Up Near the Neverwills

I've got a story to tell you. It might sound unbelievable, but the person who experienced it once thought the same. Until they saw something that changed them forever. Here we dive into the paranormal, the strange, and the unexplained. From personal supernatural encounters, To some of the most infamous unsolved mysteries in history, all told in Atmospheric, narrative-led style. Let's hear these stories. and try to figure out together What really happened? The world is a very strange place.

Someone. Because after all, everywhere has a ghost story. Archived in collaboration with Spectivision Radio. Welcome to the Tape Library. Lifelock, how can I help? The IRS said I filed my return, but I haven't. One in four taxpaying Americans has paid the price of identity fraud. What do I do? My refund though. I'm freaking out. Don't worry, I can fix it. Life Lock fixes identity theft guaranteed and gets your money back with up to three million dollars in coverage. I'm so relieved.

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I invite you to be a tourist and step into the minds of those people lost to the unknown. When I was five years old, I became terrified of something in my room. There was a disembodied voice. Science. And I moved around the room and the boys move with me. When I was a little kid, I used to see like the medicine men have to go outside and chase away skinwalkers. Clairvoyance is seeing mental images, symbols. Why is it that so many DMT experiencers report being pulled in

Into alien realms. We have hundreds and hundreds of people who have seen these UFOs. I am desperately afraid of being seen as. crazy. The weird borderline between dream and reality. We're at the cemetery. There's something moving through the woods that's staying right outside of our light. From behind the fridge door comes a big dark figure. And I could just see the small red beady eyes. He got really close to my face and he said, stay away from things you don't understand. Spectre vision radio.

A strange podcast network for strange times.

Calling me at 10 30 on a work night. Very nice. Oh my god, literally on like the second ring. I remembered they don't give you New Year's Day off. Dumbass. What's up? I am headed off for a two-day hike all the way up in your neck of the woods finally. So I'm seeing if you want to meet me on the tail end on Sunday, maybe do some miles in the Copper Crest. Ooh crap. I have a quadriceps thing again. I'm done for the winter I think.

Well, you usually just slow me down anyway, so how's anything different? Where are you hegging exactly? Up near the Neverwills. Uh I'm on some endless road here, Cattail Road. I haven't seen any other cars for like half an hour. The Neverwills? Really? You've done those woods, right? Never did. You know about the Neverwills? I just read about the overlooked and so I'm headed out now. I wanna catch it at sun up.

Yeah, uh we were always scared of there. All the way back to being kids, all these superstitions around it. Well, the name, I mean. No, people don't go out there. No one keeps the trails up. Uh there's been a couple of Murders, I think? That's turtleneck territory. Do what? Uh yeah, there was this killer they used to scare us with. Turtleneck. Lived in the woods, went all around the Neverwells looking for people to kill.

Gee, that's funny. I don't remember the trial of Turtleneck. I'm telling you, no one I know's ever gone too far in. They just don't like it. Some kind of cult was living out there for a while, like in the 80s. Well, they'd all be on social security now, I'd imagine, so I think I'll be alright. Hope you got your life straw. That's really the middle of nowhere. That's the way I like it. You got good maps?

Good is a stretch. I I have enough. Dude, turtleneck. Make sure your ton zipped. I'll call you Sunday morning anyway in case you want to do food or something before I head back. Yeah, I'm in. Alright, bye. Bye.

You're still up? Yeah. I found this old book I had. It's got some freaky stuff about the Neverwills. You wanna hear it? Oh Jesus. What's the book? Um Dark Legends of the Pope Mountains. Okay, since you have a super reliable source and everything. This is top-notch reporting. You ready? Lay it on me. Where are you now? Uh I'm on this kinda skinny gravel fire road thing. Takes me to the trail I want, I think. So you're basically there? It's like a three-mile walk just Okay, listen.

Wait, I lost it. Hold up. Ah. I'm trying to eat a muffin here and keep this book open. Supposedly named by indigenous Abenaki, the forested territory known as the Neverwills has been left wild after numerous disturbing controversies. In 1971, a coven of self-proclaimed witches started a major forest. Forest fire in trying to cleanse the area of bad spirits. One of them died in the blaze.

What kind of muffin? More notably, an area just off the long Donkey Soul Trail was reputed to become home to a secretive surgical cult for several years in the 1980s. This group of adults Dozen or so people living secretly outside the bounds of society was allegedly chased off from an old half-built house when they began to steal from farms ten miles away. The people who finally ran the cult off.

After years of rumors about what it was doing in the woods, they testified they saw people who had been horribly disfigured and who had fought back with knives and clubs. They left what few belonged to. Stay here. Behind. Listen to you, you need to be on some terrible podcast. The area is now given a wide pass by hikers and those who live in the distant towns of Korway and Whalen Brown. Some believe the cult returned and reached.

Regenerated and lives off the land in that wide expanse of the earth. Uh there's a little inset with a satellite picture where the trail goes through. They marks the spot. Okay, first of all, what is a surgical cult? Uh there's nothing else in here about them, just some ghosty stuff out that way from a hundred years ago. Which trail are you taking? Its initials are DST. Are you serious? Ooh. Almost click.

That's the only trail out here that's viable. I think everything else is wild. Oh my god, what if that house is still out there? You know, it's the level of well-researched detail that oppresses me most about that book. I think you need to go to bed. Just thought I'd pep up your drive a bit. I have found this very educational. Good night. Uh uh I'm texting you this photo of this little map inset. There's something called the old woods house marked on it. Bye!

You're obsessed with me. Are you sitting down? I'm on the trail in the pitch dark. Okay. I got some new stuff I found that you need to hear. Uh No, I did some more looking around, I found something really intense. I'm not gonna stop you. Where's this tidbit from? Okay, well what I'll read you is from Wikipedia, but the source it's really Alright, I am out. Just listen. Just listen. Okay. Roll it. I was sort of snooping after this guy rolled.

He started out as a drug addict living in the woods for about ten years. Then he wrote a book about the Neverwills. But I can't find that online. But he has a Wikipedia page, because after he died, some Nature Trust or somebody basically sainted him for all of his work on the environment. Okay. Okay. So what I'm gonna read you is the part under the subhead that says cult claim cult. Okay. Here we go. Runger's posthumously published 2008 book Poland.

Documenting the flora and fauna of a little explored part of the Northeast, but added that it was modern. Of months spent under the sway of an unsubstantiated cult. Runger wrote that in 1915. He broke away from squatters living in the Neverwills, who had become frighteningly devoted to a surgeon and spiritualist calling himself Renu Stanislav, who claimed that human vanity was the ultimate. Of the soul. He preached that more spiritual freedom was gained.

Uh, let's see. Runger claimed in Poke Mountain Passage that some of the dozen members. Squatter community allowed themselves to have entire facial features removed, and then even limbs in a progression towards spiritual purity. Ah, he He wrote of a man named Ted over the course of years had his ears and nose and left arm amputated.

You still there? Yeah. When Teddy ultimately had a psychotic breakdown, he could not bear to look at his reflection or even expose his face and would not pull a turtleneck sweater down from the top of his forehead. In December of 1988, he attacked and stabbed a hiker. A local legend seemed to grow from this alleged act, and Teddy fled into the woods and was not seen again.

Runger wrote that he escaped the cult himself at this time. Deeply addicted to drugs, he claimed he chose not to report these events for fear of imprisonment, and did not speak of them for twenty years. Get to the part about how no one's been able to prove any of this stuff. Please tell me it's in there. None of Runger's claims have ever been verified and he passed away offering little more information.

Well, if any of that's true, that's pretty great. Just bounce out man. Find a hotel so I can go to sleep and not worry. Worry about what? How about just karma building off karma? I'm gonna shut off my phone now, pitch my tent, curl up, have a nice sleep. Call me if you feel anything's weird.

Uh, where are you now? Yeah, good morning. Um I'm standing on the side of 404, some little park. I'm gonna be about an hour late, getting to your house. It it it just took me forever to find my way off the trail. You got my text right. I can't believe you actually went inside that house. Yeah, it was kinda dumb. What was it like? Um bad. Dark, wet, creaky. Graffiti? No, actually. Not one bit. Nothing left inside, I assume. I did find. Are we, as individuals, part of a universe?

Yes. Where do we end of the universe begins? Is the universe conscious? Yes. We are The universe. Transmission complete. Stay tuned to Spectro Vision Radio. Stay. Stay. Something. Ooh, so I get a souvenir? No, I left it where it was. It's not the kind of thing you want to start thinking about. What was it? I'll text you a picture. Amen. It was a little tough to see what I was looking at. The flashlight sort of washed out the thing sitting on the floorboards. But I could see enough.

He was right. The more I looked at it, the less I wanted it in my mind. It was totally smeared with moss and grime and broken. It was an old hand mirror with a long plastic handle.