Pond in November of that year trying to make sense of what happened. They witnessed beavers acting strangely in the water, and their video camera's battery drained suddenly on one occasion. Willis even went back by herself. She felt as if she was she was pulled to go. She got out of her car and circled the parking lot as if in a trance, watching the bridge and dam. Um the same terrible feeling she felt during her initial trip was back. Um so then on her solo trip, she she found herself in the park's bathroom and she was uh it sounds like she she like lost herself. Okay. So she found herself again in the park's bathroom, bent over, staring down to the toilet. Um yeah, she remembers nothing between the time she was in the parking lot and when she realized she was in the bathroom. Um after a few weeks of this, Willis and her husband were in bed watching television one night and they heard her their eight-year-old son screaming wildly from the living room. When they reached him, he was pointing to a corner of the living room. Willis and her husband asked him what was going on. Their son said that he saw a guy standing there with multiple holes in his chest, wet and covered in blood. To comfort him, she suggested that it just might have been a shadow. Which describes what happened to the like it was brutal. I didn't want to get into the details, but it was pretty brutal. But eventually, Willis began to feel like herself again. And the thing that was on her back was gone. On her most recent trip, uh in 2007, I'm assuming this article is probably a little bit late. So, you know, it's I don't know when her latest trip was, but this after this article in 2007, it was as if nothing had ever happened. Whatever was that the Brady Pond four years ago? Again, four years prior to that last trip had vanished. You know a good story first. I have a problem with it. And it's it's the same problem that when we talk about not using Ouija boards and not having seances because you we are not equipped to you know, there it's not like there's courses on how to fight paranormal entities. There's no, you know Well, I I think there might be some people who disagree with you. There probably are courses. How accurate those courses are that's it's kind of up in the air. Yeah. And it's like you go into a place that you go into a place that you're all of your intuition is saying, get out of here, get out of here. You don't belong here, don't be here. And and then you come back at night to do it again, and and then you've got a little boy at home and you bring stuff home. Yeah. I mean well, okay, I will say. I mean, I'm not I mean in her defense, she didn't intend to bring that thing home. Of course she didn't, and it doesn't sound like she did anything like uh a Ouija board or seance or anything like that. No, and and I agree. I mean, she she was just she was exploring the unknown, which you know what people have done that for millennia. I mean, at one point we have even Right Explored the Unknown. Yeah, we did that. We went ghost hunting, but uh I feel like when we went ghost hunting, it was within uh uh I don't want to say a safe environment, a controlled environment. It was a lot more controlled, and and when you always we also had a group with a big group with us as well. Who had been to that place before, exactly, and and kind of knew what to expect. And there wasn't there wasn't aggressive entities there. Yeah. And it it just I I don't know. It uh you go into something like that where you know that there has been really bad things happening, and it just you you do you open yourself up to potentially bad things happening. Oh and especially like you said, well, first of all, she's an empath, and so she knows she's an empath. And so she's gonna I mean I totally understand empaths, yeah. And and you know, if if you are somebody who's interested in the paranormal and you are also empathetic, uh like you I guess more than just empathetic. It sounds like it it's uh you know, it's a specific almost, yeah. Uh I don't know if that makes you more vulnerable or if that makes you more like a beacon. I agree. Um it but also I won't say she disregarded, she definitely kept note. She she uh she mentioned that she kept very, very um detailed specific notes on everything that happened. So she did obviously notice it, but she didn't act on, you know, she she was feeling sick, everyone was feeling sick. She kind of felt that and instead of leaving because of of the overwhelming feeling, right? She did place herself in a little bit more danger, and then she went back and she mentioned that it was waiting for her as well. And it it doesn't sound like it was a good waiting for her, it sounded like it was like, yes, yes, you fell into my trap. Right. As opposed to, you know, I have a hard time and I just can't move on. Right. And that's the difference. I mean, if you if you're going there with the intent to say, hey, I'm gonna help you move on, oh, that's awesome. Or even just figure out, like, hey, is is there something here? Right, you know, but when you when everything inside of you is saying, alert, alert, alert. Yeah, yeah. Listen, listen, listen to it. Yeah, don't be a bull, don't run at red flags. That's oh, I like that. Yes. Okay, so this story was told to me by a a close friend, and it's just a very interesting story to me. So my friend um has she and her family went camping and they went- Just name her Nicole, so we don't just call her my friend. Okay, I like that. Nicole. Nicole, if you want to write it down. Actually, you got your own pen right there. If you wanted. I I yeah, yeah, but we'll call her Nicole. Okay. So Nicole and her family decided to go camping. And um, her family at that time consisted of her husband and three sons. And the youngest son was a little bit over a year old. And so they went up to um northern Wisconsin, north of Minaqua in Wisconsin, and it was a smallish campground, and it was surrounded by um Indian reservations. And um, and it was it was like a pine. When you say Indian reservations, are these currently used Indian reservations? Okay. I didn't know that I didn't know that there was any of that in Wisconsin. Yes, they're it's like that's really cool. It uh yeah. Okay, that's that's that's that's new information. I'm I'm happy about that. Yes. So they're up there, and there's there's a lake not too far away, or waterway, because they can again hear the loons, and and we'll maybe do some more loon sounds so she can hear that. She said that the trees, the canopy of trees was so thick that it that you weren't even getting starlight or moonlight onto the camping area. And but she said that there was almost like another layer of darkness that wasn't physical. So they set up their tent. A big um, I think we actually lent them a tent, and it was a big family-sized tent. If it was the family tent that I'm thinking about, if you lent it to them, then yeah, it's a big it's a big tent, for especially for just a little family. And um and it got cold at night. I think that they went, they must have gone early in the season, and it was cold at night. Well, and northern Wisconsin already gets cold, yeah, no no matter the season. And and the littlest boy was crying. He he wasn't comfortable, he was scared, he wasn't in his bed, and Nicole was really concerned that his crying would disturb other campers because it was a camping area. I mean, they weren't like right next to each other, but since the loon sound carried, she felt like the baby crying sound would also carry. So, and she was kind of cold too. So she she took the baby and she went into they had um like a Toyota Tacoma, and they went into the truck, the pickup truck. I was gonna say, for those of you who don't who aren't up on their car knowledge, a Toyota Tacoma is a pickup truck. You said pickup truck already, so they probably could have inferred that, but I just you know and it's the smaller pickup truck. Uh the tundra is the Toyota bigger pickup truck. So uh and so she took uh the the boy's car seat and moved it up to the driver's seat and wedged it between kind of backwards so that it was between the steering wheel and the the back of the uh the the seat. So it was nice and tight so it couldn't be pushed over. Sure. And then she put No accidental honking happening. Well, no accidental honking, but also the the car seat was wedged in tight. Right. And then she put the little boy in and buckled him in, but not tightly, loosely, so he couldn't come out, and then put a blanket over him and he calmed down and he started to sleep. So she brought another blanket for herself, and she was in the passenger seat, and she had her hand on the baby, and she was kind of half asleep, half awake. Yeah, it's hard to fall asleep. And yeah, right, because you're you're in mom mode. Well, that and also just you know, passenger seat in general. That's true. It's not a real comfortable place. And she said all of a sudden there was a woman right outside the car door screaming at her, that it wasn't safe for her to have a baby in the car, sleeping in the car. And she said she somehow instinctively knew that this was a Native American person, woman, and the woman kept screaming and screaming and screaming at her. And it was she had her phone, but it was kind of lost in the blankets. You know, you put your phone on top of the blankets, and you're and so she's and she's also she said she was trying to to not to kind of make it look like she was sleeping because she didn't want the woman to realize that she was awake. She was right and and she was hoping that she had locked the car doors. And um she finally got her phone and she looked, and the woman wasn't there anymore. And so it really freaked her out. She made sure the doors were locked, and um she just she didn't sleep very well for the rest of the night. Understandably so, and she said that um so the next morning um she told her husband and she figured it was a dream. She thought it's probably a dream. And he said to her, Are you sure it was a dream? Because he said in the tent, he and the boys had had a very restless night that the boys were tossing and turning, and something was obviously subconsciously disturbing them too. But they didn't hear a scream. They didn't no, nobody heard uh the scream. Oh, it was only she was the only one that I was like, she was the only one that heard the screaming at her. And she said uh they packed up and they went far, far away to another. I think they went to the lake. I mean, they went far enough away because she and she said um she didn't know if it was the Native American thing, but she said that she doesn't feel good about camping near now Native American um reservation areas or something because she really felt and she said I I don't know. I she said I I thought, why would she be yelling at me? You know, why was she and she said Especially considering like I mean, just logically speaking, a car, especially a locked car, is a lot safer of a place than a tent. If it if she's screaming at her because, oh, you're a bad mom, that kind of thing, then it's you know, safety-wise, like it's it's probably a lot safer to be in a truck. Unless, you know, she was somebody who um slept with a baby in the car in the summer in the heat. Sure. I mean, if something tragically had happened to this woman, entity, whatever it was, and her child, and so she's reliving that by and when she sees Nicole and the the child in the car, all of those feelings come again, you know, or or were was she driving down the road and and the baby's asleep in the car and the car rolls over. I mean, there's so many things that could have yeah, but it was if anything, it could also be a similar situation to the first story that you shared. Uh not the not the opening, but the um the hiking story where it's just she's not necessarily screaming that and I I don't know. She Nicole seems to think that it was because she was in the car, but it could also just be because they were in that specific location, and it could have just been more of a not a you're you know, why are you sleeping in the car, but more of why are you here? Get out, like leave. But she said to me that it was specifically yelling at her about having the baby sleeping in the car. So interesting. Just and yelling, yelling at her, and it just totally freaked her. And it was interesting because I I called her to let her know we were gonna do camping stories, and I really wanted to show hers. Yeah, and and this. This happened like five years ago, and she said it's still it still is making she her voice was shaking as she was telling me this story. Those kinds of experiences, you know, they they they really do stay with you. And the the interesting thing about this particular story, the interesting thing about um you're you're actually doing very I was thinking, you're doing a really good job on about not saying the interesting thing about but this one is interesting. Yes, it is an interesting thing. This part is interesting. It it doesn't sound like it's a sleep paralysis thing, it could be a dream state situation where something with especially if nobody else heard the scream, it could be where her psyche, like it whatever feeling everyone else was feeling, she interpreted in her waking sleep as this particular thing. But it doesn't sound like it was a sleep paralysis because she could still move. And she was getting her phone, she was exactly she she was still a bit and also from my understanding of sleep paralysis stories, you don't normally see you can see hallucinations, but they're usually more shadowy. They're not as they don't seem like and I guess I don't know if she's actually saw the person. I sh she she she did because she thought it was she was Native American. But I've heard sleep paralysis stories about the old crone. That that is c most common sleep paralysis was. I thought it was the the hat man, the man of the hat. The shadow man is one, but the old crone is another story. Is it okay? Well then never mind, I'm wrong. Um that's okay. No, I'm okay with being wrong. But uh the the interesting thing is, um, so Nicole will probably not I don't think Nicole and I uh years ago went into uh a a store in Galena together, and um and it was um uh one of a store that had very interesting, odd kind of new age ghostly stuff. Yes, and um we we came in and the owner started coughing. And the owner looked at me and she said, uh, you just brought a ghost in with you. You know, something came in with you um because that's when when I get this tickle in my throat, it is because there's paranormal entities. So she's allergic to ghosts, she's allergic to ghosts, they yes, and so um and then Nicole said there's a little boy named John. And this the owner of the store said, Well, that's interesting, because a little boy named John was killed in a fire in this house, in this uh building, because it was one of the brownstones in downtown and there's apartments, and and uh Nicole knew that and Nicole says, Well, no, paranormal things don't happen to me. And it's like, uh, I think you're a lot more sensitive than you believe. And and then there's also this in your mind's eye, you know, sometimes you can close your eyes, and even though you're not seeing it with your eyes' eyes, your mind's eyes, yes, yeah. I love that. The third eye, you can and and that could have been it. You know, she this image was projected to her. Yeah, and so I I don't know, it was just, yeah. That's interesting. I mean, yeah, there are a lot of and that's the that's my favorite part about honestly. I love some of these stories that we that we share. I love the fact that we don't have all the answers. I almost feel like sometimes some some ghost stories, there's almost too much like, oh, well, the reason why this happened was because so-and-so had died this many years ago in this. Personally, I almost feel like I won't say more realistic because I will never you know dismiss somebody's experience because there's too much information, but I I definitely feel like there are plenty of paranormal experiences that people have that are never fully explained. That they just we will never know. We will never know why they saw something, what the warning was about, especially if they heed the warning. The best, the best case scenario is something happens, they feel like they've been warned away from somewhere, and they never have to find out why. Exactly. Uh, and so I just yeah, that's that's very interesting. And that's also interesting that Nicole's, you know. Yeah. Let me uh just with with that that you said. Um, I wasn't gonna include this, but um, because it wasn't really camping, but it kind of was. My sister and I, years and years ago, rented a lighthouse in Canada. Oh, it was right out of um Sault Ste. Marie, right outside of Sault Ste. Marie, and it was on a little island, and there was a little house, uh, like the farmhouse. Oh, no, well, the lightkeeper's house. And then the it the lighthouse wasn't huge, but it was onto uh it wasn't Lake Superior, it was Lake Huron, I think, because of the way it and it it went out uh from this island, and so it wasn't a big tall lighthouse. So the the lighthouse was the here on the island lighthouse. Yes, yes, it was I'll be here all week, guys. Um so um, so we rented this this lighthouse on this little island, and you know, so the the owners had a house to get to the island, you went over this like land bridge. So it was more maybe a peninsula than an island, but it was just this narrow. Well, if it's a land bridge, I guess if it's a bridge made out of land, I don't know if it's if it was it like a dirt, uh a narrow so did they build it? Was it man-made land bridge? Okay, because it was if it was man-made, then we can still call it an island. Okay, let's call it an island. Yeah, but it was a it was not very big. And so um So big rock. It was a big grass. It was with and so it's it and the the house was creepy. It was haunted, it was definitely haunted. And lighthouses are are I mean, excuse me, because of a lot of the psychological torture of just isolation that people, a lot of lighthouses. I mean, they're one of the best horror psychological horror movies that have has come out in the last decade was called Lighthouse. It's a black and white movie. I don't know if you've heard of it. I know uh black and white movie um starring uh oh shoot, why can't I think of their names? You you probably know. Um uh I'm only thinking of the characters they've played, which is the Batman and Green Goblin, which is really sad that I can't think of Will William Defoe or Willem Defoe, excuse me. Okay, and um I I want to say Christopher something or Chris, but I think I'm wrong. Uh I'm sure that we have audience members who are screaming at us right now, uh, probably angrily typing in whatever comments. I know that Ash is looking it up currently. Good. So So we'll come back to that. So it sounds like he has it. Oh yeah, sorry, everyone. Yeah, sorry about that. Okay. Willem Defoe, yes, Robert Pattinson. Robert Pattinson, that's yes. Yep. And it's it's I think those are the only two that are in it because it's all about the psychological horror of isolation in a lighthouse. Wow. And it's, I mean, it's yeah, so it makes sense that a place like that, if you spend all your time there, you have to spend all your time in. Um those would be places that would be haunted. So we're there. And uh my sister has one room and I have the other room. And it's funny, my sister doesn't want a bedroom. She is sleeping in the living room where it's more open. I have the bedroom, but it is it's creepy. It's way creepy. And there's a second floor that neither of us want to go up to. You know, we're just we're straining on the on the side. That's probably where the the actual light is. No, the lighthouse is a separate building. Oh, you're not in the house. So there's a little house that belongs to the lighthouse, and the lighthouse doesn't have it's not big enough to have living quarters. Sure. So you just kind of walk over there and you do your lighthouse thing and you can walk in back to the house. So anyway, you lighthouse it up a little bit. So I am woken up, awakened, awokened. Sure. You're woke. Awoked up in the middle of the night. And I I it's like, well, I'm awake. Why am I awake? And I do you do you know what time it was? Um Did it happen to be three? It wasn't three. Oh. It was like midnight-ish, one o'clock in the morning-ish. Okay. And I was kind of tired, but I get up and I'm supposed to go outside. I know I'm supposed to go outside. So I do, even though, you know, I've seen those movies. And, you know, but I go outside. Dracula was there, and he's like, Yes, come to me. And I look up and there's northern lights. And I go and I wake up my sister, and we go out, and there's two um picnic tables. And so we each lay on a picnic table and watch, and the northern lights, it's the weirdest thing because they're not colored, they're white. And what's happening above us is there are swirls happening above us, and they're making uh like there's an eagle and then it turns, and there's a snake, and then it turns. I mean, it was like we were watching this show and it lasted for like 45 minutes, but it was it wasn't colored. It was, and I'm thinking, oh, I can tell why the Native Americans would worship this because it looked like these animals were appearing in the sky above it. It was the coolest thing, and it went on again, you know, 45 minutes and then it was gone. And um, it was magic, but it was one of those that something warned me, something woke me up. Yeah, this was more of a it wasn't a warning, but it was a hey, hey, hey, you don't want to miss this. Yeah, yeah. Living living in the lighthouse, it's whatever spirit was there, living in the lighthouse sucks, except for this really cool thing. You should check it out. Wake up, wake up. Yeah, it was it was awake. The sky's awake. So I'm I'm awake, yeah. So we have to play. That's right. But yeah, it was just it was it was very cool. That's yeah. That that is that is a function. So it was kind of camping, but it was more glamping. Yeah. Uh and also probably a little bit of mushrooms as well. There was no alcohol or drugs involved. That you know of. That no, I promise. I promise. I would have known. Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah, sure. Go right ahead, Andrew. So this, um, so I'm gonna do if it's okay, I'm gonna do two stories. I just took two. Uh the first one, and this is the only one of uh from this website uh that I'm doing because there are so many of these, but this is from the the BFRO or the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization. Um, I think I'm also gonna put a link to that as well. Um, I'm just gonna be F R O. Um, it it has just thousands of personal accounts. People report. I love that. Uh and and it's it it looks like it's a police report. And then there's also like usually a Bigfoot researcher will then call the person who sent in the report and they'll have an update, you know, and they'll like get extra details uh and things like that. Um and so there are a lot of camping stories. Um, there are also just a lot of other kinds of stories there as well. But this one is, like I said, it's the only one that I'm gonna do, or else they would all just be crypted, um, because there's so many of those. But this one is from June 21st, 2008, at Gulch Lake Campground in Paul Bunyan State Forest, Minnesota. Okay. So, and I just I literally just copied and pasted uh this. So it the so it the person who reported it described. We went on an all-girls camping trip, June 20th to 22nd of 2008. We were making up a fire, making s'mores, and having a few drinks. There was a total of six girls on the trip. Everything was fine until we went to bed at around 3 45 in the morning. Which good on them for staying up that late. When I'm camping, because it gets dark early, I tend to go to bed earlier than usual. It's cold outside. Well, depending on sleeping weather. I'm sorry, go right ahead. No, no, yeah, you're no you're good. Yeah, depending on depending on how where you're going. Minnesota at that point. Well, June 21st, I don't think it'd be getting cold in Minnesota. June in Minnesota, it could be, it's still springy. You know, it could. Okay, fair enough. Fair enough. Um, anyway, four girls slept in one tent while my best friend and I slept in another tent. About 15 minutes after we finally got settled in, we heard some loud screaming slash grunting. I knew that I had never heard anything like that before. My friend and I were totally silent and listened again. We heard it again, but it was moving fast through the forest. I'm just gonna pause here and say on the the follow-up later on, the the guy who asked them questions, he he commented uh or or he uh went to more detail about what that meant. And so the first scream, I believe it was about two seconds. It was a it was a duration of two seconds of a scream, and it was stationary and it sounded pretty distant. But then the second scream, when she when she said it screamed and was moving through, they this one lasted for about four seconds, and it's and it as the scream was happening, the the source of the sound was rushing. And it sounded like it was coming very close. Like it was it was going from distant to like really close to their camp. Um, and it was a a speed faster than something that would be making that sound should be able to move at. Okay. Definitely not a human, definitely not a human. And and I mean it could be some other kind of like a bobcat or cougar or something, but it doesn't sound like that. And I don't know, I don't know what the wildlife in Minnesota is in that location, that area. Northwoods. So there could be bobcats and things. Mountain lions, bobcats, wolves. They've reintroduced wolves to the area. It's not gonna be wolves making that noise, though. A fox could make a true, true, but go ahead. We agreed that after that we would not be able to sleep by ourselves. We left our tent, grabbed the hatchets from our campsite, and slept in the tent with the other girls. Totally get that. Honestly, that that is one of the first stories that I've heard where I'm like, yes, yes, smart. I have that weapon, have that way of defending yourself. Um, if anything, just for your own psychological benefit. Um I did not sleep at all that night until after sunrise. I was scared out of my mind. I stayed awake with the hatchet in my hand for the rest of the night and the following night. Later on that same eveningslash morning, I heard something walk through our campsite, but I didn't even move. I was too scared. In the morning, I thought I heard our cooler open, but I was much too tired and thought it was one of the girls. When I got up all of um when I got up, all of our water was gone out of our cooler. And specific let me specify there, they they in their water cooler or in their cooler they had brought water, like bottles of water, they brought beers, and they had brought various different foods, hot dogs, hamburgers, those kinds of things. And the the bottles of water is what she's talking about. The bottles of water were gone. Um, so the the water was gone out of our cooler, but the beer and the food was left. We never woke up the other girls that night, and we didn't tell them until morning. I was on high alert the second night, but didn't hear anything except what might have been a small raccoon or something rustling around in the bush, in the brush, excuse me. I know what we heard was not any normal animal. I was really scared and will never forget it. Ooh. So something with opposable thumbs and the intelligence to know that a vegan non-alcoholic Bigfoot. I mean, look, we don't actually know. We have no idea what the dietary restrictions of Bigfoot are. We've never really, I mean, I'm he knows you shouldn't be eating those hot dogs. He does he knows what they're made of. Yeah, he knows what they're made of. Um, he can smell the the various different tube meat that that's composed of. Like, I'm not sure. Yeah, yeah. What why would you put that into your body? That's right. Because it's good, Bigfoot. Okay, don't judge me. Um so anyway, yeah, I just I I just think it's interesting that I don't know why Bigfoot or whatever was interested in in the water. And let me ask you this question. And it's the same one that we've talked about before when you know you're frightened in your room, you think there's bad things in your room. Sure. You put the sheet above your head and you're safe. Yeah, I can't see you, you can't see me. That's right. Why do we think a tent is going to protect us from like Bigfoot? I don't know. I'm sorry. This is nylon. Yeah, you can't get me. Yeah, and and what are you gonna lock your zipper door? That's right. I mean, you can technically, but then you're not getting out yourself. Well, I guess you could, you know, lock it from the inside. Don't you think? I mean, it can be ripped along the seams. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Your your zipper is not gonna do anything to something with I'm safe. I'm in my little tiny tent. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and then something big can just go. That's right. You know, if it wanted. If it wanted. But that's the thing. I think it's it's I think it's again the psychological benefit of I can't see it very clearly. That means I can't, it's plausible deniability. That's right. I don't know what I saw. Right. And so it can be something else. Um, and also it might not see me, it might not know that I'm there. That's probably not true because a tent definitely sticks out. And they can smell you, and they can smell you, especially I can smell your fear. That's right. Um probably, literally, probably, yeah. Yeah, I probably smell your your sweat and your perspiration and everything. So this next story that I wanted to do, um, I I mentioned that I have one about somebody feeling like they shouldn't be going on a trail in the woods. Okay. And so this one, the the the last, the the next stories, the rest of the stories that I'm gonna be sharing are gonna be from Reddit. Uh, just because Reddit is a great source of what I call um modern day folklore. Um I'd like that. Yeah. I mean, that's if somebody has an experience, where are they gonna go to? They might tell on Facebook, but they're probably gonna go to Reddit. Exactly. Um, the downside there is like normal folklore, um you can stories can get exaggerated, there can be extra details, or someone can make something up completely. Um like creepypasta kind of exactly. Yeah, and I I try to avoid any uh subreddits that are specifically fiction, right? Um, but unfortunately, we don't know. So any uh the rest of these stories that I have, take it with a grain of salt. I like to believe that people are um are all signing the same social contract that the experiences that they share are ones that they've actually experienced. And if they break that social contract, I'll be very sad. Um, but this one is literally titled A Trail in the Woods Told Us Not to Walk on It. And this one's by formal ad 4125. Okay. My wife, oh, and also I should say, sorry, the subreddit that I got this one from is uh a glitch in the matrix or glitch in the matrix. Okay. R slash glitch in the matrix. I've got a few of those from these, and let me tell you, the glitch in the matrix ones, I think that's my favorite subreddit now. It's just weird. I love it. It's it's it's closer to uh Fordian. I I guess this is all Fordian ideas, but that one is almost like just bonkers, like unexplainable. But anyway, so a trail in the woods, totals not to walk on it. My wife, sister, and I are all avid back backpackers. We spent a lot of time in the outdoors. But back in 2018-ish, we decided to we decided to do pull-up camping with stargazing in Colorado as a as the main goal. We are from the Midwest. Same. Same formal ad 4125. We used a light pollution map to find a remote camping area in the San Juan National Forest, and plan to hike during the day and stargaze at night. That's awesome. The first day and night, the stars and trails were amazing, and we uh were all super stoked to be in the mountains and away from Flatland. It was the clearest I have ever seen the Milky Way galaxy, and it was phenomenal. Yeah, okay, just make sure. After the first night, we all got up early and decided to do another hike. This time following a dirt a small dirt forest road through the mountains. We all were having a great time, and there was nothing but positive vibes. I mentioned that our hike felt more like a walk since we were on a road, so we all agreed to take the first proper trail we came across. We had a GPS unit map and compass, so we weren't worried about getting lost. We finally came across a trail that ran perpendicular to the road and had a slight. Gradient running down the mountain. Staying true to our word, we all agreed to see where it went and turned onto the trail. As soon as we left the road and stepped onto the trail, I had an unprovoked and overwhelming feeling of doom come over me. Suddenly my excitement left me, and I felt almost instinctually that I would be in serious danger if I went down this trail. This unprovoked feeling of doom was strange enough. But when my sister said, Guys, I I don't think we should go down this trail, and my wife responded, Oh my goodness, you feel that too? I lost my mind. He doesn't say mind, but I editing on the fly, I lost my mind. We quickly returned to the road and continued our walk. We all agreed that we had the same unprovoked sensation once we stepped onto the trail and could not come up with any logical explanation. I've never experienced anything like this, but it still gives me goosebumps thinking about it. See, Nate did the smart thing. Yep. The trail said nope, and they said, okay. Which I will say, in the defense of the of the guy for he he had a lot of things happen. It doesn't sound like he got the feeling until it was too late, right? Like he was about to start unpacking and everything, and that's when the trail was like, actually, no. We tried, we tried to be gentle, and now we're telling you no. Yes. Um, whereas this one, as soon as they stepped on the trail, the they just all felt no, this is not this is a good idea. Good for them for sharing that information with each other. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they shared it in the right way as well. They didn't go, I'm scared. No, they just said, This doesn't feel right. We should leave. They they didn't um similar to I don't know if you shared the the the shadow story that you I think you have shared that a little bit. Right. Um, you know, with the the experience you had when you were in Utah. Um, but yeah, it almost feels like if you acknowledge it, acknowledge it, but in the incorrect way. You can you can acknowledge it correctly. You can go, we need to leave, as opposed to, hey, I feel scared. Right. Or there's something here. You don't want to give it that power of your fear. Exactly. Yes. Not until you're out of that situation. Right. So I did some Reddits too, and this is uh Suchi 23. Um, and this one from four years ago. I went camping on a mountain with a friend. We had a fire going and we were just chatting and messing with the fire when I heard a very faint sound that distracted me from the conversation. I told my friend to hush for a second, and we both listened closely. We could hear a woman singing in the distance, which sounded like a really old medieval melody. We couldn't make out what it was because she was singing in another language. Uh did she say where she was hiking? Um, no, I don't have that. Okay. We couldn't make okay. We were far from any other campsite, as we like to camp in our own spots, away from anything that might have other people. Well, that's that's not good. I mean, it is good that you're it's okay to be isolated. I totally get that. Yeah, no, yeah, I'm not saying that. But if you hear singing from another language in a place where there aren't many people, that's where I'm like, oh no, that's not bad. Yeah, yeah. Creeped us out. But what makes it freaky is I ended up posting pictures of our camp on Facebook. And another friend recognized the location and asked me if I heard anything weird. I said, Why do you ask? Innocent, innocent, innocent. He went on to explain that he and another of our mutual friends were at the camp, that same campsite on a different night with one of their dogs, and they heard a woman crying as she came down the road that passes by the site. They decided to check on her to see if she was all right, but when they got to the road and called out to her, there was no response, and the crying immediately stopped. They thought it was strange, but decided to head back to the camp. When they got back, they found their dog convulsing by the fire and foaming at the mouth. Oh my gosh. They grabbed him, got in their car, and started high tailing it down the mountain. He said the dog went limp in his arms on the way down and he thought it had died, but once they reached the bottom of the mountain, the dog woke up immediately and acted as if nothing had happened. That's creepy word. They immediately assumed there was something evil in that area. When he was telling me this story, I turned as white as a ghost. And once he finished, I explained what my other friend and I had heard near our camp. It really freaked me out because my buddy with the dog ended up going up the mountain with me and showed me where everything went down, which happened to be exactly where I was hearing the singing the night I went camping. And they don't share the location? Nope. Nope. I I You'll know it. Well, yeah, when it's too late. Because the problem is they those those experiences happen after they had already set everything up. Tiptoe through the two lobs. Uh uh. If I heard Tiny Tim uh from the woods as I'm trying to camp, I um hands are gonna get thrown. I'm gonna I'm gonna go look for that thing. I'm gonna go, you wanna you want a tiptoe? I'll I'll make a tiptoe. That's not true. I'm a scaredy cat. Um okay, this so this next one, it's a bit, it's a little bit longish, but it's fun. Okay. Um let me see if I can find the correct, I think it's this is six and seven. Okay, perfect. Uh just it was on it starts on page six. Okay. It ends on page 14. Uh eight. It ends on page eight, but there's a lot of spaces in between. So, and also this one is um, I'm gonna be doing a lot of on-the-fly editing. Not a lot, but a little bit of on the fly editing because I just copy and paste it after I liked it. Um, anyway, so this is from uh this is also Glitch in the Matrix by uh scumbag Stacy's ex. Okay, I love that name. All right. Yeah, um, I'm assuming it has something to do with the fact that Stacy's mom has got it going on, but I'm not sure if that uh, you know. Anyway, so I watched myself, this is this is the title of it. Okay I watched myself walk from the tent site to the privy this morning from my tent site. Privy this person's obviously from England or the UK, uh since they're calling it the privy, as opposed to an outhouse or toilet, or they call it toilet, a bathroom. So anyway, there's a place near me that has a nice flat four-mile walk into a big lake with a couple of lean twos and a tenth site on the shore of the lake. I go there a half dozen times or so. Uh sorry, a half dozen times a year or so. Okay, each lean two is about 300 yards apart, and the tent site is about 300 yards past the second lean two. Each lean two and the tent site has an outhouse, privy, we call them. See? Yeah. Um, about 50 yards behind it, further from the lake. This is state land, and it's very remote and all first come, first served. So that sounds a lot like here. Appalachian Trail. Well, here it's um in the west, there's uh BLM land. Right, right, right. Yeah, which you know, unfortunately it sounds like less and less of that is is, you know, they're more and more is getting bought up. But I I mean, I've camped um some BLL land before. Uh, and it's it's it's cool, it's fun. Anyway, so that's kind of sounds like it's the same idea. Um, so I got to the trailhead at about 4 30 last night, and there were no other cars. It was raining buckets. I don't care. I'm enjoying laying in my hammock in the rain. This was perfect for me since I knew my tent site would be open. I prefer sleeping sleeping in a hammock to the hard floor of a lean two. It makes sense. I I agree, though hammocks also make my back hurt after a full night. That's just because I'm out of shape. Anyway, ate dinner and listened to the loons, had a restful sleep. Woke up once at about 3 30 or so to pee, slept for a few more hours, woke up to the sound of heavy rain again mixed with loon calls, ate my breakfast and drank my coffee under the tarp while sitting in my hammock. I started breaking down camp and packing my bag, or sorry, packing my pack, and as I was taking down my tarp, I got the sudden urge for my morning constitutional. I'm stuffing my tarp into the pack and I look toward the trail that goes to the privy, and I see a guy dressed in the same colored clothes as me, gray rain pants and olive raincoat, turn off the trail and start walking away from me toward toward my privy. Dang it. I need to do that. Uh sorry quote, dang it. And then I need to do that. So why is this guy using my privy? I really don't want to start hiking back because walking usually loosens things up more, and I don't want to crap my pants. So I'm just standing there in the rain, and I just put my tarp away. I've been there. That's never fun, you know. And you don't want to have to, you know, dig a hole in the woods. I don't know if if you're allowed to in in uh on on state property. Anyway, all I could think of was someone came into one of the lean twos late last night, and maybe this buddy was using that privy, so he had so he had to use mine. It sounds like the the outhouses are are for like their campsites assigned to each outhouse. He was assigned to that one, but somebody else came to use his, which I agree is very rude, you know? Yeah. Um, so I'm standing there a full 15 minutes just staring at the trail to the privy, waiting for this guy to come out so I can go. Getting dumped on with rain the entire time. Finally, I'm like, screw this, maybe I missed him come out. I walk through the woods toward the privy and go in. There's nobody there. That's bold. Just to bravely, just to brashly walk into the to the You don't know what you'd be walking in on. Yeah, yeah. There is nobody there, and there is no evidence of any recent use. The pit inside is not very deep, and you can see old deposits, but nothing fresh. I get why he's sharing a little too much information, but I get it because you know that means that nobody gone in there. Well, I had to go, so I made a fresh deposit. Only took me a minute or so. Thank you for that. I hiked out past the two lean twos, and both were completely empty, and nothing to indicate anyone was there. Hiked out in about an hour back to the parking lot, and my car was still the only one there. When I think back on it, I never made out a face on the guy. I thought it was weird that he had the exact same rake raincoat and rain pants as me. Mine were a mixed set from two different manufacturers, and most people with rain pants have a matching jacket. As I hiked out, I became more and more convinced that I watched myself walk to the privy and then stood there like an idiot for 15 minutes in the rain. I know I didn't just imagine it. I was low-key kind of mad that this guy was using the privy at my tent site instead of the one at his own lean to. So interesting. Yeah. So he potentially he didn't see the face, but it sounds like he probably saw I don't know. I mean, I don't know if that that can't campsite was the one that he used specifically very often. So I don't know if it was a shadow of himself or or if it was like he watched himself do what he was going to do 15 minutes later. I don't know. A doppelganger type thing or or whatever. What was the one um that came before you? The one from I I know, yeah. I I am very disappointed in myself that I don't remember the the name of that. Okay, but there was some Norwegian, right? Yeah, yeah. Or it was uh some kind of a shapeshifter who realized, oh, somebody's there, I can't walk through as Dogman, Wolf, whoever. And so let me uh make myself kind of look like him. Yeah, yeah. I mean, he's the only human around, so I'm just gonna make myself look like him, gonna walk into this path uh because it's the path. I don't think he actually saw the person go into the outhouse. But they just has to go through. So it's like, yeah, don't bother. I'm just I'm just a human. Yeah. Yep. I look exactly like you. That's right. Not saying it's aliens, but it's aliens. Not saying it's dog man. That's right. I was on a backpacking trip in the Manistee National Forest with my Boy Scout troop. We were several miles deep in the woods, all zipped up in our tents for the night when the noises started. That night I heard ungodly noises that scared me half to death. Screams, shrieks, and calls echoed from deep within the dark forest. I hate that. We were a couple of hundred meters down the river and close to our campground when I saw an incredibly clear and bright white figure of a portly preteen boy walking atop the water. Am I doing this right? It's yeah. Um, oh, maybe these are two different stories. Oh, I'm so sorry. Oh, did you just share two stories? I just here, let me finish. I'm sorry. Screams, shrieks, and calls echoed from deep within the dark forest. Um the noises lasted for what seemed like hours and were only interrupted by what sounded like a baseball bat violently striking a tree. The next morning, not a word was spoken about the night before, except by the assistant scoutmaster. I distinctly remember him saying something to the effect of those were some high-pitched coyotes last night. Later that day, while continuing along the trail, we encountered a solo hiker passing in the opposite direction. He paused to question our scoutmaster. He asked if our troop had been causing a raucous or making noises in the woods. Which honestly is uh is an understandable assumption. Exactly. He was quite agitated as he had been kept up all night by noises. He even said he yelled at them to stop, but to no avail. Our scoutmaster explained to him that it wasn't us, and we continued along the trail. Year later, I found a YouTube video of strange noises recorded from that same forest. The whole event and then small sinecrities sounding it have made me yeah, have made me more curious. Oh, wait, synchronicities? Synchronicities. Okay, okay. Thank you. I said that wrong. A little bit. Synchronicities surrounding it have made me more curious, but also cautious about what could be out there in our own backyards that we have no idea about. So something that stood out in that story, specifically the the baseball bat. Yes, that sounds a lot like uh a Bigfoot thing. A lot of a lot of Bigfoot researchers say that you'll use Dell U sticks and you know hit hit trees and whatnot. So let me just quickly do my one that I kind of read the last part. Yeah, yeah. The conclusion, I suddenly a bunch of noises, and then suddenly there's a ghostly portly man on the on the water. I felt I feel bad for the way that he was described. No, well let's see if having the first part of the story is better. I doubt it. I misnumbered my pages. I just will say if I'm dead, I don't want to be described. Like if I'm a show up as a ghost, I don't want to be described as a pale, portly man. I I I will never describe you that way. Thank you. I appreciate that. None of you are allowed to do it either. Even if I'm a ghost and you see me, and I am a pale, portly individual. Please just describe me as a as a translucent, stunning specimen of a ghost. Yes. Stud muffin, even. Yes. I had a paranormal encounter when I was camping with a few friends in Okanagan Falls, British Columbia, Canada. Thank you. Okenagan. We were camping to celebrate my 13th birthday, and the girls and I had walked down to the lake for a swim. On the walk back to our campground, we walked along a river that had a fair-sized dam. Unfortunately, there has been an incident where two brothers drowned after being unable to escape the turbines a few years earlier. That's so sad. That's tragic. This town was only 40 minutes from my hometown, so we had heard the story on the news. The dam had been marked with a skull and crossbones and large signs saying danger. Yep. We were a couple of hundred meters down the river and close to our campground when I saw an incredibly clear and bright white figure of a portly preteen boy walking atop the water. I stopped and told my friends to look, and one of them did and exclaimed that she saw him too. The other covered her face and said she was too scared to look. We watched him for a few minutes until he faded away. He walked along the river's surface slowly for about 10 minutes, then disappeared. It is still the most incredible supernatural encounter I have ever had. Jeez. Yeah. Okay. I wouldn't have described him as poorly. I well, I mean, but I understand why. I especially if she's, you know, 13 at the time. And if he's in a swimsuit, it's kind of, you know. Well, I mean, yeah, that's I I saw I saw a a pale, translucent man with love handles and a muffin top walking stubbily around the around the water. Like, let's just let's just roast this poor dead guy more. Well, but he, you know what? I gotta say, a lot of preteen boys are are they still have their baby fat. And then they hit teenage years and they get taller and muscular and they lose that baby fat. And some of us when we high school, we don't. We have to work for that. That's right. Um, I okay. I have two, I mean, I've I have a lot more stories, but I would love to share two more if that's okay. Yeah, let's do that. Uh is that okay with uh okay and and yeah 148. Okay. Oh wow. Okay, yeah. So I've got two more, and I don't know if you want to share. No, I think after I think I'm good. So I'm gonna share the first one, is uh I won't say more mundane, but it's it is it's reminiscent of the one you just shared, and it's from R slash paranormal. Okay. Um and then the other one is we're gonna end with the bonkers one. Another another glitch in the matrix. But the first one is from Tim the Demon, which is obviously a very reliable source of information. Yeah, I would say so. And some call me Tim. I don't know if that's why he named himself that, but uh I hope that's what he was thinking. Anyway, it's called I May Have Witnessed Two Entities on a Camping Trip. A few years ago, my mom and I decided to take a road trip. We were going to different camping/slash hiking spots along the California coast, and we were in the big Sur area. I'm assuming that's how it's pronounced, S-U-R, Sur area, at the time of this particular incident. It was getting to be later in the day, so we had been sort of scrambling to find a campsite to sleep at. I I can't remember the exact details, but for some reason we ended up going up this long windy mountain road. I'm assuming it's windy, though it could also be windy, mountain road that seemed to go up forever. Eventually at the top, we found a secluded site with camp spots and um okay, yeah, it's 10. So with camp spots and even a bathroom. Nice. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. It's like the other guy. You know, you gotta make sure you got a privy and make sure that you don't have doppelgangers using it. That's right when you gotta go. Didn't see anyone around, but the sun was about to go down, so we figured we could find the person in charge in the morning and pay pay them then. By now it was dark and we had been around the fire for a few hours. Our sight was right at the edge of the trees. Beautiful. Beautiful. I bet that was gorgeous. I heard some rustling coming from that direction and looked up. Two people walking one in front of the other, dressed in all white, perfectly clean clothes. The person in front had their arm back to hold the other's hand, but they looked straight ahead. They didn't acknowledge me or my mom whatsoever. They walked out of the woods, past us, and right back into the trees. Here's what's weird both had no lights, were barefoot, had no belongings with them, and were not dressed warmly. It was probably around 40 degrees, pitch dark, and rough. Terrain. Not to mention the gut-wrenching heart drop feeling I got when I saw them. I asked my mom if she saw that, and she said no, even though she was facing the same direction as me. I was on the edge of rest. Sorry, I was on the edge the rest of the night and had trouble sleeping. In the morning, my mom found the camp owner, paid him, and told him what I had seen. He replied nonchalantly, Oh yeah, those are the night walkers. People see them around here sometimes. When she asked him if if he thought this was paranormal, he said he was, quote, pretty damn sure. This is how it ends. Got the hell out of there as soon as I could. Understandable. I love my what another one of my favorite things is when people come up with names for some of these guys. And sometimes they can be the most terrifying. Nightwalkers is a creepy name. I don't care. I mean, especially considering it's I'm thinking night crawlers, which is the like a it's a bug, right? Does it come? It's a worm because you use it for fishing. Right, right. Yes, yeah. Yeah. But night walkers sounds creepy. Isn't there the that Hawaiian, those Hawaiian spirits? I I are they called nightwalkers? Are that also nightwalkers? I want to say I'm gonna look it up real quick. I'm gonna look it up. You read your story. Oh, okay. I like that. I like that plan. Okay. This next one is, like I said, from uh R slash glitch in the Matrix. And um it's from Masquerading Muppet. Again, just another. Oh, I love that name. Um this one takes place in Wisconsin in Wisconsin. And it's titled Portal in the Woods. Not to be confused with Privy in the Woods. No, no. Okay, though, I mean you could consider a privy a portal to uh hell. That's a portal you don't want to jump headfirst into. Let me tell you, you will probably die. Anyway, portal in the woods. Hi, I'd like to ask if anyone else has had an experience like this. I've had a handful of weird things happen in the woods in the years I've been camping. This one and one other experience have both stuck with me a lot. So this happened in September 2017 in the Kettlemoraine State Forest in Southeast Wisconsin. I'm assuming that's S. E. Southeast Wisconsin. And you've been have you been to Kettle Moraine? I've been to Kettlemarine. You've been to Kettle Moraine. I've been I definitely I remember going to Kettle Moraine. Delavin, and it's near it's not far from Whitewater. Okay, okay. Yeah. So so if it's called East to Bray Road area. Okay. Well that makes sense. That makes sense. And yeah, Whitewater. We want to do eventually a whole episode on some of the things that happened in Whitewater because that's fun. Anyway, so um they're night marchers, by the way. Night marchers. Okay, okay. So the night walkers is close. Night marchers make sense because they're they were soldiers. Right. So it makes sense that that uh yeah. Anyway, so going back to Wisconsin. Um, two friends and I had decided to do a last-minute camping trip before the end of summer, and class is getting into full swing. I was going into my grad school year, and my two friends were going to be seniors. So, okay, so probably then they were going to University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Yeah, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Or or University of Wisconsin, Madison, or or uh Milwaukee, any of those places. I was going oh sorry, I already read that. None of us had been drinking when this happened, which in Wisconsin is a very important detail. Right, right. Um I think the University of Wisconsin-Madison is known as the uh the party, or not the party college, but the heaviest drinking college. Oh. Um, they they like they liked their their briskies. Yeah. They they like their spirits. Uh not just the ghosts, the other spirits too in Wisconsin. Anyway, we set up camp and decided to go for a hike along the Ice Age trail that ran next to the campground before it got too dark. We didn't leave with a specific plan to plan in mind, but found a loop trail and continued on that. This section of the woods had trails that were on top of a ridge, so there were steep drop-offs on the other side. Not like you'd die if you fell, but pretty steep. Twenty-foot hill drop, more like, so you can't so you really can't go off trail. So the trail's probably four uh I don't know if this is four fifths miles or four to five miles. Or four to five. Is it four slash five? I would say four to five miles. Okay, so four to five miles. And by this point, we weren't going on our last sorry, at this point we're going on our last mile, and the sun is setting. We didn't realize we'd take this long, so none of us even had our headlamps with us. But that's fine since we guesstimate we only have about another mile or so. We round a small corner and the trail ahead has trees arching from either side of the path overhead, creating a doorway almost. That wouldn't be a big deal, except for the fact that the area of this doorway was shimmering. Almost like when you drop a stone into water and it ripples and sloshes a bit. We all stopped, and one of us said something along the lines of Am I dehydrated or does that look weird? That's the best way I can describe it, at least. We all saw it. But there was no turning back at this point. We only had maybe 30 minutes of daylight left, couldn't go around and couldn't turn back. Finally, one of us, I think it was me, but I don't recall for certain. I think I was the brave one to I can't remember for certain, but I'm writing the story, yes, I was. Yes, it definitely was me. Stuck our arm through. Smart. Nothing happened. See, now I would have stuck my arm through and screamed like something got me. Yeah, yeah. Oh just kidding. And then that's when something reaches in and pulls you. Yeah, yeah, and then you are stuck in the other side of the portal forever. Um yeah, nothing happened. It still looked the same, shimmering like water or heat-off black top on a hot day. We all walked through and were fine. Seemingly. We joked for a few weeks slash days that we stepped into an alternate universe. That was actually my thought. I'm only friends with one of the I'm only friends with one of the friends now, and a few years later I brought it up to her, and she'd just say that she didn't want to think about it. It didn't impact me that way. I just thought, slash, still think it was odd. Anyway, I've heard of Stairs in the Woods, which unfortunately that's I think more and more it sounds like it's more of a hoax type of thing for for the stairs in the woods. But we can't be the only one to encounter or portal in the woods. I d I think that's interesting. Um I mean because so there has been some interesting there has been some discussions of people going into alternate universes and things, and I don't know how much I How would you know? Exactly. I yeah, especially if if there is an alternate reality that's super similar to our current one. I mean, if you step in from one alternate reality to the other, the only way you would know is if your other you is still there as well, and then you just happen to run into yourself, and now the other universe that you just left behind doesn't have any version of you, which would be kind of sad, um, depending on who you are. Um, I guess, you know, if for instance Hitler happened to walk through a portal uh to another universe and we didn't have him anymore, I think most people would be okay with that. But but that poor person the poor world that he walked into would then have him. That's true. But then maybe in that world he would be an artist and uh they would have, you know, let him into the the his uh painting career would have taken off and he wouldn't be in politics. Who knows? But he'd have a TV show there he showed you how to draw paintings and he'd grow his hair and mustache out. See? Heil time with Hitler. I'm what is the guy that does the Bob Ross. Bob Ross. Bob Ross. I you know, I don't know if I want to ever compare Hitler to Bob Ross. I'm I'm I'm just saying he in his alternate, he could have grown his hair out, grown his little mustache bigger, and he could have done the Bob Ross thing. I don't know if Hitler could have ever grown his mustache bigger. I think that was the the I don't know if that was the style necessarily. I I don't know if he wanted to. You know, they were both in the military. Bob Ross was in the Air Force. I did. I did know that. Actually, that's one of the reasons he didn't uh he he wore sweaters most of the time with long sleeves, because he wanted to cover his tattoos so that you know he didn't think that a children's entertainment figure should be showing tattoos. No, that you're thinking about I'm thinking Mr. Rogers, not Bob Ross. I didn't know Bob Ross is also in the military. Yeah, he was uh that's like he says that his chill nature was because he had to yell at a lot of people when he was at them in the military. So he wasn't gonna do that anymore. Yeah. You know what? I love that, I believe that, and that makes me happy. And see, that could have happened to Hitler. I know. If we had just walked him through Kettlemarine State Park through a portal. Uh Voices from the Attic uh does not in any way uh uh condone anything. We uh Hitler's bad. We made that last statement. Hitler's bad and I don't know if there was any redeeming him, but maybe. Maybe if he walked to a different universe, who knows? But unfortunately, he was in our universe. That's right. And he jacked it up a little bit. But anyway, um, yeah, but I do I I I don't know if I fully buy the idea of traveling into an alternate reality, but I mean, that might describe some of like the Mandela effect type situations where you know there are certain things like when somebody asked me, I don't if I think it was like the Baristine Bears. I don't fully remember exactly what it is about the Baristine Bears, but I remember somebody asking me a question, me saying the wrong answer, and them showing me, and I went, I don't remember it being that way. Um it could be it could be a psychological effect, but it could also be something else. Because there's so many of those examples of us thinking something and being wrong. But I also have never walked through a portal. No. So very interesting. And I gotta say, when you start looking into the Beast of Bray Bray Road, they there's a the idea was there's portals in that whole area, which is where they were. So Yeah. Yeah, I mean, um, especially with all the dog man and and uh yeah, the beast sightings. But it doesn't sound like they they were missing any time, they were feeling any different, they just you know, so maybe they just He didn't feel any different. We don't know why that one friend Yeah, didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to talk about it. She they had a very different reaction to it, and I don't know that's that's the thing I don't fully understand. Why did that person have a different reaction? Right, as like that I don't want to talk about it. It was just because they saw something weird and they walked through it. They didn't want anyone to know that they went camping with this guy. That or she was the one that went through first and he claimed it, so she's mad at him. Or did they actually walk through something and they came back to a life that was slightly different, and they they there's something that they either gained or missed because of that, or it wiped their memories, and so she failed out of college and became a drifter. I that would that would be messed up, that'd be so sad, especially considering the other guy, nothing happened. I was fine, you know, and then she's she's now just yeah, this this drifter, because yeah, that'd be a tragic way to end the tale. Let's just end it on a happy note. Thank you for listening to our spooky scary stories. If you guys have spooky, scary camping stories that you'd like to share, we would love to hear them. Absolutely. Any any spooky camping story that it whether whether it's just a feeling that you had, or if it's uh noises that you heard, or if it's a dinner you had to eat that somebody else made, often spooky scary. That's true. Or the effects of said dinner, the the scary noises that emerge from somebody's sleeping bags, those can be really scary. There was one of the stories about that, that they somebody had gone camping and for some reason they had oysters and he was sharing a tent with somebody and he had to sleep with his head out of the tent. They smell salty going in. They smell very sulfurous coming out. Right, that's right. So we don't need to hear thank you again. I mean, we don't need to hear them, but if you want to share them, I probably will read them chuckling. So at the dinner table. As people are trying to eat, probably pudding. That's chocolate pudding specifically. That's so gross. Thank you. I'm still I'm trying to do this. Thank you so much for joining us at Voices from the Attic. Since it's the outro, we might want to look at the main camera. Oh, let's let's do that. Okay. I I'm really bad at doing that. So it's all good. It's all good. Thank you for joining us. And uh please like, share, subscribe, follow. Yep. Am I missing any other uh yeah. Uh if well, I'm not saying you comment, comment, um, share it with your friends, like like she already said, share, comment, follow. If you're uh thank you for watching it uh on YouTube if you're there. Uh if you watched it and you liked it, please, please give us a subscribe. It will really help um the the Almighty algorithm, show us to new people, to other people. Uh and if you're listening on podcast, if you wouldn't mind if you like the episode, if you wouldn't mind um rating it, letting it letting others know what you thought about it. That also does the same thing, but on the podcast side for the for the mighty algorithm. We would really appreciate it. And also if you have your own, like we said, if you have your own scary story that you want to share, yeah uh email us at vtfadic at gmail.com. It's a voices v from ftvadic at gmail.com. Yeah. Um, we'd love to hear your stories. And also if you just want to comment your stories as well, um we'll we'll see those two. Also, we are um gonna be doing um in in the next couple months a podcast about theaters. We've already got somebody sending uh us some stories that happened to him scary, spooky theater stories. If you've got some, that would be cool. Send them to us either comment or send it to us in the email. We're also doing another episode as well about Bigfoot, and uh we have a specific idea in mind, but if you happen to have any Bigfoot stories of your own, um, you can send us those too, and those might make it in the in this episode or uh the upcoming episode or other episodes that we're gonna be doing later. Probably be doing. In fact, I like the idea of us letting people know what the topic is. I think we might start doing that. Great idea. Great idea. Hey, have a great week, and thank you for stopping by in the attic with us. Bye.