It Was Not a Bear ! - Daniel Benoit's Story

not a bear. This is the Up the Creature's Podcast. I am Brian and with me as always my co host Todd.

and that's been around for years. And I'll be honest with you, I believe you know, as I tell people, that's basically what did it for me. It's kind of, uh, sparked that curiosity and put that excitement in me that grew into a passion, you know. So you know, ever since seeing that, and then you know, then there was documentaries on that later on. You know, they've been till this day, they've been trying to bump that, you know. So I just found that to be very fascinating. It's

basically captivated me. It draw me it well, I say it, it pulled me in. And because you know, long before that, you know, Bigfoot wasn't really nothing that was on my mind. I didn't think about Bigfoot. Although I grew up in

the woods, I was familiar with nature, you know. But yeah, as far as getting involved with Bigfoot and watching the different shows that come on and finding Bigfoot, you know, which was a lot of fun and now we got expedition, but you know, so yeah, it just you know, I started doing a lot of exploring and really doing a lot of in depth research. You know, my senses were more alert and more heightened, you know, where I was starting to pay attention to nature a little bit better,

you know, and my surroundings, you know. And then as far as taking off from there, I started getting on social media. I learned about Facebook, and you know, well before Facebook, I believe my Space came around. There was my Space, and then I jumped to Facebook, and and then I started playing around learning how to use social media, and I was discovering, Wow, there's all these other Bigfoot groups and communities. And I started watching and listening, and

you know, I didn't really interact too much. I was more or less like the student in the back of the room that was just sitting back and listening and observing, you know, taking notice of all these different fair is. It started to flood social media, and I didn't dismiss anyone because I didn't know, honestly too much about the subject itself. So I started taking notes and I started looking into things on my own. Then I took it upon myself to do my own independent research and studies

both in and out of the field. My main focus was on the wildlife, but I wanted to find something that closely resembled Bigfoot, especially with all their reported activities that we hear about or may have even experienced, all the way down to the vocalizations. I wanted to find a species that existed, that we know that existed, that I could start comparing to. You know, so I discovered one,

and I chose one. And to be more specific as far as our our non human primates chimpanzees, gorillas, baboons

and so forth, you know, orangutans. I started reading into these and are looking into how they act and behave, learning and reading on different uh, you know, some of the research and the notes from primatologists and what they know and what what was observed from these primates, And in my studies, I've actually come to find that there was so many similarities within what you know, their behaviors, things that people are in our own neck of the woods.

Are you know, giving Bigfoot credit for well, you know a lot of the a lot of our findings, you know, they're basically could be logically explained. But then on the other hand, some of these findings that you're scratching your head and making you think, WHOA, wait a minute, there's

something to this. So but long story short, I was doing cross comparisons with our non human primates and what bigfoots, you know, what people are giving Bigfoot credit for, and that they're started to draw my own conclusions of what

Bigfoot might be. So but then again, as I developed on social media, you know, started presenting some of my basic little research here and there, I started picking up on you know, friends and other people that were interested in hearing what I had to say, and it kind of drew grew from there. It kind of started growing and developing from there, and so I started looking for other people so to participate with me or you know, associate with me, because you know, we all learn from

each other. You know, I don't have the answers or all the answers or I mean, because I don't have answers at all except for my honest conclusions and my honest beliefs behind the subject. But yet there's still a lot we could learn from one another. So that's where I took it upon myself to start trying to gather people you know, so cool. Yeah, sorry if I'm rambling too much.

So just give your heads up. I try to give people heads up when I do these, when I do public presentations, because you know, I know sometimes people find it horror follow me because I'll start on something, you'll hear me merge something else, and then I'll come back to it to explain why I was talking about that.

did a lot of daytime exploring up behind camp. And yeah, we were up behind camp. We we did some good you know hiking exploring. Yeah, we found a few interesting things here and there. A couple of guys I didn't get to see it. This part of us kind of

split off. A couple of guys plan to have found a couple tracks down in a wash out, washed out creek, and I would have loved to see that because that's actually where I love the look for tracks, by the way, uh, anywhere where the dirt is well exposed, where it may be soft enough with something, but really you pick up the details or show details. So yeah, after a day of you know, exploring and everything, coming back to camp, everybody relaxed, rest, you know, we grabbed the bike eat.

We had planned to go out that evening because you know, everybody likes a good night height, you know, when it comes to big footing. So that's what we did. We set out on a foot. Now in the area where we camp at, there is a lake in the area. Actually there's two, the other ones a couple of miles away from the one lake that was close to us.

So from where our camp was to the lake. It was approximately maybe a mile all right, So we had made foot down to the lake and it was perfect because usually there's people down there parked over there, you know, spread out around the lake fishing. Well. To my surprise, there was nobody there, which was perfect, so we could do what we wanted to do without being disturbed or whatever.

So now keep in mind, by the time we got to the lake, the sun was already gone down, and so I mean we still had a little bit of daylight, even though we came prepared for the night, and so we paired up in twos. We spread out around the lake. Now, we had a couple that came down all the way from Vermont and Keimmy and Darren there were older so you know, we kept them at the beginning of the lake.

There was like a little peninsula with a little bench there, so you know, there was no sense of walking on the backside of the lake. But yeah, so the rest of us, we you know, it was my buddy Tracy Allen and his son, and then there was me and Cliff Stanley. So yeah, like I said, we went further down, spread apart, and we all had radio communication and for the record around the lake. There is these little square docs or piers or whatever. They're handicapped accessible. So what

we did. We yeah, we all got on these you know, spread out on these little piers or docks whatever. You know, we're listening. We got me and Tracy, we both had parabog mics and so yeah, we're listening. Yeah, we're hearing a few things up behind us. There's a ridge up behind us. You know, you're hearing some limb snap, what sounds like some kind of movement or walking, but it was very distant from what I was hearing. It was distant. It didn't sound too close, but you know that timeline.

It could be dear, it could be bear. Whatever. So anyway, while we were set up there, I radio down to Kimmy. Now I have to say this. I share this, and I'm proud to say that anyone who is familiar with the vocalization that Bobo from Finding Bigfoot does. Kimmy, she's a little lady. But I'm gonna tell you I've heard her vocals numerous times, and I was like, this was the perfect place to hear a vocal because you got the lake and you got these two mountain ridges. Surrounding you.

So and then you know, any vocalization's going to bounce off these ridges and it's going to be heard from a good distance. So I radio down to Kimmy. I said, Kimmy, all right, you know everyone's hearing me as I'm contacting Kimmy. I said, all right, everybody, Kimmy, we want you to do your vocal. And as soon as Kimmy's done, everybody let's was silent, And so Kimmy gave off her bobo vocal and after that we all remained silent and we listened.

Now for the record, keep in mind that me and Tracy, Tracy was a little he was down I'll call it. He's in the middle between me and Kimmy. Kimmy's way down at the entrance of the lake and I'm up on the upper end and Tracy and the sun were in the middle. So, after about a good ten seconds or so, we ended up getting a response. And it was not it was not a echo, because echo welred have heard that immediately. This was a good ten seconds or so, and the vocal you could tell you could

hear there was a little distance. It sounded like it was coming over to the other bridge that was across from us. So we just found that fascinating that we got a response from Kimmy's vocalization. So so after some time was fastened by, we weren't hearing nothing, we weren't getting no activity. We figured it was late, it's time to rig group and head back to camp. So that's what we did. We all met back up, regrouped that where Kimmy and Darren were, and we set back on

foot the head back to camp. And now we're walking out of the lake. It's all gravel all keeping my most or majority of the forest road in the national forest where we were, it's all gravel. There's some parts of it depends on the direction you go. It is paved. However, we were walking up the gravel road and we were headed out to the main forest road. And as we're walking up, we're in a single fire line. I'm in I'm basically up ahead in the lead, and then follow

me was Tracy Cliff and the Kimmy and Darren. So we were walking along and we're all talking. We're all talking in normal tone. We're not trying to remain silent. We're not you know, our goal it was just to get back to camp, you know, because it was late. You know, I didn't really feel tired of nothing. But anyway, so we started noticing, Oh, there's deer on the side of the road. It was like nonchalantly walking. Now it was so dark because of the headlands we had on.

It's weird how you could just notice your eyes shine. Just bobbed along, and I guess they were just within that range of light. I don't know, but yeah, you know, it was a deer. It was just kind of bobbing, you know, had the bluish marble eyes, just bobbing along. Then went further away into the darkness. Funny thing is most of the deer around there usually you know, they

get scared, they're very skittish. But it's like this deer was I don't know what the deal was, but it was acting like it was not scared of us or whatever. It didn't act freaked out. It was just nonchalantly taking his time on the side of the road and then went into the woods. So, you know, I thought it was interesting. You know, I mean, I've been close to the deer before, put up on the parkway, because up on the Parkway that runs on skyline drive of here. Yeah,

the deer they know they're safe up there. I mean, yeah, you can get close to the deer all day long up there, almost touch them. They got because there's no hunting allowed up there. So anyway, after seeing this deer, you know, which was cool. You know, we saw a

little something, you know, some wildlife. But we're catching and walking and just past where we saw the deer, on the opposite side of the road, something catches my attention and I'm looking to something and I don't know my I got my head lamp, but I'm trying to adjust it. It's whatever I'm looking at down to my left, probably

a good thirty feet maybe something's reflecting. I thought it, you know, immediately, one of the first initial thoughts was at first, before I saw it blink, because that's what maybe really it was a subject, something, a creature of some sort that was there. But at first I was trying to get focused because I couldn't tell that it was ies. I mean, right away, I thought it was one of these little yellow reflector signs that sometimes you

see in random places in the national forest. Sometimes I say, no motor vehicles beyond this point. But I was thinking, this is an odd place that have something like that. There's no way a vehicles would drive off over there. But then as I noticed, like I said, when I saw it, it blinked and opened up. I realized again it was a creature my words. When I called Tracy was right behind, I said, Tracy, I pointed right out. He saw it too, And because it looked low, my

first thoughts were, was that a mountain line? Excuse my language, I use other words at the time, but because I was like starting to like kind of freak out, because mountainline was the first thought that popped in my head. And all of a sudden, as we're looking at it, it kind of looked like it zipped away, like it disappeared. So traces like, guys, come on, come up here. We got eye shine up here. So we all get up into that position where we saw it, and we're all

standing there. We're looking directly into the woods, and our headlamps are shining in. They're pretty good, and it's real dark in there, but you could see some of the trees and some of the bushes, and but whatever was there, we saw it again. But keep in mind, for the record, there was nothing about eye shine. We could not make out any physical features, you know, no details, nothing whatsoever. We're just seeing a set of large, yellowish looking eye shine.

And yes, it was yellowish. I know a lot of people describe like an amber reddish color, but these colors were like a large yellowish color, almost like the color of this shirt. But yeah, they were blowing pretty good based off the you know, the reflection off of our headlamps. And what this was doing was actually swaying back and forth pretty fast. It had this pretty swift swaying motion. And I had no idea what the heck I was

looking at. But I could tell you for a fact, I knew that this was not a bear because bear. If that was a bear, I would have seen red eyeshine. Bears have that red eyes shine, especially off of refleshing. Every bear I've ever seen at night had red eyes, you know, from off the either the headlights of the vehicle or my flashlight. But this here was something different. I knew it was different, but then at the same time, I had no clue what it was. So we're observing

this subject. Keep in mind, it's a good Another thirty forty feet from the edge of the fourth or where we were standing and were it was kind of exciting but very mysterious as a swaying side to sign. But then it got a little bit more interesting because another set of eyeshine showed up just about five maybe four or five feet to the right of it. For this time,

this side of eyeeshine was much taller. And before I go in on any further, I have to make this clear that from where we were standing, the side of the road sloped down several feet then leveled back out. So yes, we are looking down at what we're looking at now. The other one that's about six foot tall is what we estimated, So we got a four foot subject. You'll hear me call them subjects, because like I said,

I had no idea what these are. So we're looking at two subjects, the small ones still swaying side to side. And now we got this other one that's around six foot tall, same color eyeshine, same reflection, and you can notice it blinked its size on a few occasions. And now we got two subjects we're trying to make out. We're still trying to make out what they are. We're not not seeing no features, no details whatsoever. You know,

like I said, it was just kind of odd. But after observing these two right here, I'm looking over I'm just scanning the you know, the best I can. Keep in mind, we got some of us had some bright headlights headlight lamp sign But I'm looking over there through the bushes and I'm looking over, looking around and seeing if there's something else around. Because whatever we're looking at, we don't know what they are. It's not making sense.

But then through the bushes, very low, I see another set of eye shine and I pointed there that I pointed that out. And I don't know if Tracy was the next one to see that one with me, but everybody, sorry, after I got all the way up, well and let me back up, because like I said, it started very low, and I kept my eyes on that one because there was like I didn't know what that could have been. But I noticed it started raising up. It started getting

taller and taller and taller. And then when it stopped looking at the other ones, this one was towering over top of the six foot one easily by two feet. Now it's starting to get a little interesting here because now we got three sets of eye shine at three different levels. We got a four foot, we got a six foot. Now we're estimating this one to be around eight feet tall. Okay, what's in the woods that's eight

feet tall? You know, Again, these were not bears. So now the thought of bigfoot is starting to kind of flood through my mind a little bit here, But I wasn't saying nothing. Tracy Arnold was the first one to say anything about squatches. He's like, guys, we got squatches, And at that point I wanted to believe that, but I needed to see something more, you know, because small ones still swaying side to side. It slowed down a little bit, but it's still swaying. The other one was still,

you know, occasionally blinking his eyes. This one here, it was just standing there. I noticed it blinked his eyes once or twice. But then at one point, the tallest one made this left turn maneuver. It turned to the left and it appeared to make a step or two and then turned back around. Now, when it made this maneuver, I don't know if it was the angle position of what it was with the light, but we were able to make out a silhouette of wide, broad shoulders in

a big round head sitting on top. I saw that. Tracy saw that. I know. Kimmy. I've talked to her since this. She said she saw that too. So now, I mean, as far as the eye shine, everyone's seeing everything as far as eye shine. But that silhouette and that shape that I saw, Like I said, I know, at least Tracy and Kimmy saw that. I know that much. I'm not sure about the others, but I'll never forget that and seeing that, and I'm actually convinced that what

we saw was free squatches. I want to believe that there were possibly a family unit. I get asked that a lot about family units, clans, groups. I mean, based off of this one observation, that's where I tell people. I share this, and I tell people as well. I'm

convinced that they were squatches. I mean, what else has wide, broad shoulders, eight feet tall, big roundhead, you know, and then you know just where they're located, because I've heard a lot of interesting vocals in activity, big powerful tree knocks from this area. Some of these things happened later on, you know, since then where others got the experience that with me? Because there's actually a campsite right around the corner.

From there, I started camping in this spot more often in hopes of experiencing more or hearing more, which it has been very productive hanging out in those areas. But here's there's more interesting stuff about this. It's actually more disappointing, but it's still interesting. So after our observation of what we were seeing, all three of them basically turned off and went off further into the darkness. And I believe we didn't see the details like I would have loved

to have seen. One. I think they were they had black hair. Two they were blending in with the darkness. It's the only thing I could think of. As Some believe that they could have been cloaking. If that's the case, I don't see if they were cloaking. For the record, I don't. I don't agree with cloaking, but there's other things I'll agree on along the way in between. But I think if they were cloaking, I don't think we would have even seen the eye shine or that you know,

that dark Shillowett. But yeah, for the record, here's the disappointed part. We made our way back to camp. We didn't see no more. Uh. We started walking back to camp we got back to camp and all of a sudden, we took our gear off and we started we had, you know, started up a fire and just we're just shooting the ship, you know, just talking nonchalant and trying to debunk this. I was like, you know, I was like, guys, you know I want you know, I mean, don't get

me wrong, I was convinced. But at the same time, there was a part of me that was like, I'm running every thought of every known species that I know that exists in these woods, and we're trying to debunk this.

And uh, and here's another thing too, me and Tracy Arnold, and in each of our backpacks, we each had our own night vision binocular and not once during this whole, uh, this whole incident that we think about, or the thought of across our minds to pull our night vision out to get a better observation of what we were seeing and experiencing. So, yeah, we were kicking ourselves with the butt. I felt like, I mean, I was kind of mad

at myself that I never thought of it again. Both of our devices, they weren't the most expensive devices, but they weren't great, especially at the distance that we were observing them. We were to guy a great view of them. You know, they were within thirty to forty feet you know from where we were standing, at least that's what I estimated that could have been. Maybe it was a little further, but yeah, so, yeah, we were both kicking

ourselves in the butt. You know. Not once did anyone mention, hey, bring your bring your night vision out, you know. So yeah, it never worked out for us to do that, but we did go back to that spot the next day and we tried to confirm our height estimate. We had a couple a couple of us stayed on the road, I know, me and the other guy that was with was Cliff Stanley. He's I'm six foot tall, he's probably about six three. He's just a little taller than I am.

So we got behind the bushes where we seen the talls one and basically with me raising my hands straight up, you know, you know, I believe Tracy was up on the road. He said, yeah, that's about with eyeshine was you know, so our heighth estimate, you know, was pretty accurate. So but we were looking around in the area behind the bushes where you know, around the trees. We were

trying to look for tracks. We were trying to look for something, but it was a little difficult because that ground it was kind of grassy and lumpy and very uneven. So to find anything decent as far as tracks in that general area, it was hard to really pick anything out. There was some impressions, but that could have been the uneven ground too, you know. But yeah, that was the twenty fourteen encounter skipp into. A year later, I I had another experience just in the same section of woods,

but just around a corner. Now, unfortunately I didn't see anything, but what I heard let me I guess I'll back up a little bit on the story what led up to it. It was during the hunting season, and during the hunting seasons out there, I always try to camp out there as much as I can during a hunting

season if it works out. So this one particular area, keep in mind, right outside the entrance of the lake, there's a big camp spot, and then just through the woods a little way there's another spot a little smaller, and I was set up in that spot right there, and probably between nine thirty ten o'clock at night, I was sitting there at camp. I had the fire going, had my shotgun leaning against my vehicle, and I was like,

I was sitting there. I was kind of bored. I was wide to wait, you know, and I was like, I grabbed my spotlight decided to walk out to the middle of the road. Now keep in mind, I didn't not have my spotlight on until I got into the middle of the road. I know there was nobody else camping, nobody else in the area. But as soon as I got in the road, before I turned it on, I don't know why. I looked up them down like this, you know, even though you can't see nothing, it's dark.

The only light I had was in my hand that I didn't turn on yet. But when I did turn it on, over to my left. Immediately as soon as I started shining in the tree line, you could hear a deer run off. You know, there's deer all through these woods over here. And but I didn't see the deer, but you could hear the four you know, the four legs run off, you know. So I'm trying over there. It's oh cool. I kicked up a deer. And sometimes

a deer I've seen them. They'll come from where I'm camping at they'll come through the woods and run across over there. For some reason, they love going over there in the evening. It's like a bedding ground. There's a there's a streaming creek that run through there. So so yeah, they hang out there. They feed in there and whatnot. And I believe some of them been down and there. But anyway, so as I was shining the spotlight after hearing deer run off, I'm shining them, you know, the light,

panting it to my right. And as I come across around the one the two o'clock position, and I stopped, and all of a sudden, what I heard next was something very large and very pipe. You know, it was bipedal, but it was very large and very heavy. It was walking. You could hear every step, every step whatever it was step on, and you could hear a crack and a thump. You know. It was so large and so heavy. It was like a I don't know. The best way I described it most of the time is like a like

a I don't know. I don't want to use sound effects, but I'll just say it's a loud, you know, crunch and a thump. You know. So I've used sound effects before, to trying to describe it, but I sound stupid doing it. But so I mean, now, for the record, from where I was standing to the edge of the tree line was a good twenty feet so whatever that was over there was just beyond the tree line somewhere. And I don't know. I mean, I'm listening to these steps. You

can hear crunch, crunch, crunch. It wasn't slow, but it wasn't fast either. And when I was hearing this, I was like, my heart started thumping pretty hard, and it's like, you know, you get that feeling, like you know the expression my heart was in my throat. That's the adrenaline of the heartbeat I was feeling. It was like you

can feel all the way up here. And I was actually like I was kind of freaking out a little bit because I was like, I'm by myself, I'm unarmed, So I'm actually literally starting to walk backwards and with my free hand, I'm reaching down on my belt loop and make sure my vehicle was unlocked, because the thought was like if I had to get out here, you know, you know whatever. I was just freaking out. But I got back to camp. I made the fire. The fire

was still going. I fewed like another log or two on it, and instantly I gotually, instantly calmed down, and then I started thinking about what I just heard. That was very large, that was heavy, and you could hear only two feet you could hear a set of feet bipedal steps. This was no quadruped, This was no begger. Yes, there's big bears out there. I've seen them. I found their track. Some people don't believe that we be the

size bears we get here in Virginia. But but for the record, I could promise you this was not a bear. You know. I got to thinking about this, so yes, I meant a lot of the activity. I mean, the encounter of the year before happened just around the corner over here. I have found nice sized track impressions in this area across from the camp. Vocalizations, big powerful tree

knocks late at night. The different screams you know that I you know, as far as screams and vocals, these are sounds and vocals that I cannot match up or compare to it known species. I mean, I've heard all the different No, I've heard tons of owls. I heard the coyotes, I've heard foxes, screaming bark. I mean, there's all these different vocals of various species I'm very well familiar with. But as far as everything that I've experienced what I've referred to as the unknown, it's come from

this general area. Yes, there's other areas I've maybe heard or picked up on some other things. I've heard the reports a couple of miles up the other end of the forest road from people that I've actually seen them across the road. But hearing something very large and heavy bi Beutle, I mean, yes, I didn't have to see something to believe that know what it was, especially based off of my previous experience. So yeah, like I said, when I sat down and calmed down and thought about

what I heard, here's a couple of things. One, it was going away from me. It wasn't coming towards me, so that you know, that's one observation from what I heard. You know, listen to what it was, how it was stepping in the direction it was going. Two, just prior to hearing that, I spooked up a deer that was in the tree line just over to the left. Then I back up and think about the twenty fourteen encounter just prior to having this encounter. Remember how I mentioned

it was a deer right there. It was just nonchalantly walking down the forest road. I often think about these two incidents. Was that a coincidence that there was a deer involved with each situation because or did I actually interrupt something? Did I come in between a possible neal? You know, I like to believe that they do eat deer. A lot of people believe that it's a you know, good source of protein. It's a healthy meat, you know.

So you know, that's something I think about often. You know, that I possibly interrupted their hunt, you know, thank god if that was a case, they didn't get, you know, pete off and come after me, you know. So, but those are two of the most exciting experiences I've had. I mean, I've had other little things happen here and there. I mean, hearing different vocals here in tree knocks. I've had a rock throne at me one time, but in a whole different area, still part of the national forest.

But that was another incident. But yeah, it's been quite an interest, very interesting, you know, because you know, I love even if I go out there and don't experience anything that I would relate or associate the bigfoot man. I love being out there because, you know, here in a different wildlife, it's exciting to hear them, knowing that they're you know, nearby, you know. True. I've had the sound of a rabbit being taken by our predator right behind my camp. You can hear that rabbit squeal squam,

and it was like, that's cool, but poor rabbit. Yeah. But you know, it's like natural geographic out there sometimes, you know, it's just the coolest things ever. You know. I love wildlife. I love nature. So but yeah, that was that was those incidents right there.

You hear people's stories and encounters. Yeah, you know prior, you know, just prior to have the encounter. They smell this as what some people may describe like a wet dog smell to uh maybe a combination of feces combined. You know, I've heard different things, but yeah, I can't say I've ever smelled anything, especially during these encounters. But and the other thing is I wonder if it it depends on the area that they may be dwelling in, you know, I mean after anything like us or even

another non human primate. You know, one primates give off they have glands where they do give off different uh sense and stuff. You know, as far as body odor, man, human body odor is awful. So you would almost think that you would smell something from them. You know, we'll

get a whiff of something. You think. You would think that their body over and would be very potent, you know, a lot stronger than ours because if you have if you're within a couple of feet from another person that has bad body order, you're gonna definitely smell it maybe five feet away or so. Yeah, it depends if you're if the way, if you're outside and the winds blowing, You're like, oh my goodness. You know, you can almost tell for where it's coming from, you know. But no,

I never experienced any bad smells during these events. So I think on one rare occasion walking through the woods, sometimes I do take notice of different smells as I'm exploring. I've had the scent of things that smell rotten. Yes,

I mean you can smell dead animals out in the woods. Actually, one of the last times me and Jessica were out there exploring, we were exploring in that same area with these where these took place at We knew there was a dead animal and the smell were we were actually trying to locate it, like, that's a dead animal out here. It's a hasn't been dead that long, but it's strong enough where you can smell it. We never did find it.

Most likely it was probably a dead deer, you know, that a coyote or maybe a big foot took down. But yeah, it was interesting. Yeah, I like exploring through the air during the day because you never know what you might find. We did get, how that at a very close range from coyotes. We never saw the coyotes, but we were on the other side of this creek.

We were looking at a couple different tree shrucs the tree breaks, and we did hear like a like a distant off what sounded like a possible tree knock up on the higher ridge above us. And then as soon as we turn around and start walking through this like we're in the woods, but there's another later tree lines over this little embankment. We started walking towards it, and all of a sudden, coyotes started howling of what you know. I was like, I was like, I said, just get

behind me, and I like, don't move. I don't know, I had no idea. I didn't know if it was going to come out at us. You know, I've heardotes attack people before. I don't know how common it is, but I don't know how many it was. But all I know is I had my nine milimeter with seventeen rounds, so you know, if I had to, I mean, I had enough to take out a cane, a small caneine, you know, but a coyotes can be very vicious from

what I understand. Yeah, So, but that was actually interesting little thing that took place here, you know, like hearing the tree knock then a coyote howling at us, you know, I mean, I don't know, especially during the daytime. This was probably around maybe noontime, one o'clock maybe, but yeah, most of the time you hear coyotes are at night, you know. But I don't know. Maybe it was doing is mid I don't know. I don't know what it was doing, but it was sounded like it was very close.

The kind of freaked me out a little bit, you know, it was sending alarm for some Yeah, exactly. So anything, anything's possible.

group of people that camped out there. So we set up our base camp there by the river, and which was interesting because we did some daytime exploring, which was okay. You know, I was able to point out a few things and darkment, you know, and there was a couple of things that got interesting at nighttime. Actually we heard there was a couple of things that we pointed out. I don't want to give off too many details. You'll

have to watch the movie. So but yeah, yeah, it basically consisted of some of the stuff that happened while we were filming some of the We had some other eyewitnesses that shared their encounters their stories, and then of course there's a lot of me blabbing in there. So so but yeah, that was actually a very fun little project. I've been in talk with the film producer. He's an independent film producer. He's actually got a couple of movies under his belt, Bigfoot, Path of the Beast. He has

that one out. He actually has a Facebook page for that, and then his other one is Black Eyed Children. So yeah, which is interesting. Yeah, I haven't watched that one. I watched Bigfoot Path of the Beast. Now that one there. That was the way he describes it from what I

recall him describing it, even though I've watched it. It's slightly based off of almost like a missing form on one report, but it was based off this guy that goes out in the woods with his wife or the girl he was kind of propose to, and and they having some kind of disagreement. Something happens, but the guy is madly in love with her, but somehow she ends

up disappearing and he can't find her. All he finds is the ring on the ground, and so he goes on this hunt to look for her, and he starts investigating, and yeah, and then it goes from there. I don't want to ruin it to it, like I said, for an independent film, and I thought it was pretty cool, you know. But and one of the big foot costume that he uses in the movie, he actually used that as a prop next to his booth last June at

our last event. So yeah, he had sunglasses on it and yeah, and then oh, actually he had two of them. He had the one, Yeah, he had the one at his booth and then he had one out on the street by the sign. So we had people taking pictures with a big prop, you know, which was cool. But yeah, it was a big for a prop that he used in the movie, So it was pretty cool. But yeah, as far as a Loosi legend, yeah, I hope to

continue that me and have we've actually been talking. It's just a matter of trying to find the right time, uh, because he lives up in northern Virginia. Well, actually he's in Washington, d C. And it all depends because you know, as far as the schedule between him and his wife, they got three little ones now, so you know, trying to find the time because he's like, he's like, well, what time do you think we want to do this?

As well, I'm trying to keep in mind, trying to look back at my dates on what events I got played. I was like, well, it looks like July might be the only free month I get, you know, but I mean I have one event in July. But uh, yeah, so I got June, July and then August with the event. Yeah, July's only Yeah, I only got one event in July for the rest of the month of free. So I was considering trying to do something with July, but he keeps telling me, he said, if we do another one,

we need to have something solid. He's I want to capture something my film. I said, well, we're going to have to spend some good quality time out there. You can't expect it to be you know, happened when you're out there. I mean, I consider as I don't know, a blessing or if you're lucky that you know, you know, my thing is. And like I tell people, like at the end of this month, we got our you know, our camp out, and we got about between ten to

twelve people signed up for that. And I try to organize campouts in early May if I can, at least early May or early you know, like as far as spring and fall, like early to mid spring or early the mid fall, of course right before you get into the hunting season. Because I consider the temperature. I consider like as far as let's talk about springtime around early the mid spring, your foliage is just starting to come in. The weather's just starting to get a little warmer, but

it's comfortable. I like to consider, Okay, if I had to live out here, you know, and it's very hot weather, I'm not going to be that active. I want to you know, find a water source or hang out in the rock ledges and find a den you know that keeps it nice and cool. I don't want to be walking around and sweat my butt off if I don't have to, you know, unless I need to go eat,

you know, same thing with the fall. You know, sometimes here in Virginia on the east coast, you got I mean, the fall is still maybe pretty hot in the fall, so you know, I try to look at September more like October, even though October you can still have a lot of hot nights, but it cools down. Especially where I came back, it's more out in the mountains. It's more towards the western part of the state. You're in a little bit higher elevation, so at nighttime the tempers

drop to a cooler temperature. You're usually about it anywhere between a five to ten degree difference compared to where I'm at here. I mean, I'm i got mountains surrounding me, but more to the west. I mean, we're in the western part of the state. We're in the Shannando Valley. So if you go a little further west, about forty forty five minutes or so, yeah, you're very You're right

there over by the West Virginia line pretty much. So yeah, I'm the temperatures, you know, I think every year they kind of vary, but they're pretty close the way they work out. So yeah, as far as I mean, you experienced different activity all year long, but it's not going to be as interesting as if it was at night when it was cooler, because, yeah, a lot of these animals and species, a lot of people believe that they're nocturnal, although there have been sightings of them numerous times during

the day. But yeah, they tend to be a little bit more active at night, you know. Of course that's when the deer start moving. They blend in better with their environment at nighttime, especially like the incident. That's how I look at it. From two thy fourteen, they were definitely blended in with the darkness. So it only makes sense, you know. I mean, how many times did I walk through the woods where maybe there was one few just a few feet away from me and I never knew it.

I think of those things, you know, you don't know, they could be dead still, They could probably remain still for a very long time, you know. Yeah, you just don't know. So so yeah, I mean, I for the longest time, I've gone out in the woods doing a lot of my own daytime exploring, and I've camped out a lot by myself. Some people think that's crazy. Maybe it is. I don't know, but I will tell you one thing, as I mentioned, but my nine millimeter out

there when you know, we got howl that. Yeah, I mean, I I'm most of the time I carry my forty four magnum because you know, I like carring necks. It's much more powerful. But then I considered the nine millimeter because, yeah, for example, let's say the coyotes. Coyotes come at you. It's faster action, a lot lighter, you know. But uh, yeah, of course a forty four magnum might take down a bigger bear, you know. But you know i'd say that.

But at the same time, I don't really fear a bear all too much because bears, especially as black bears, they're normally very skittish of humans. A lot of times they'll smell you before you can see them, you know. And like, for example, some of the bears I've seen out there while hiking during the daytime, by the time I notice them, they're already running them on in the opposite direction because they've already gotten wind of you.

Well I heard recently and again I need to look into this. So they say that's very rare for a mother to be aggressive if you come across his cubs. But that at the same time, it don't make no sense. But you know, most apex predator animals are I would assume that they would be very protective, especially mountain lions. Mountain lions are very aggressive if you come across their cubs. You know. Yeah, you don't want to cross a mother

mountain lion. Yeah, you're asking for serious trouble. But as far as bears, i've heard, I don't know, that's something I really need to look at you because I'm taking no chance, right, That's the way I look at it, you know. I mean, you know, like I said, I don't want to be you know, I don't want to come across as the guy that goes out in the woods and yeah, I can go put an animals. You know I don't, I said, just because I say I don't fear an animal, I respect them. You know. It's

not like I'm the beast master. I can go out there and you know one of them are Daniel.

that believe they're some like ancient religimitad. You know, I believe they're somewhere or something along the lines of unclassified undiscovered non human primate. Now when I say that, I'm not saying they're a type of rangutang. I'm not staying there a gorilla, you know, because I believe, you know, gorillas in US humans we're actually completely different, although science says we're they're the closest living relative to the human

because of the DNA numbers and the percentages. But there's a lot I like to look at again with my cross comparisons to these various species. I honestly feel that they got to be, you know, And just because I'm saying they got to be doesn't mean they are. But I honest believe that they got to be some type of highly intelligent primate. What kind of primate, I don't know. There's a whole list of primates that date back from you know, ancient times still up to today. You know.

When I say ancient, I talked about relative, you know, somewhere along the lines. For the longest time. I believe I always practiced or preached the Gigantopithecus theory, and I always try to look at that as like, Okay, I had people tell me there's no way he could have been Gigantrophithicus because Gigantopithecus the remains were found in different parts of Asia, and so forth. Okay, But then again, we had dinosaurs all over the world. I mean, it's

not like we had them in one stationary location. I mean, everybody believes about or has a ferry, but the Barren Land Bridge, you know. But I mean we have all these different species that are found all over the world. We have big foot that's been found in every like China, Indonesia, Australia. Everyone has their own bigfoot legend. So why does something like a gigantopithecus, you know, why are we limiting limited ing the possibility of their whereabouts, of the location or existence? Right?

So you know, I'm not saying bigfoot is a jackantapithecis. But just like all the species of different animals that we have today, over time or as some people would like to talk about evolution or evolving, I believe over time certain species adapt and they do tend to evolve in certain environments over a period of time that they develop and look different because of how they learn to strive and survive in these areas. So I mean, there's a couple of different ways I like to look at

this as in a few different possibilities. I don't want to limit myself to these possibilities, but these are different possibilities and believes I like to try to stay focused on for my own reasons. So yeah, So, I mean, I'm not going to say he's human, but I'm not going to say he's not. I'm not gonna say he's a you know, a temper primate. But as you heard, I'm definitely saying he might be. You know. So I

don't know. I know I may not make sense to some of you know listeners or you know whoever, but it's I had my take a few on things. Maybe there's a few other things and a few other ways I can I'm getting a little bit deeper details if I had my nose present, but I don't so.

of cool stuff with a movie and that film. But the producer who actually put all our footage together in my thermal footage, he shows that at the very end. I'm not saying it is, but I'm not going to deny it. Zach's convinced that it is, so I mean, I said, Zach, I'm gonna leave it up to everybody's conclusion what they want to believe. I mean, there was something there. I can tell you whatever it was, it wasn't there earlier. Because I will say this much. I

scanned my thermal in this area earlier that night. There was nothing there that showed up the way this showed up, you know, So something was there, you know. You can see this dark image looked like it was like, you know, just wide and bold and you know, and it also appeared to be upright, so you know. And then there was an over back in the woods, way up behind camp. There was something else. Don't know what it was, but something else picked up a heat signature. There was Stacy.

You could like all of us are standing in this area open area was and somewhere down way in the distance back towards the camp, or well actually in between our camp and the other field, I was picking something up just to the left of Stacey from where Stacey Coughlin was standing, and I think you can see my finger point at it because you can't hear my audio on the camera so on the thermal. But but it was interesting we picked that up. But yeah, I try to tell people, you got to check that out. When

it's when you get an opportunity, so yeah, we certainly will. Absolutely. It was a lot of fun.