Outdoorsmen Are Confessing the Most Terrifying Experiences They've Had in the Woods

Boy Scout Summer Camp, 1997. Place called Camp Tamarack. I was 13 years old. Our troops campsite was the furthest away from the mess hall, so a group of 3 of my friends and I were looking for a shortcut. Our campsite was on a sort of elevated, flattened off ridge.

We stumbled upon a somewhat skinny and overgrown game trail that dipped down into a lower lying, densely wooded area of the camp. According to our little brochure map of the somewhat vast property there was nothing there, no buildings, campsites or maintained trails. The soil was a bit soggy, so I assumed it was a flood plain.

We descended down into the thick woods and discovered the area was a veritable labyrinth of game trails so we kept exploring. About half a mile in, we took a smaller, fairly overgrown side trail, then another. We rounded the corner, and what we stumbled upon stopped us dead in our tracks....

There was poop... and poopy toilet paper. EVERYWHERE. I'm talking hanging from tree branches 8 ft up, n multiple tree trunks splattered with what appeared to be GALLONS of Butt-Mud. It took us several seconds to comprehend what we were looking at, and even then it made no rational sense. Normally someone would have busted out laughing, but none of us said a word. We were far too horrified.

Finally, one of my friends broke the silence and shakily whispered "DOOD... what... the...FUCK?"

It was like stumbling upon a crime scene. A *disturbing* amount of crap was splattered EVERYWHERE. All over the surrounding ferns and other plants, the bushes, high up on tree trunks. In a HUGE radius. What seemed like an entire rolls worth of shitty toilet paper hung from the surrounding branches, gently wafting in the faint summer breeze. And on some of it you could see blood stains.

It legitimately looked like some kind of unholy Shit-Bomb went off. Like an entire beach ball filled with a foul mix of chilli-mac and vegetable soup violently exploded. And I can't emphasize the sheer *amount* of it was the most disturbing part. It was obscene.

There was SO MUCH OF IT... EVERYWHERE. It was so... *confusing* , and our petrified brains struggled to merely *comprehend* what we were looking at. It shattered our fragile eggshell minds. The sheer abomination we beheld kinda...*broke* our brains. From that moment forward we would never be the same.

And then the smell hit us...an overwhelming, putrescent, festering wall of STENCH that made our eyes water and took our breath away. It defied description... but if I had to describe it... it was like sticking your head into a pit toilet. But it also had this underlying reek of decomposition.

Like roadkill. The fact it was a hot summer day made it all the more worse. I started gagging involuntarily. And there were an ungodly amount of blue bottle flies swarming around. A cloud of what had to be hundreds, possibly thousands of em feasting on the shit. There collective buzz was deafening.

Finally one of my friends broke our horrified trance by yelling "LET'S GET OUT OF HERE!!!". We turned and fled, running all the way back to camp. When we got back we were all genuinely traumatized. We tried to tell some of our friends but they just cackled at the absurdity of such a claim, and refused believe us.

A couple of the guys I was with when we found the shitsplosion tried taking some of the unbelievers back to the site to prove its existence, but I refused to return. Oddly enough they couldn't retrace our steps in the labyrinth of trails and failed to relocate it, so the others continued to insist we made the whole thing up. But we knew what we saw.

And what I beheld that day... it's almost like it gave me some mild form of PTSD. I even ended up having a couple almost Vietnam flashback-like nightmares about it. To this day it gives me the willies. I have goosebumps right now as I type this. When I try to explain the "HOW?" I'm at a complete loss.

If that came from a single individual... just...*HOW?*. HOW is such a thing possible? And if it came from more than one individual... well the implications are equally horrifying. Because...WHY? I will never have the answers.

The scene I beheld that day defies all logic and reason. It legitimately scarred me for life and will in all likelihood haunt me until the day I die.

Username: MrEndlessness

Oh god get ready for a crazy one. It’s gonna be long. I was visiting Idaho years ago with my family. We found a beautiful campground in the mountains.

Perfect, secluded. I drove an old Jeep at the time that was lifted and had big tires so we always tried to find tough trails to camp at because we knew it wouldn’t have many people. We set up camp and did some fishing. On our way back from the river my foot stepped on this weird object that was mostly buried.

I got out my foldable shovel and was able to get it out of the ground. It was a box about 9 inches long and about 4 inches tall and 4 inches wide. It looked really really old. It was made of metal but the metal wasn’t smooth.

It was really a rough surface nd it was a dark green color. We went back to the campground and I sat down with this object on my lap looking for some way to open it. There wasn’t a single crack, nothing, had no writing, no markings at all.

Like any idiot I decided to get the hammer and tap it and it felt and sounded hollow. After I hit it a few times it started to get warmer, and warmer to the point I had to drop it. It didn’t turn glowing red or anything like it was gonna start a fire so I just let it be for a while.

I touched it about an hour later and it felt the same temperature as when I touched it before. So I sat down again with it but immediately it started to heat up again. So I dropped it again. I left it on the ground and went to the cooler to get the food out for dinner. I was gone about 15 mins when I walk back and my 3 year old son was holding it.

I grabbed it out of his hands snd it was cool to the touch again. I asked him how long he’d been holding it and he said about 15 mins. Which is weird because it only took a few moments to heat up for me but apparently it didn’t heat up at all for him.

He looked up at me and said he needed to take it back to the boy who lost it. I said what boy and he said the boy who was standing by me. There was no boy beside me. I’m not a believer in the supernatural so I just chalked it up to his imagination but I played along.

I asked him what the boy looked like and he said he didn’t have a shirt on and he was dark skinned. I asked him if the boy talked to him and he said yeah but when the boy talked his mouth didn’t move. I asked him where the boy came from and my son didn’t say anything he just pointed to the sky.

I asked him a few times and all he would say was “somewhere there” and he’d point to the sky. I told my wife at the time and like me she just chalked it up to our sons imagination.

We ate dinner and went to bed. I woke up in the middle of the night and heard some twigs in the ground breaking. I grabbed my rifle and went to go check on my son and he was asleep.

The moon wa really bright that night so you could see pretty well and I didn’t see anything that would make those sounds. All of a sudden I heard this weird mechanical grinding, I looked over by my chair and the saw the object from before and it was glowing.

This weird blue/white light. At this point I started to get kinda freaked so I woke my wife up. She got up and went by the chair with me and saw the same thing I did.

That glowing. Then she asked why there were 2 lights directly above us in the sky. I hadn’t even looked up but there were two lights the exact same color as the object probably a few hundred feet above our campground.

The lights started pulsing and at the same time the object did the same thing. I ran over, woke my son up, packed our stuff and got the fuck out of there. We went into a town called Ketchum and got and stayed at a hotel.

The next day I let my curiosity get the best of me and went back to the same area alone during the day. I found our campsite and picked up a little trash we left behind and cleaned up. The object was nowhere to be found. Right when I was about to leave i thought I’d go check where we found it.

There it was, buried the exact same way as if we never took it out. The ground around it wasn’t disturbed or anything. Nothing. Not a trace we had ever moved it at all. And that’s why I never ever will visit Idaho again.

Username: Kingofoutdoors

Not an outdoorsmen but i was a dumb ass teenager who spent a lot of time running around in the woods. I was 16, and my boyfriend(now fiancé) and I were meeting up with a friend’s brother and his partner to buy some weed. I live in the PNW and this happened in 2016.

There’s a smallish lake with lots of trails in town and we decided to meet there and take the main trail in the woods surrounding the lake. it’s 2.6 miles long and will bring you back to the parking lot, we’ve all walked the trail countless times and there was plenty of little trails that led to clearings and places to sit down (no camping was allowed here)

We must’ve gone down the wrong trail and ended up on the logging road. We weren’t really lost as all we had to do was just turn around and go back the way we came and we’d be right back on the trail and back to the parking lot, so we all plopped down and started smoking. Once we were done we noticed a trail about 10 to 15 feet up from the trail we came from, and decided to check it out because the grass was super green compared to the rest.

It wasn’t long before we came across a shit load of cut up deer bones. Picked clean and perfectly cut edges and just scattered fucking everywhere. We counted 8 spines alone and those were just the ones we could clearly see. (We ended up finding like 12 or 13 total) It was cool at first, until someone cracked a joke about this being the beginning of a horror movie, teenagers stoned and lost in the woods stumble across cut up body parts and then become cut up body parts.

Anyway, we figured this was just another side trail and would lead us back to the main trail as it looked like all the other ones, and was going the right direction so we followed it, and found a toilet.

We kept going and very quickly realized we were not back on the trail, and we’re somehow getting deeper into the woods even though we all knew we were going in the right direction. My fiancé hunted a lot as a kid and can usually navigate himself through the woods with ease.

We were all starting to get concerned as we should’ve hit the trail, we weren’t way out in the wilderness and the parking lot should’ve been like 3 miles away, but somehow we just ended up going deeper.

We all had cell service, and we were trying to ping our location but everyone’s phone said something different. I called my fiancé’s sister as her and another friend were supposed to be meeting us at the other entrance of the lake.

They were at the spot and waiting for us and we figured we can’t be that far so I told them to start yelling for us so we could try to figure out how far out we were.

They started yelling and we could hear them loud and clear, so I told them to listen for us. I muted my phone and put it back into my pocket and all four of us started shouting. They didn’t yell back so i pulled my phone back out and asked if they could hear us yelling, and they couldn’t.

We started to get really freaked out now, and my friend’s phone suddenly pinged a road near us so we all followed that. Instead of getting to the road like we should’ve, we were still stuck in those fucking woods. We’d been out there for almost 3 hours too, even though it felt like it’s only been maybe 20 or 30 minutes.

We just kept going, as we didn’t really know what the fuck else to do as we just kept getting turned around and going deeper, even when we had tried to just go back the way we came.

After what felt like for fucking ever we finally saw the fucking toilet and knew we were out. We searched around a bit more, and that was when we found even more deer bones, and decided to was time to get the fuck out of there and go home.

Even though nothing bad happened, all the weird little things that happened scared the fuck out of us at the time.

Username: VampireDanny

I've posted this before but it's applicable. Many years ago I did a cross country road trip from Georgia to Alaska with my dog. I was moving for work and decided the best way to get a fun/ money saving experience was to bounce from national parks and KOA camp sites to tent camp my way to Alaska. It was mid-October so Autumn setting.

I sold most of my stuff and took about two weeks to drive around the country on my way up north. On about my fifth or sixth night on the road (maybe a little over a week, it's been a while) I stopped just as the sun was setting in central Oregon at a little campsite I'd found while I was googling cool places to stay back in GA (this was around the time of mapquest).

It's a beautiful campsite, backed up against a nice little creek and only about a 25 minute drive from the highway. Plus, I had it all to myself. It gets a little chilly in October but based on my KOA experience I expected to see at least one other person.

There's still time for some other campers to show as I had gotten into the camp a little earlier than expected, so my dog and I walked around for a little bit before I commit to setting up camp (tent camping).

Well it's still early-ish for me so I figure I'll drive to a gas station and fill my truck up before I set up camp and make dinner/get cozy in a tent .That way when my dog and I get up to leave in the morning I don't have to stop and we can get right on the road.

Now I'm faced with a choice, I can head back the ~25 minutes to the highway, get off on one of the next exits and get gas, OR I can go deeper down this side road into eastern Oregon back-country looking for a gas station.

Well, I like to explore so the choice was obvious. I set down this back road for about another 15 minutes drive this back road for about another 15 minutes drive (not a business or home in sight) and eventually get to a rundown wooden building with the old style gas pump out front.

Perfect. So I pull into the dirt parking lot and crack a window for my dog, then I get out and walk toward the building (no card reader at the pump).

As I'm approaching the building I remember thinking it was strange that this tiny old wooden building had weird looking black splotchy door but I don't think much of until I get closer.

I reach out to open the handle and freeze. The door is not painted black, it's covered in flies. Thousands of flies crawling underneath the door jam and buzzing around the frame, obviously trying to get inside.

At the same instant I hear a very clear and distinct two finger whistle like you would do to get someone's attention. I turn around and in between me and my truck is an older man wearing flannel and work pants on a four wheeler with a small dog sitting on his lap.

He sternly asks me "what you doing here?" And I explain very quickly I just came this way to buy some gas. He lets me know they're closed and suggests that I go back to my truck and go home. So I slowly walk past him and this tiny dog (who I now realize is missing an eye) and get into my truck and pull out of the parking lot.

He sits in that spot on the four wheeler and watches me until we finally lose sight of him in the rear view.
I drove straight past the site I had previously selected to camp only 15 minutes up the road and I hit the highway. After stopping for gas I camped on the Washington border that night.

Even if it was a misunderstanding, creepy as shit. Also, some of the most fun two weeks of my life. For those of you considering it, driving across America is beautiful and lots of fun.

Username: dogfishmoose

I was in my twenties and about to backpack overseas for a while so my best bud and I decided to have a little farewell camping trip. We lived in Flagstaff AZ and she told me about this “free creek side camping spot” she found. It ended up being just right next to this abandoned new age retreat where a lot of people died in their [sweat lodge ](http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/03/14/ray.sweat.lodge.witnesses/index.html) but shockingly that has nothing to do with what happened- just added creepiness I guess.

We drive up to the site and of the 6 slightly spaced out camping sites, theyre all occupied. One site had a tent set up but no car around it which in retrospect was possibly a red flag seeing as this area wasn’t a walkable place where you just cruise around on foot- it was off of a highway.

Anyways we are already there and it’s evening time so we decide to just make our own little site in-between the no car camp and the one further down. We were only in one small tent with 2 small dogs and figured we didn’t take up much space anyways.

As we are unwinding, we start having some drinks (bad idea) and make a little fire to cook hot dogs on, I can’t help but take notice to the campsite without the car- just distant enough to now see a man in his early 40s behaving strangely. He looks over at us a lot, at one point he’s just standing still in the middle of the creek staring at something for long periods, taking his tent down, putting it back up, clanking pans together- behavior very similar to someone who’s high on meth or dealing with some sort of mental illness.

I start getting this really bad feeling. As it becomes totally dark, we are by the fire when I hear someone approach us. It’s the guy. My parents pug was with us- he’s incredibly friendly to everyone and at this moment he hid under my car. Something I’ve never seen him do.

The man begins talking to us and my completely non street smart friend invites him to sit down by the fire with us (I know- what on earth was she thinking?)

As he began talking to us I almost immediately knew he was out of whack as he described the endless gold pyramids that were located across the creek and the “gold skulls” and just weird shit.

He mentioned how his sister got a boyfriend in Oregon kicked him out and he was now homeless. He then mentioned in this really uncomfortable tone that he “saw us two beautiful girls and couldn’t stop wondering what we were up to.”

That was when I immediately noped, and abruptly told him OK well you can head back to your camp now- have a great night in which he got up and walked back over.

I immediately told my friend (who was still so
Oblivious) that we were unsafe and we had two options: risk getting a dui, leave our stuff behind and get somewhere safe -or- get her boyfriend here ASAP.

She called her boyfriend and he agreed to drive straight to us (45 mins)
During the 45 mins waiting for him which felt like an eternity- I clutched my knife and his weird behavior continued: pacing non stop/clanking rocks together/jumping in the creek/ screaming at something to get away from him- total delusional manic behavior.

Her boyfriend finally arrived but the fun didn’t stop. (Boyfriend had Oregon license plates which is relevant)

With having some relief of an extra person with us, we tried to relax and have a somewhat decent farewell camp trip until the guy came back again but this time his tone was completely different. When boyfriend introduced himself - scary guy wouldn’t shake his hand- he had this “you encroached on my property” type of vibe. He left and then wandered back two seperate times- each time with some weird delusion.

The first time he was going on that the boyfriend stole his cigarettes and mentioned his car and Oregon then I started piecing together that somehow in his delusion he was beginning to think that the boyfriend was the guy that kicked him out in Oregon. We tried to de-escalate and decided to go to bed hoping he would just forget about us and do the same (as if people on meth go to sleep lol)

Anyway my friend and her boyfriend passed out immediately and I proceeded to lay away the entire night clutching my knife. He paced around our tent multiple times that night. At one point- just as a horror film begins- I saw his shadow against the wall of the tent lit by the moon- you know- just fun things you see moments before you die.

He rummaged through our stuff at one point and drank all our beer.
Somehow we survived the night and I could no longer hear him as the sun was rising. We got the heck out of there as early as we could.

About a year later I went back (why) with a group of people to the same camp area and just around where we camped that one time was an abandoned tent just in a pile- a bottle of holy water- a crystal and a book about horse training jotted with pages of notes and ramblings. Maybe his? Maybe this place was haunted? Heck idk but I’m glad he didn’t murder us.

Username: aus2Nyc

Used to go to a cabin during summers when I was a lad. My sisters and I would wander through the forests basically the entire time alone as the adults drank themselves to stupor.

Every year we went a little deeper into the woods, venturing out past dark most nights pretending to be trappers and adventurers.

One night we came.through a clearing and stumbled onto one lone house in the dark woods covered by low hanging trees. The house was lit up spectacularly and appeared to have large number of people gathered for some reason but there were no cars and there was no road that led to the property.

As we snuck closer the lights suddenly shut off all at once leaving us in near complete darkness. I grabbed my two ten year old sisters and we ran as.fast as possible back to the cabins.

Next morning we were emboldened and planned our return for the evening. We decided to try to approach from another angle and maybe get look at what the hell was going on. Fast forward

Evening now and we are at the house. We have crouched ourselves next to a dilapidated shed waiting to see any movement in the house and after 20 minutes or so of nothing we creep up towards the window.

Now, I know this sounds like we are little creep fucks that should mind our own business but this house was seriously weird and seriously isolated. We felt like we are in a movie.

As we move in, I notice somebody sitting in the window, a dining table with 4 people sitting silently and another couple people sitting across the room in chairs, all of the completely motionless. We freeze. It's just about to be dark with the days last light fading as we stood frozen. My sister whispers to me - let's, go please let's go, we are gonna get in trouble - but I'm set on the idea that I'm going to continue to look in until someone moves, this was too weird.

I crouch below the windows sill and my terrified sisters follow for fear of beung left alone in the terrifyingly dark woods. At the window i peer in slowly looking around the room to find 4 or 6 adult sized mannequins sitting in the chairs and couches scattered along the walls. I looked past into the dining room and see a table of 5 more adult mannequins sitting upright staring back at me.

Im now almost too freaked out to run. I continue looking slowly until my eyes meet those of an old grey woman. She is there on the couch sitting completely motionless amongst the dolls, a droopy wrinkled face with grey hairs hanging over her eyes.

Her hands with mangled fingers and sharp nails were at her knees and she sat, eyes open staring directly into me. My sisters had now just seen her and I could feel them melt as they grabbed me and pulled at my shirt - at that moment she threw herself into motion and let out something like a pained Yelp as she quickly darted across the room and into what looked like a cabinet.

This creature/woman moved so quickly and so animal like that this couldn't have been a traditional old woman. This was something else.

Fuck that. We ran screaming into the dark. Up felt like down and right like left as we tore thought he brush but after an hour we found our way back to the cabins. We spent the remaining days cowering with the drunks. Never told anyone about this.

The following year, upon return we spent a solid days time searching for this house. I believe we managed to find the lot but the house was no longer there and what was left was just what looked to be a dead grass patch where the house maybe had been in the past. No sign of the feral old woman.
Username: Yellow129087

My dad took me ice climbing at Arethusa Falls as a kid, we camped right on top of the frozen river. Down a ways from our tents there was a big hole where the ice hadn't formed over it.

Nothing happened then but we went camping there again another time with his friends DJ and Cheryl.

There was fresh snow everywhere and being a stupid kid I went walking over by where the hole had been last time. I was walking very carefully to my little kid mind, and taking big stretched out steps searching for where the hole had been. And meanwhile my Dad was climbing the waterfall with DJ on belay.

Cheryl was keeping a rough eye on me while also watching them climb, and eventually asked me what I was doing. "There was a hole here last time but I don't see it now." I said. Naturally she told me I shouldn't be walking around over there and to come back over to where she was.

So I turned around on the spot to follow my footprints back, but instead of stepping in the exact spots I had stepped in previously I stepped in between the last two steps I had taken and fell right into the hole not realizing that I had just stepped right over it a moment before.

The only thing that saved me from being sucked away in the dark and freezing cold water beneath a sheet of ice thick enough to hold grown men and their camping equipment was my dumb ass going "Whoops!" and sticking my arms out in surprise.

Suddenly only my head was above the snow and after a moment of shock I realized nobody had reacted to what had happened. So after this momentary processing I went "Uhh... help? I need help!" DJ and my Dad were climbing and hadn't seen anything, and Cheryl must've turned back to watch them when it happened.

She now literally couldn't see me anymore from where she was sitting even though she had just looked at me one second before.

Once I started yelling for help Cheryl started asking where I was and I had to explain that I was in the same place I just was and what had happened. It was so cold out that day that my foot touched the water and it felt *warm.* She quickly found where I was and my Dad and DJ raced down to lift me up as fast as they could get him down and off the rope.

A quick change of clothes and some warm food later I was fine, but I don't think we ever went camping on top of the frozen river again. I'm convinced had I not stuck my arms out as an involuntary reaction I would have been swept away and drowned trapped beneath the frozen river, and they wouldn't have known anything had happened at all until it was too late.

They would have found my footprints in the snow and a newly uncovered hole and put two and two together for my Dad to live out every parents worst nightmare.

And the hole was long too, had I been turned sideways from the way I was facing when it happened then sticking my arms out would have made zero difference. It's a miracle that I'm alive and I am able to write this down now.

Keep a close eye on your kids when you're out camping, it would only take an instant to lose them forever.

Username: Robobvious

Ok this story still gives me chills when I think about it. I know I took LSD but I swear this was no illusion or at least it did not feel like or seem like it (I’ve done LSD, shrooms, dmt plenty of times)

Me and my ex wife were chilling in my old apartment in AZ(it starts inside then goes outside). We wanted a good night and I had prepared Jack Daniels, weed, and one tab each of LSD.

We drop the tabs at the house and smoke a bit. We then proceed to take a walk in the park nearby. We proceed to chill there for 3 hours, after that we are feeling pretty sober again.

We discussed and thought it would be a great idea to go to the river north of Mesa at about 2-3 in the morning.

We take off and once we arrive we find a parking area next to the river. Once we pull in we see two other cars parked but no people. Kind of weird, but we thought maybe they were camping somewhere (it’s legit middle of the desert).

We get out of the car grab our bag of weed and Jack, then proceed to walk towards the river. As we were walking a man carrying a lunch box walks right past, doesn’t look at us, and doesn’t respond to our hello. He legit just walks off into the desert into the darkness. We thought it was weird but whatever.

So there we are at about 3 in the morning just chilling at the river smoking away. Then I hear a baby crying and splashing noises (mind you this is probably 5-6 hours after dropping) I say nothing at first thinking I’m still maybe tripping. The hairs on my skin raise up as I hear the sound again, and then my ex turns to me and says “you hear that too right?”

FUCK! My stomach sinks that very moment, and the crying (sounds exactly like baby, not a mountain lion/bobcat) gets louder and the splashing is louder.

So I spring into action (thinking it’s a child), and escort my ex to the car, give her the keys, and lock the door. I pull out my side arm (gun is at the ready, not pointed, finger off trigger of course) incase it’s someone (the strange man) who is harming a child. I shine a flashlight and proceed to close in on the noise (as it has not stopped making noise)

My heart is racing, but I move forward calling out “is anybody there?” And the noise would stop every time I called out but then start again (baby crying, and splashing in water)

As soon as my flashlight lights gets close to lighting up the area that’s making a noise. I see a dark figure (probably 5 feet or under, but a thicker build) hunched over the river, and fucking staring at me.

NOISE STOPS, figure jumps in water, LOUD audible splashing, and then starts racing towards me down the river.

I FUCKING SPLIT, regroup with the ex, and get out of dodge.

I highly doubt there was a child it all (at least I hope so) but that fucking terrified me. I’m 100% that was no hallucination but I did take LSD. Anyways, yeah, that’s my scary story!

Username: Full-Metal-Jae

I went on a camping trip with my Dad and a couple uncles. My half-sister was along too. We were going to meet up with a bunch of guys and their families from my uncles military unit. My Dad went on ahead us while we chilled and went at a more sedate pace.

My uncles are pretty cool but they are hardcore campers/survivalists. So they suggested we take a more 'scenic' route through some woods. It was kind off the planned route and my sister and i had a lot of fun as my uncles were messing around with walkies and pretending to 'scout' places. Campfires were fun and more relaxed with drinks than when my Dad was around and my uncles told some pretty good stories.

Things started getting weird though. My uncles one day stopped joking around and actually started taking proper looks around. They wouldnt tell us why. But i guessed that something had spooked them. My sister is better at the tracking stuff and she started noticing things werent right. That someone was following us. Then we started seeing things carved in the trees ahead. Meaningless symbols.

I confronted my uncles. They told me they had a feeling that they were watched when they first entered the woods, but kept quiet as there wasnt any evidence. They told me that the evidence they found was off, too obvious. The man that was watching us could have concealed himself much easier than he did, but he didnt want to.

He was trying to make us take a different route as my uncles would alter course depending on the signs of him being there. I originally thought this might be an elaborate joke, but i saw something in their eyes that changed my mind. Fear. These are hardened vets and they were scared.

Thats when we started seeing him. At a distance. Through the trees. It was deliberate. My uncles didnt chase him, as they didnt want to leave us alone. They shouted at him, pointed a gun at him. He didnt care. He just stared at us. He looked like a wildman, ragged clothes and a lot of hair.

My uncles took turns taking a watch at night. No more jokes. On edge. Gun out. Told us to use our whistles if he got to close and gave us knives if he got really close.

It was a really dark night all of us around the fire but looking into the trees, and we heard him speak. His voice haunts me. Why? because it was strangely normal. Completely civil, almost smooth. Not the kind you would expect from as my uncles called him 'the wildman'.

He said 'Good evening'. Nearly pissed myself. The voice was really close. My uncles went quiet as they started looking for where they thought he was. My sister was the first to speak she said:

'Who are you? What do you want?' It was quiet for awhile. Then even closer from a different direction:

'Interesting questions. I'm afraid i don't really want to answer them.' I caught glimpse of him, he was smiling. I shouted and pointed and my uncle took a shot. He moved away. One of my uncles chased after him with a torch and gun whilst the other stayed with us. He didnt catch him.

None of us slept that night. We took a different route coming into a clearing with a largish body of water. He was on the other side, he waved. Then disappeared back into the woods.

Then we saw what he wanted us to see. A campsite. But it was a wreck. It looked trashed. My uncles reckoned it wasnt more than a few days old. One of the sleeping bags was soaked in blood, the other was ripped like someone had been dragged out of it. There was human hair as well, torn out. With clumps of skin on. It was too much for me and my sister.

We found the others a day later. The police and rangers were called. The two missing were a young newly wed couple really into camping/fitness. There was a search, my uncles and their military buddies actually went and searched the woods before the police and rangers.

Nobody found anything. Just weird things carved into the trees. But the symbols were just gibberish. They literally had no known meaning.

Edit: My uncles had a new name after they saw the campsite. They called him 'the Devil'.

Username: [deleted]

Not many people believe me but, I had an encounter with a Wendigo in the Maine woods while I was hunting.

Edit to add full story: This happened when I was hunting several years ago. It was November of either 2015 or 2016. I went out hunting with my grandfather in a patch of woods not incredibly far from his house.

I met him on the road by where we usually park to go in. We loaded up, figured out a plan for where to post and what we’d do and set off into the woods.

For those that like visualizing the best they can, this was a fairly dense section of woods bordered on two sides by roads. The hill I usually posted on (sat and waited for deer) was met by a large swamp on the bottom. I got to my spot and my grandfather went deeper into the woods.

It had already snowed that month so the ground was covered with snow and more snow was due to fall that do but we figured we’d be out before it started.

After being set up for a few hours the woods went dead silent. This usually only happens when a predator is around, i perked up and started looking around just to make sure I wasn’t the target.

I started hearing a crunching and squishing sound from down the hill from me. As I stood up and looked I saw a 7-8 foot tall emaciated creature ripping something apart and eating it.

The creature and the ground around it were covered in blood which contrasted with fresh snow.

At this point I audibly said “what the fuck” and it cocked its head and began to turn and look at me. Terrified I raised up my rifle and fired 3 rounds at the creature. It screamed the loudest sound I’ve ever heard in my life and dropped its meal and took off towards the swamp.

I’m sure I hit it at least once but seemingly I only pissed it off. I immediately called my grandfather on his cell and before I could even say anything he said “stay where you are I’m coming to you, we’re leaving. Now”. My grandfather was and still is an avid hunter and outdoorsman.

He resembles a mountain man. Hearing that in his voice put me on an even higher alert because there was no risk of me misinterpreting what I had seen. He reached me pretty quickly and we hauled ass out of the woods.

When we got to the vehicles we heard one last distant scream and that was it. He never acknowledged what we had both heard and I had seen and nowadays he just says he was cold and was tired of being out there that day. I have never seen anything even remotely close to that before or since.

I know the story sounds crazy and if I hadn’t been there I wouldn’t believe it either. If anyone has any questions I’d be happy to answer it. I still hunt, I just make sure I’m out of the woods well before sundown now.

2nd edit: the Wendigo was roughly 7-8 feet tall. Emaciated with a distended belly, pale white skin that was both stretched tight and saggy. With long claw like fingers and deep eye sockets with pure black eyes.

Username: Auspicious-Toaster

When I was 20, I was hiking the Camino de Santiago with a friend (we’re both female).
After being to Canada I had some severely traumatizing incidents concerning bed bugs, so I can’t sleep in hostels or anything like that anymore.

Before we left I googled about the bed bug situation on the Camino and found it to be getting more and more severe.

So I Knew there was no way for me to hike the trail and sleep at those hostels. We really wanted to go though. So we decided to take a tent with us, expecting it not to be a huge problem to camp around the hostel grounds.

But as we arrived in Spain starting the Camino, it became very hard to find safe places to put the tent every night.

Most of the hostels had gardens or even stone patios, so we would ask to pay for a room but not to use it and instead sleep on the property in the tent,so they could get twice the money since they had „our“ empty beds that they could charge someone else for.

One night we were quite in the middle of the Pyrenees already, so it’s very rural and the only people you meet are other pilgrims and people that still life in those old villages.

On that evening we were denied to sleep on the property (by the owner who was a woman), in front of a lot of pilgrims she recommended a lonely field just outside the village. So everyone had heard where we were going to sleep that night.

We then left and put up our tent on that field and I swear I couldn’t close one eye, because I was so scared Someone would follow us and try whatever.

I had my knife in my hand in my sleeping back and was ready to fight or die, honestly (and yes maybe I was overreacting but it truly was a life threatening night for me, because it was such an isolated area and us 2 young women).

So at Night i start hearing footsteps around the tent and I know this is it. Honestly I just hoped to get k****ed right away and not r**ed before.

The footsteps circle the tend over and over and I’m paralyzed. At one point my friend whispers, asking if I’m awake, I can’t even speak. I don’t know how much time passed until I got everything in myself together, Jump up, open the tend just in my underwear with my knife in hand and see ... a donkey 😂

I swear I’ve never been more terrified in my life, ready to die. I laughed so hard. Next day we quit, went back to Madrid and flew home. I started having panic attacks afterwards though 😄

(I know we should’ve done more research and no one is to blame but us, but I really didn’t expect people to be so unfriendly and not willing to help, but maybe I was just naive)

Username: karasupertramp

Super late to this so I hope you have time to read it. I was 12 my mate and I had just watched brave heart for the first time.

I grew up on 80 acres in Australia, NSW. And for reference we had both explored the entire property very well. At no point we’re we lost.

So here we were charging through the bush with long sticks in our hands destroying [Kangaroo tails](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xanthorrhoea) (As someone who does their best to preserve nature in my adulthood that sentence make me cringe) as if we were soldiers.

My big black Newfoundland and his Australian cattle dog were also running around in the thick bush and scrub around us.

We were running through the bush about 20m away from each other but sound plus the occasional clearing had us aware of each others positions as we cut down our stick enemies.

I was running and I had a sense of unease start to wash over me, I started to slow down and it became panic. I’m not sure what was scaring me but being 12 and not wanting to look scared in front of my mate I just kept running and cutting.

That panic quickly turned into full fledged fear, I came out into a clearing and quickly looked to my mate to reassure myself. He was standing there looking at me with as much gut wrenching fear as I dare say I was looking at him with.

We stood there frozen just staring at each other, about 10-20 seconds later our dogs came running out of the bush, tails between their legs yelping as if they’d just been hurt. I’m talking yelping like how a scared puppy yelps. That was it the breaking point.

All four of us ran home together as fast as we could. We were about an hour from home and half way I remember collapsing in long grass sucking in air, hearing nothing but my own heart in my ears and then I stood up and still managed to jog the rest of the way back.

Being young and “tough” we never spoke about it until we were adults. I wouldn’t particularly class myself as a spiritual person and I’m not a believer in the supernatural.

So what happened? What the fuck happened to make two hardened bush dogs and two boys (with the fool hardiness and exploratory nature that only 12yo’s can have) suddenly stop in fear without visual sight or communication with one another. And that fear to be so great to cause all four of us to run home. me, my mate, the dogs.

It’s just so many unrelated factors. Nothing physical happened, nothing supernatural.

Just fear, absolute fear. A fear I have only ever since experienced upon realising while looking for a mate in his house that he was in fact hanging in his garage.

That same slow realisation, that same panic turned to absolute fear. The speed, the reflexes, the adrenaline. I’ll remember those days for the rest of my life. Seared into me like any animal.

Username: Industrial_Laundry

Went for a drive in the woods in southeast Alaska a few decades ago. It was my best friend driving, my fiance riding center seat, and me in the passenger seat of a single cab pick up.

We stopped at a gas station to get snacks before heading out. It was late in the evening so it was already dark out by the time we stopped to eat some of our snacks. The night was cool as it was late fall.

So here we are chatting in the truck and eating our food parked off of this long winding dirt road to nowhere. My buddy starts taking about local legends and lore including the "kushtaka". I was fairly ignorant to the idea and myth and thought it was all BS.

I thought if would be funny to harass him a bit about it and push the limits of testing this kushtaka nonsense. He was dead serious when he told me to stop. But I continued. Then i heard what sounded exactly like fingernails tapping on my window next to my head.

I looked over and seen nothing but assumed i was hearing things. I couldn't see anything because the cab light was on it was pitch black out. A few moments pass and i hear it again. This time both my finance and friend heard it.

My friend sorta nervously smiled and laughed. Then I realized I had to pee. So i jokingly tell them if I get snatched up by this kushtaka you best come after me.

I open the door and pee by the front passenger tire. But the area felt very weird and uncomfortable. I mentioned that as i got back in.

There we talked a bit more and I realised we had pulled off unknowingly (at the time we stopped) near a very old small cemetery that contained frog type headstones of the tlingit and haida culture in an area amongst large southeast evergreen trees.

I still not being a believer and love flipping shit to my friend then started yeah well if this kushtaka bs is real why dont they make themselves known? C'mon. C'mon already.

No sooner had I said that than something punched or hit the front fender twice. My buddy turned ghost white and in one motion started the truck up and threw it in drive and we were fucking gone. We got off the dirt road and back onto asphalt really quickly and stopped under a street light.

We got out and looked. Sure enough, you could clearly see where something had hit, up high, the front right fender when we were parked. 2 distinct marks of dirt missing.

To this day, I still don't know what it was, but with every other paranormal experience Ive had since that time, there's no doubt in my mind that something was trying to tell me to stop pushing it or something bad would happen.

Never again did I talk shit about the kushtaka being bs. And I'll never go into the woods of southeast ak alone...ever.

Username: [deleted]

One time my wife and I woke up at 2am underneath a moose. It was terrifying enough being within three feet of and underneath a moose--we were in a small pup tent, the moose's forefeet were pressing up against two sides of our tent (ie, against us in our sleeping bags) as the moose reached OVER the tent (ie, us) to a third side of the tent in order to yank up giant clumps of grass and very noisily worf them down.

I mean, we weren't just close to the moose or metaphorically underneath it. We were literally underneath it and between its legs as it leaned its head over to the other side of us.

Moose stomp a fairly large number of people to death annually--more than bears kill, according to some--and this mother moose had a baby nearby, making her excitable and defensive--pretty much the most likely type of moose to attack humans.

Exactly underneath an 800 pound mother moose is pretty much exactly the last place you want to be, if you like to live.

However, that wasn't the most terrifying part. More terrifying than that was being gently woken up at 2am in the wilderness by this tremendously large beast--which has been accurately described as "Like Darth Vader without the helmet on," except that he forgot to mention that this thing is FIVE TIMES LARGER AND MORE ASTHMATIC than even Darth Vader--that is three feet directly above you.

But even that is not the MOST terrifying part. The MOST terrifying part is slowly coming to consciousness at 2AM in the pitch dark, and slowly remembering where you are--in the exactly in the middle of nowhere in the flimsy tent--and slowly coming to the realization that what woke you up is some kind of massive Darth Vader type breathing noise directly above your tent. And then realizing that you HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHAT IT IS.

You know how they say that real terror exists only in the mind? Yes. Because real terror is spending the five minutes in a tent in the wilderness at 2AM carefully playing dead while you frantically run through every possible scenario for "thousand-pound Darth Vader-like beast and/or human who could possibly be visiting our wilderness camp at 2AM hulking directly over our tent--and WHY?!!?"

Five minutes in the pitch dark is a v-e-r-y long time to think and each possible scenario the panicked mind invents is so much more horrible than the last--grizzly? sasquatch? gorilla? elephant? ax murderer? mind-sucking space alien abduction?

After all that, finding out at long last that you are "only" under the very hooves of an 800 pound death-stomping moose actually comes as something of a relief.

Username: flug32

I was moving out of state and my buddy held a ‘going away’ canyoneering trip for me as he had just been certified as a guide and I had been one of his first instructors as he went through the process.

The hike in was super hot and steep so by the time we made it to the canyon bottom itself we were all excited to splash our way downstream and were having a great time slipping and sliding down the rocks into pools whenever we could.

One drop in particular was essentially a mossy water slide into a chest high pool and we all took turns sliding down. My buddy was the last to go, hit the water and went under, popped up, screamed and collapsed face first back into the pool.

We all rush over to him, flip him so that he’s floating on his back and try to figure out what’s going on when he tells us ‘I can’t feel my legs’.

Immediately what had been a super fun, low key trip turned into a rescue scenario. My injured buddy and I were the only two WFR/WAFA certified medics on the trip and with him being the victim I needed to take over.

We were 3-4 miles back in a slot canyon with no cell phone reception dealing with a possible spinal injury and we needed to get out. There’s no way up the canyon walls so we need to get to a place where extrication is possible at minimum.

As we’re making a rescue plan, feeling starts coming back to my friends legs and feet and he insists he wants to get out rather than wait for rescue so we stabilize his back as much as possible, fill up our dry bags with air and improvise a floating litter and start guiding his prone body downstream to limit the movement from him.

Certain areas were too technical to float him through so we’d float him on our backs as far as we could and rig cargo hauls for him down the drops required to get to the end of the canyon.

The final obstacle is a 60 foot rappel down a waterfall straight in the hydraulics into a pool with a floating disconnect. The way we’d normally rig this is to set your ropes so that they end a foot or two above the water and you rappel off the end of your ropes so you don’t get pushed underwater and get tangled up and drown while trying to come off rappel.

We didn’t want to risk further spinal injury so we decided the best course of action would to have the rest of the team head down first on the regular rig, pull some additional rope through for a full length rappel and he and I would go down tandem while the team below used the additional rope to ‘fireman’s belay’ us and trolley the rap line out of the hydraulics so we wouldn’t get pushed into the drowning machine at the bottom. As a bit of insurance they also left us with all their inflated dry bags to use as buoyancy aids.

Long story short we made it out fine. My buddy had a compression fracture in his lumbar and a pinched nerve in his back. What was supposed to be a fun and easy couple hours turned into a day long nightmare. I’ve gone canyoneering one more time since then, but i think I’m good for ever going again.

Being a wilderness guide and instructor was a lot of fun, but between this and a few other experiences (stalked by animals, caught in an avalanche, etc.) I feel like I’m getting too old and safe and I’m perfectly happy and content growing into being a boring old man with the love of my life by my side.

Sorry for the long story that wasn’t about fighting Bigfoot or whatever.

Username: sack_of_dicks

I’m not an outdoorsman but I was camping with a group of friends. We were in high school on spring break and decided to all go camping for a couple of days. Takes place in the late 90s.

Three tents a truck and SUV. There were 8 of us the first night. We drove far from the main road towards the mountains. We found what looked like a good camp site, flat ground and a good size field next to it.

Now as teenagers we wanted to have fun so we had alcohol and weed. The first night we all got wasted. One friend pissed himself and another threw up on the hood of another friend’s truck. Scratched up the pain trying to clean it up. Anyways. Onto the scary stuff.

The second night there were 6 of us. There wasn’t much parting going on and everyone except a friend and I stayed up cooking food over the fire, munchies.

We were cooking and he’s telling me a story and as he’s telling me this story I hear a scream in the distance. I stop him “did you hear that?” I asked. “No” he replied. Alright it could be that I’m a little buzzed.

We finish eating and decide to call it a night. On the way to our tent I hear the scream again and it’s in that open field. My heart stops immediately, I get goosebumps and I’m terrified. My friend turns around and I ask him “did you hear that?” “Yes” he replied.

Now to describe this scream it sounds like a woman giving off the most bloodcurdling scream. Extremely high pitched and loud.

Now me feeling a little buzzed I’m thinking of this ugly chupacabra alien looking creature just staring at us in the distance. Ready to run up and kill us.

We immediately jump into the tent and remain quiet. Our breathing is quiet but we are on alert. This is twice I’ve heard the scream. We hear it again, it’s much closer now. Again I’m thinking of this creature never seen by anyone because it kills everyone who sees it that is coming to kill us. My heart is racing and I think this might be it.

All of a sudden another scream, but from the opposite direction. Oh My God there are two of them! The screaming continues from both directions probably every 20 seconds or so, it’s like they are talking to each other planning on how to kill us. We’re surrounded!

We finally whisper to each other “what do we do”? It’s probably been a good two minutes since we jumped in the tent but it felt like an eternity. There’s another friend in the tent passed out. He never wakes up.

My friend remembers he has both sets of car keys. He quickly presses the panic buttons. We let the car alarms go off for a few minutes. During this time we couldn’t hear any screaming. We can see the car lights flashing against the tent.

When we thought the creature got scared away we stopped the car alarms and both yelled loudly “get the fuck up everyone!”

We unzip the tent, he’s already unlocked the car doors we see people emerging from the other tents in panic. We all jump into one of the vehicles, start it up and lock the doors.

Everyone is asking what’s wrong. We explained the screams and asked them if they heard. They all replied “No”. We explained what happened and I think because of how terrified we were they believed us. We all agreed to leave the camp and drive to one of their houses and spend the night there.

I couldn’t sleep that night. I kept thinking the creature somehow attached itself to the car or followed us home just waiting. Daylight couldn’t have come quick enough. We had some breakfast and told his parents the story. Well now they think we are crazy. We decide to head back to the site.

We arrive and there are large paw prints around the camp site. One of my friends suggests it could be mountain lions.

The most terrifying part is when looking at the paw prints, our shoe prints had walked over the paw prints. Now we were careful not to disrupt the scene when we returned. This means when we heard the screams they may have been closer than we thought. After the car alarms scared them away we stepped over their paw prints. I looked to the empty field where I heard the screams and got chills.

I found a video of what the screams sounded like. Turn your volume up listening to this and imagine yourself in that setting. I still can’t listen to these sounds without remembering this story. https://youtu.be/pxo8X5uIWRE

Username: googz187

When I was about 16-17, I had really bad stress induced insomnia. I lived in a small town and my house backed onto the Australian bush, I used to go for night walks with my dog as a companion.

I always found these walks relaxing, the sounds of the crickets and cicadas and occasional tree frog was lovely for atmosphere, though sometimes big bloody roo's would jump around making alarming crashing sounds - but you got used to ignorring them and the dog would always go charging off after them barking madly so if they ever spooked me she made me feel protected.

So one night its a full moon and I got to about 2am of rolling around not sleeping and decided to go get the loyal doggo and go for a wander. We head out the back gate and the bush trail was pretty well lit, but there was something really off that night.

It was dead silent. No cicadas, no crickets, no frogs. Not one.
I could hear my every footstep which felt weird, I had heard a lot of stories from the aboriginal elders from my hometown about the concept that the bush can talk to you, just not with words - it gives you warnings and signals, like when the hairs stand up on the back of your neck that's the bush warning you of danger, and you'd best back off or suffer for it. I really wish I had heeded this warning, because the hairs on the back of my neck could have cut glass they were standing so straight.

The worst part was my dog. She normally would run ahead of me and then run back, then run off again, she liked to do her own bit of exploring and checking her wee-mail, but this walk she wouldnt walk more than a couple of steps ahead of me. I only noticed how nervous she was because at one point when I went to pat her she flicked her head back as if she was going to nip me, and she wasn't that kind of dog.

We were about 2kms away from the house when I first heard it, this noise that I almost missed, sort of a snort. I wasn't sure what it was but figured it could be a possum, those buggers shriek and hiss so I wouldnt be surprised.

I took a few more steps, then heard it again but much louder, I realised it sounded like a ratteling breath, a deep one going into a big animal sort of noise.

That was when I truly got spooked because my dog whined, I had only ever heard her whine with excitement after we got home from a day out or something, but this was a whine of fear.

I heard the noise again, this time it almost sounded like breathy laughter, I started proverbially packing my dacks and started stepping backward from the direction the sound was coming from, trying to stare into the black bush and see what was making it.

There was something in there moving, i couldnt make it out completely but i knew it was big, the way it shifted about seemed so unnatural, like it had long spindally white legs and some mishappen upper lumpy body - my heart was racing and I remembered stories about the spirits and creatures of the dreaming, terrified this was some undiscovered yowie or evil spirit (and im not even religious but i was so spooked at the time I would have believed anything).

I stumbled back a bit and thats when my dog started growing and the weird white shape in the bush suddenly screached in this blood-curdling echoing noise and came lurching forward - my life flashing before my eyes I screamed too at the top of my lungs...

It was a fucking dear. A goddamn, antlered, on its hind legs, jumping out swinging in a defencive/attacking position dear.

I fell on my ass and my dog charged at it, it sort of rolled its head at her once and then took off.
I had never seen a dear in this bush before (introduced species to Australia - and a pest) but the weird smell must have been what spooked my dog (she is also afraid of horses so idk) I also didnt know one of the things they do is SHRIEK like a goddamn banshee when cornered. Just about ruined my nightwalk ritual.

I was waiting for some soul-eating nightmare beast from a Dreaming story to come tear me up, glad it was nothing in the end but still, I dont go walking on nights when its that quiet anymore.

Username: [deleted]

Okay here’s my crazy one. It was so long ago (about 13 years) it almost doesn’t feel like it really happened.

So I was about 21 at the time. Living in Arizona. Started really getting into hiking. I’d frequently go into the Superstition mountains on a whim. Probably could have planned my hikes better but what are you going to do.

So one day I decided I was going to go on my first solo overnight hike to a waterfall. The drive out was long. A bit longer than I anticipated and I think I only arrived to the trailhead with a few hours before sunset. So I hiked what I could and found a spot to set up my tent and sleep. I should note there were maybe two other cars at the trailhead and I didn’t see anyone else on the trail so far.

Just as I’m laying down ready to doze off I hear something scratch one side of my tent. I thought it was probably an animal and will go away soon. Didn’t hear any other sounds like that after. But it did scare me a bit and I couldn’t sleep so lay there awake.

Maybe 30/45 min passed and I heard another noise (I set up my tent on an area that had a lot of gravelly rocks). This sounded like a footstep coming from the left side of my tent. Then I heard the same noise coming from the right side. 10min go by and another “footstep” from the left followed by one on the right. 10 more min same thing.

Again. I’m scared. I’m trying to convince myself that this is an animal of some kind but the steps are too perfectly timed. I fully believe there are two people out there.

I’m still inside my tent. It’s pitch black at this point. I have a knife and a handgun which I brought at the demand of a friend. So I’m sitting in the tent. I haven’t moved or made a sound. I have my knife in my left hand and gun in the right facing where the footsteps are coming from.

My logic here is maybe they don’t know who is in the tent. Could be three dudes and not one young girl alone in the middle of nowhere. I didn’t want to step outside because I thought it would leave me vulnerable. I tell myself if I hear one more footstep I’m firing a warning shot.

Sure enough the same synced up steps. I fired blindly through my tent. My ears were ringing like crazy for idk 5min? After that I didn’t hear anything for 45min. Then the steps started up again. Same as last time. One from the left then one from the right. They waited. Then again. And again. And again. I fired another shot.

I had run through the thought that I legitimately could die tonight. How much I’m going to miss my parents and sister. All the fear and sadness slowly started turning into anger. If there were people out there I wasn’t going down with a fight.

After the last shot I think maybe an hour passed. I still hadn’t moved a muscle or made a sound. Maybe tmi but I peed through my clothes while I sat waiting. Sure enough here we go again. Except this time I heard a footstep from both sides at once. Still spaced out by about 10min. Again. Again. Again. I fired another shot through the tent.

I now had a plan. I was so angry and tired at this point I maybe was feeling a bit reckless. But my plan was to wait until they footsteps got close enough then I was going to cut through the tent (zipper would take way too long) and try to shoot whoever was out there before they could get to me.

I waited but those were the last footsteps I heard. I sat there in the same position until the sun came up. I finally got the courage to go outside of the tent. I couldn’t tell if there were any footprints or not. But I packed up my tent and finished my hike. Saw one guy along the way.

I’ve never backpacked alone again. I really don’t think that was my mind playing tricks on me although this story seems almost unbelievable to me after all these years. I guess I’ll never know. But there are all kinds of crazy stories about hiking in the superstition mountains.

Username: Kgcampbell

Not me, but my father told me this story about his encounter with a grizzly bear cave.

When my dad was young, he worked as a laborer (?) not sure of his title, for the US Forest Service in Alaska, a long ass time ago, like in the 60s (I'm old af). The way he described his duties was that there were random cabins kind of spread out throughout the Alaskan wilderness that the Service maintained for either lost hikers, or rangers working in the area, whatever. He said they were very rough, but would keep you dry and warm during a bad weather bout.

My dad was one of the dudes that would go maintain them, he only did it for like a year or two. He would build them, fix them, stock them with supplies, etc... The catch was, there are no roads to these cabins, they are all walking in and out only, and some are 100s of miles from roadways, at least back then, and so the only way you could get relatively close was to hop on a float plane and have it "puddle jump" from one body of water to another.

Sometimes, when you puddle jump like that, you have to be wary of your fuel on those planes because the heavier the load, the more fuel you burn and you can't load down the plane too much because they are small, etc... So the cabins were made of wood harvested nearby and built by hand. Tools were about the only thing that could be flown in. You're not fitting plywood and shingles on a float plane.

Anyways, this would require many trips, and depending on where the cabins were, you may not be right next to a lake, or you may need to hike a while to get to them.

What I'm trying to say is that the cabins weren't built out of convenience, they were built in a specific location because of a specific purpose (seismic reading stations, radio towers on top of a peak, etc...) ease of access for a lot of them was not the point.

So my Dad was having to hike to one of these remote cabins because the last person there reported that it had been damaged the previous winter or whatever. He wasn't carrying very much, like a tool box, a flare gun, and some other stuff. He'd been to the cabin before he said, but didn't remember the easy way to get to it, so he tried to go an easy route up and come back down.

Well, the way he tells it, he had lost sight of the peak in the dense trees at the base, and the cabin was near the peak he was trying to reach. He decided to walk around to the base side of the peak because he remembered approaching it before with the main mountain on his right.

While he was trying to get there he started to smell this awful smell. He described at as a mixture of sweet cotton candy and rotten flesh all in the same. He immediately thought of bears, and thought one was close, so he stopped got low and listened out for one.

He says he stayed put for like 5 minutes and didn't hear anything, just this god awful aroma and it was coming from all around him. He could not discern which direction it was coming from so he could go away from it. He began to get panicked and decided to go back the way he had come.

And that's when he heard it. A very loud snap. He looked up and thought a tree branch broke, or something, but as he looked up, the ground fell out from under him and he fell about 7 feet to solid ground.

It was pitch black, the smell was so intense that he could feel his eyes watering and could not catch his breath. He got to his feet and was just scared to death. He had fallen into a cave, and it was one used by a bear to hibernate.

Fortunately, he only worked from spring to fall, which is like 4-5 months, and so the bear was not at home. he made his way out of the cave and was covered in bear shit and nastiness of all kinds. It was inside his boots squishing into his socks, and just everywhere.

He had to hike ALL the way back down to the only source of water around, where a plane was waiting and the pilot was completely shocked. According to the pilot, apparently there were only Grizzlies sighted in this particular area at that time, so he's 100% convinced it was a Grizzly cave he fell in. My dad was so lucky no bear happened to be in there at the time.

He had to bathe in the lake and decided not to work for the service shortly thereafter. He always asks if you've ever smelled a grizzly, because they are filthy awful smelly creatures.

Username: Anadyne

I used to work for a photography company that did all the photos for 13 rafting/zip line companies in Clear Creek County, CO and was living out of my car at the time with my dog. I generally had to chase different raft trips down the river or shoot this one company's zip line that was up at the top of this mountain.

One day I was shooting the zip line, and in order to get to it you had to off-road up the hill and then park and hike into it so I had to leave my car and walk about a quarter mile down this tiny little itty bitty sketchy ass trail to where I needed to shoot from.

When I say this thing was maybe a foot wide I am not exaggerating, and it was a cliff drop off on the right side walking in and a super steep incline to the left that had a bunch of trees and boulders etc.

A little background - a fun fact about Clear Creek is that it has the highest ratio of mountain lions to humans in the US, and across the street from the zip line at the old high school building is where one of the only recorded mountain lion inflicted human deaths has occurred in Colorado when some kid in like 2000 got snatched off the track while he was out there running after school, when mountain lions are largely active (around dawn and dusk).

They are also my favorite animal and the one I identify with the most spiritually. I've found almost an entire skeleton on separate occasions over the course of a few years in the same area. They are EVERYWHERE.

I shot probably 10-12 trips that day and the last one ended around 7, and I grab all my camera stuff and am hiking back to my car by myself and I just got this weird feeling like I was being watched. I can't explain it, I just felt it.

The hairs on my neck were standing up and my heart rate was just a-thumpin' away. You can't ever tell me that today's humans, regardless of our stage in evolution, don't have the same instincts we did in the early days - this was one of the most primal survival instincts I have ever felt.

I kind of slowed down and quieted my footsteps (I'm wearing fucking Tevas lol) so I could do a quick scan of the area and at first I didn't see anything, but as I continued walking I got this huge whiff of pungent, fresh cat piss and I was just like .... "ohhhh fuck my ass" and I froze for a second and look up the incline and about 500-600 yards away from me right next to this boulder is a small younger female mountain lion just clocking the fuck out of me.

I bout shit my shorts. If you know anything about mountain lions, they stalk their prey for a long time before they attack so you generally don't know they're there until they're on top of you, unless you wander into their territory and they have cubs in the area which was what I was the most worried about.

I'm thinking to myself "aiight, you have your knife but it's in the side pocket of your backpack and you're gonna have to move real quick because you can't outrun her in fuckin' Tevas...your other option is to throw yourself off this cliff." But she didn't really seem threatened or aggressive.

Like she wasn't poised to pounce or flicking her tail and didn't have her ears pinned, she wasn't growling or chirping or any of the behaviors I know are some of the last ones you'll ever see.

For the most part, mountain lions are far more curious about humans than they are hungry for them, but you never know. This girl was just staring at me. I looked away from her and was just SWEATING profusely and trying not to tremble telling myself "you have to move, you have to move" and started putting one Teva in front of the other one super slow so I didn't make much noise on the loose rock or any sudden moves and she just watched me. The. Whole. Time.

I finally got out of her line of sight and started running back to my car, got in, shut the door, and just burst into tears immediately.

It was probably one of the most intensely terrifying, beautiful, spiritual, and overall coolest experiences I have ever had and I've been bonkin' around the Rocky Mountains my whole life.

Out of all of the crazy things I've seen in the wild, I will never ever ever forget that feeling and how I was completely at the mercy of nature and my surroundings and was left untouched. Just thought I'd share that with y'all and would love to hear any other mountain lion stories you guys have!

Username: subconscioussunflowa

In the summer of 2014 I was in remote Alsea, Oregon. As in, remote for Alsea, which is already pretty remote in the middle of the coastal mountain range. It was dark and I figured I’d save myself some time trying to get back to my camp site by cutting across a creek and through the woods.

I knew from previous research on google earth that this was possible, rather than walk a path and cross a footbridge, I would save roughly a half hour to cut through... what I hadn’t anticipated is such thick vegetation off path that there was scarcely ground to walk on.

It was very dark except for the moon and stars peeking through the clouds occasionally, dense with massive ferns and Viney maple I just kept squeezing between the sticks and foliage.

At what I figured was about the halfway point between where I started my shortcut and where my friends up at the campsite were, I could hear their laughter and soft music in the distance which gave me invigorated energy, I knew I was going the right way and couldn’t wait to surprise them coming from out of the woods rather than the path...

This was as much about showing off as it was saving time. Not long after I stopped because I thought I heard something off to my right, several footsteps in quick succession.

My blood ran cold, I felt like time had slowed down, in this shit I could barely drudge through, something was running at me. As soon as I turn to my right to face whatever was coming my way I am face to face with it...

The most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life. She had pale skin that glowed in the light of the moon and massive eyes that I could see the stars reflected in, black hair down to her shoulders at least. I was fixated and terrified, I couldn’t look away or muster the courage to speak at all.

I was so intimidated by her beauty, were face to face close enough to kiss, close enough to smell that she reeked of lichen and moss so much so I could taste the mineral metallic taste of the fragrance. For the first time in my life I was afraid of how beautiful someone was, she didn’t seem human...

She’d run up so fast and was instantly in my face, silent snd still. Tears were beginning to well up in my eyes and the intense pressure of her presence felt like it was crushing me.

I was absolutely certain I was about to die and it would be at her hands, or maybe I already was dead and this was the face of god... Somehow, I gathered just enough courage to squeak out a “Hello?”, and move my head back just a couple inches...

My eyes refocused. I was face to face with a massive maple leaf about the size of my head. Have you ever had a dream you were talking with friends or on the phone, but then you wake up and realize you were actually alone.

That same feeling crept over me, like someone was just there, now there weren’t... I had the dim light of my phone, but there was nothing to see around me but the same thick vegetation I’d been trudging through the whole time.

I eventually made it to camp but I was so stunned by the experience I’d just had I could’t really get into the spirit of it. I had just come across a specter of some sort, a guardian of the forest who was angered by my presence... I couldn’t see it on her face, but I just felt as though I was in trouble the way a child would be if they were caught doing something wrong.

I told my friends that I had seen a ghost, they laughed it off, dismissed it as me trying to tell a spooky campfire story.

I’ve never seen anything like that again, I also don’t trek off trail anymore. Cougars, bears, wild dogs, hermits... Nothing else I’ve ever encountered in the woods has so throughly induced pure terror quite like the beautiful woman who walked through the trees.

Username: Marl_G

For context this is the Canadian Rockies and normally on the Alberta/BC border. The areas we tend to hike have some of the highest population densities of grizzlies in the entire range so we bring ample protection just in case.

The first after a few nights at a lake about a days hike in and just as the sun finally goes down (I was asleep during the elongated twilight in the valley) I wake to hear excessive grunting and snarling outside my tent.

Being in grizzly country and still being quite new to these trips I started to panic. Quietly waking my father next to me we calmly exited the tent.

At some point we spooked when ended up being a moose who bolted across the camp sight through some thick bush and stopped looking at us, eyes gleaming in the distance in our head lamps as we prep the bear gun in case of a charge. Luckily no such thing occurred and the moose ended up getting lost in the dead end of the valley.

The second was in Waterton national park where we couldn't bring the bear gun which was our last line of defence anyway, we have never needed to use it.

We were only staying in the site for a night and planned to leave the next morning to leave the park deeper into the woods. At about 1am we wake up hearing someone yelling for help. A poor sole finds his way into camp.

He was new to backpacking. Inexperienced, missing equipment, and behind schedule. We help him set up camp and settle back in not noticing in the dark that the food bag he set up next to ours was not air tight.

The next morning I awake to my father making a lot of noise that I knew had to be bear related. Luckily once I got to the center of camp it was revealed to be a pesky nuisance bear.

Overall not a very big black bear who is keeping his distance from us so the worry starts to dissipate as we realise we need break camp sooner than planned. Last I heard the person who hiked in got out no issue after we provided some tips and had to spray the bear as he was getting too comfortable.

Unfortunately this year I heard a small black bear in the region had to be put down as it was coming too close to people too often for food.

The third was on the same trip and this time not animal related. It was a 6 day trip which required walking some ridges and even climbing a few mountains with loaded packs.

Normal trails can have enough hazards and messing up an ankle 30 KMs into the backwoods isn't a fun idea. during the longest day and after 2 previous mountain summits I found myself suddenly walking along the bad side of a ridge on loose terrain around 4-8ft from a drop I couldn't accurately tell the height of. It totally changed what I could be fearful of on these trips.

The thought a single misstep could send me tumbling to what was almost guaranteed to be my death didn't leave my mind until we were done with that ridge. All things considered, still one of the more amazing treks I've done and overall the most beautiful.

Username: normancon-II

I was member of an avalanche rescue team. Some artists wanted to go up to the mountains, and I was asked to scout for a place where they could go.

It was a bad weather, heavy snow storms, and the cable car which lead up to a mountain restaurant was not working for the public. I took the cable car, drove up to the restaurant with my dog and found myself in a terrible snowstorm.

I knew my way, though, to a stair which led up to a bridge which connected two mountain tops. There I waited for a while until the weather cleared up.

When I considered the situation to be safe, I went up the stairway, crossed the metallic bridge to the other mountain top, climbed down until I was sure that the situation was safe for the artists once the weather cleared up.

I returned, but on the middle of the bridge, I Feld as if ice-cold water were dripping on my neck. I knew this was not possible because I was tightly wrapped in my gear, covered from tip to toe. At this moment, I saw my dog:

She normally had curly hair, but now she looked as if someone was pulling at ever single one of her hairs. She looked like a soft hedgehog, and not moving at all, she was staring at me. At the same time, everything around me turned dark, as if the night had started - it was 9 in the morning.

The metallic bridge had handles which were fixed on steel poles, and out of the poles came little, blue flashes. I tried to reach out to my dog for taking her and run off the bridge, but I barely could move. My black gloves seemed to be gleaming, and my hole body hurt as if someone was sticking needles into me.

The, for a short moment, there was a bit of light. Walking on the small bridge, not seeing where I really went to, I grabbed my dog on her collar, stumbled toward where I thought the stairwell must be, we fell down a couple of meters into the snow, then I crawled to the closed restaurant, my dog beside me.

The weather had become worse again, it was pitch black, but now, some flashes were twitching through the dark, but not from top to ground but in every possible direction.

I still have no idea how long it took. My walkie-talkie wasn't working anymore, and the electricity for the cable car had shut down. So I had no other Joice but to wait for the weather to clear up.

Eventually, my dog and I made our way down, first through fields of fresh snow, then climbing down and finally walking through a wood.

Once we had arrived at the station, some of my colleagues were already there, assembling with their rescue dogs, waiting for getting the "go" for flying up with a chopper and searching for my remains.

Turned out I was in the middle of a really bad thunderstorm, witnessing elm's fire and "Pickelsausen".

Username: NetAtraX

Not a ranger, was with a trail ranger following a search of marsh land that was next to a national park.

Backstory, we were on vacation from the UK where I was working at the time and we had basically had to go out to a company outing around Christmas time as it was when we started to party (work day off, entire company from the US offices was there).

We had noticed one member of the team got drunk and basically wondered off somewhere. So we had to call rangers to find him, luckily we were being guided by a trail ranger.

Before anyone says anything, getting really drunk in a national park is never a good idea. Most of us had one or two beers and that was it.

This guy couldn't really handle his drink and also had way too much of the blue can stuff people nicknamed "rednecks finest" (not sure of the particular beer), more suited to European beers in pint glasses rather than this canned stuff.

We didn't find him for a while to the point it got dark, like really dark. So we had to get flashlights looking for the guy. After searching many hours, we managed to get a search team together.

After several hours it felt like someone was following me, alone, in a national forest with only a mobile to contact us - so basically I got lost looking for the guy. Panic started to set in because I didn't know where the trail ranger had went a few miles beforehand.

So alone, no idea where I was in marsh land (walking on soil) a few tall trees in the distance. Along the way I hear what sounds like footsteps (muddy, like someone was walking behind me in the marsh). Turn the flashlight to face the noise, it stops.

Continue walking. Hear it again, stop, turn around, point flashlight, it stops. Start to get really nervous. Happens again, get a sudden sense of dread, so shoot off running.

Manage to reach the trees in the distance, heart pounding. I run into the guy we were searching for (along with the trail ranger) saying he had managed to track him.

Told him what happened to me, told me that the place in the marsh was infested with alligators and that's the sound they make when they creep up on people. Says I was either very brave or very stupid to walk there because people have been grabbed by them before.

We managed to make it back to the hotel with the guy slurring his words and still very drunk. Park ranger congratulates me on my balls to brave marsh land, in reality I didn't know and wouldn't have went there if I had known. Still think about how differently it might of ended if I had known about the alligators.

The noise is there when they creep up on you, but when alligators see flashlights they sometimes stop in the dark. Never knew that. Apparently a thing.

Username: ukitern

This may not be scary to a lot of you, but it was to me. After backpacking once, I can say there are some things you just can’t know until you try it. It was my first time ever backpacking.

I was in the Rockies in Colorado backpacking with my best friend and a small group of guys. We found our camping spot for the first night, a beautiful little aspen grove about 200 yards from a little pond, at the base of some 14ers.

It was pretty late at night, I’d say around 11:30 pm, and everyone was asleep except for me and my friend. We decided we should go get water from the pond about 200 yards or so away from our campsite and filter it so we can be ready to go the next day.

The pond wasn’t far, but you couldn’t quite see it from our campsite since the trees covered our tents. We headed out with our headlamps in the pitch black to get some water from the pond.

We take this very clear gravel path to the pond that we had walked back and forth down almost a dozen times the day before. We get to the pond and filter our water, and then head back to camp.

As we are walking back, I turn my headlamp on, to be met with a pair of glowing green eyes about 50 feet away from me. My heart absolutely dropped into my stomach. Slowly, more and more huge green eyes appeared from the trees.

There were as many as 20 pairs of eyes staring at us. When I tell you my fight or flight kicked in stronger than it ever has before, I mean it. I literally thought I was about to die. In hindsight, it was silly, just a bunch of deer, but I didn’t know that at the time.

We start to head back down the same path we took. We walk for 5, maybe 10 minutes, until we realize something isn’t right. We’ve definitely gone too far. We turn around and walk back the other way, looking for our camp site. We cannot find it anywhere. W

e end up all the way back at the pond. So, we turn around, taking the same gravel path as before, this time really looking for our tents in the aspen grove.

We still can’t find them. At this point we start to panic, as we are unable to find camp, it’s cold, and there are tons of unidentifiable green eyes staring at our souls from the trees.

We start jogging, back and forth we go. We searched earnestly for about 30 minutes, which felt like hours.

We knew tents didn’t just disappear, but we swore we were on the same gravel path. We even looked for another gravel path going from the pond and we couldn’t find one anywhere.

We finally found our tents after about 30 minutes of absolute panic. While it may not seem scary, we were both pretty young and in a completely new element at the hands of Mother Nature. It was a terrifying experience to say the least.

Username: [deleted]

I am not necessarily and outdoorsman but I want to contribute with my story. When I was in the 5th grade (around 10 yr old at the time- female) my friends and I would walk kinda far from our house to this small patch of woods that sat in the middle of some farm property.

The woods were surrounded by corn fields but at this time of the year the corn was crumbled, dead and pushed on to the ground so it was easy to walk through. We would see deer and wild turkeys back there which was fun for us being the little tomboys we were.

Anyways we would hang out in these woods and be completely oblivious to the very clearly marked “hang out spot” someone made.

Like there was an old couch that looked like someone (maybe some homeless person) would crash on, and we would find poop that looked like human poop on the ground. Whatever we didn’t care lol and continued to explore that area which was huge.

One day me and my best friend (11 f) explored the area for a bit and as we are leaving walking through the surrounding field two boys our age ran towards us screaming.

I could hear the one boy say “he’s trying to kill you!” And “he’s gonna hit you!” These kids were pretty far away and it was hard to make out what they were saying- suddenly I heard the sound of like a motorcycle. I turn and I see a kid on a three wheeler coming right for me.

He is headed straight at me and I just froze... let me tell you I couldn’t move... my friend ran towards the boys trying to get away and I am literally petrified standing in a field. Then I see his face. He looked completely dead in his eyes- then he fucking hit me and snagged my left leg.

My entire body like flew horizontally if that makes sense and when I hit the ground it was like I was sliding into home plate- just slid on the ground for awhile before realizing what happened.

The kid on the three wheeler disappeared and the boys ran towards me. I recognized the one kid from my school when he noticed I had blood on my sneaker and he pulled up my pant leg revealing a nasty gash.

The next thing I know is my mom is there, I get rushed to the hospital where my leg gets stitched up. I later find out the kid who hit me was special needs and his cousin (a kid named Mikey who had a crush on me but I couldn’t stand him) sent him after me to kill me.

Apparently Mikey was bitter I wouldn’t be his girlfriend and literally sent his cousin to hurt me!

Mikey had a rough reputation in our area and I wonder if Mikey was the one who made camp in those woods... maybe he was watching me and my friends.

Idk but Mikey years later killed himself which was a sad shock. And I have a scar on my leg from the ordeal.

Username: popcornkernals321

Me and some friends took a road trip one day out to the La push indian reservation on the peninsula of washington state. We live in Seattle so this is a far place, about a 4 hour drive, DEEP in the wilderness.

We hung out on the beach all day, very very beautiful place. You could almost feel the spiritual vibes that flowed through the land. This isn't exactly a tourist location despite a lodge about 15 miles from where we were.

We were the only people for as far as the eye could see and it was wide open beach on the ocean and you could see for miles down the shore in either direction. We were smoking alot of cannabis that day but we all have high tolerances so werent getting too loopy or anything.

After several hours of being rowdy and loud with curiosity and socializing, we were stoned enough that we all sat quietly together on the beach, enjoying the scenery. There was this odd sound of drums, very tribal sounding but it was faint and came from the direction of the ocean.

We all could hear it, but it was difficult to distinguish. We were about a 30 minute walk from the car, and you had to take a little hike through some forest to get there, so it probably wasn't the best idea that we stayed until sunset.

We were all too stoned at this point and weren't using the best of judgment. We started getting very eerie feelings as it got darker and decided it was time to leave. We all become extremely startled when we heard this very odd sound of almost tribal yelling.

Only way i can describe it would be some kind of native war cry, and we all stopped dead in our tracks, but there was nothing to be seen anywhere as we looked down the beach. Again, it was coming from the direction of the water.

The wind began to pick up and it produced the strangest whistling sound that all gave us goosebumps and made us take off running.

It kicked up a bunch of sand and made it seem as if it got dark very quick and out of nowhere, this flock of birds came from behind us as our back was turned on the ocean.

But it seemed as if they had been on the ground next to us cause they were all taking off and beginning to fly, this made no sense and we never saw them coming from anywhere and they engulfed us they flew by.

At this point we were sprinting back to the car, and strange noise kept echoing through the woods that were scaring the fuck out of us. When we got back to the car, my friend peeled out of there so fast we nearly crashed on the way out.

We all were quiet on the 4 hour drive back, in complete shock and terrified of what had happened. No fucking idea or explanation of what happened to us that day.

Username: teezymac

I was around 13 and very experienced by then in the woods and as a hunter. My family dropped me off on the opposite portion of the hunting land we were leasing in south Georgia USA.

At over 1,000 acers of timber they could not even hear me shoot where most people were hunting. I was dropped off in the darkness over an hour before sunrise so that I could hike the mile to the deer stand.

As I stood in the darkness to allow my eyes to adjust I could hear a pack of feral dogs yipping and howling as if they were chasing a deer. I was making my way quickly down my trail and noticed that the dogs were getting closer.

I thought to myself that if I felt they were closing in on me that I would get up in a old rotten stand midway to where I hunted. If they were a deer they would run past my position and if not they would scatter trying to find my trail.

The sounds of the pack intensified and it sounded like they were at the road where I was dropped. I hurried to the mid point and could tell they had picked up their pace.

I scurried up the makeshift ladder and got into the stand with my heart pounding. Then the most chilling thing occurred - they fell silent.

I stood in that stand with my heart pounding straining to listen for their approach. Suddenly they were there bursting from brush around the trail. In total I would say there were over a dozen dogs of various breeds that had gone feral. No collars on any of them.

They stopped and fanned out sniffing once my trail was broken. I slowly turned and shifted my stance to get into a firing position. Since these dogs were clearly hunting me they were a hazard to anyone in the woods.

I started to raise my rifle when a very large chow chow looked up and started growling. The pack all started barking as the chow snarled and kicked dirt around it.

This made it clear who was going to go first. My first show was true and killed the chow instantly. I immediately went to work to take out as many as I could.

The pack immediately ran the opposite direction and headed to even heavier brush and young pine trees. They melted into the forest rapidly and as I fired many shots were blocked by small trees.

I was only able to take a few more of the pack out but I think I made my point as we did not encounter any further sign of them on the property.

It was probably 15 min before I stopped shaking from the encounter. After I calmed down enough to climb down I was still stunned with processing what had just happened.

I continued onto my deer stand and was able to harvest a doe and met my family at the road at my pickup time.

Username: 404photo

This happened one or two years ago to me and my Step-dad. We were in Colorado on a Elk hunting trip and we had been hiking all day when we got to a place that we would make camp.

We are there for a few hours and noting really happens we scout a little and don’t come up with much, this was our second EVER elk hunt so we did really know what to look for. We cooked a dinner of MountainHouse freeze dried beef stew, on our gas stove.

After we finish up we both sit and catch our breath you see me and my step-dad are from Texas and at 11,000 feet our longs aren’t holding up to the thinner air, we sit there for a while and break out our biviees (not 100% on the spelling of that) which is basically a thicker trash bag made or reflective material and is waterproof.

We shove our sleeping bags in and settle in, we were both pretty tired but we were slightly worried about bears because I have bear spray, my dad has his 9mm Glock and my dads Bow which is attached to his bag.

We have our food bag in a tree out of reach of a bear so we have done all the things we need to make our camp bear proof. We fall asleep and I have theses weird, fucked up dreams.

I hear people talking about how they hope it doesn’t rain, then I hear them talking about the best way to put a fire together, and finally I just hear a fire going. I wake up to the feeling of a fat rain drop hitting me in the face.

I then feel where the rain drop had hit me and it was dry, I look around and there is no fire and not evidence of any people, no nothing really. This scared the shit out of me and I sit there for a few hours, waiting for it to get light.

When it finally does get light my step dad starts to wake and I’m sitting there still shivering even though it is only in the high 40’s and I’m wrapped in a jacket a sleeping bag and many other layers.

He turns to me and says “dude we need to leave.” I say “why?” And my dad says “I had all sorts of fucked up dreams!”

He proceeds to explain to me That in the middle of the night he had heard what he thought was a bear, then what he thought was me screaming in the middle of the night, me getting dragged away, and then finally what he thought was a bear just standing over him and he had not been able to sleep much due to the fact that he thought his son was getting eaten by a bear.

I then explained to him what I thought I heard and the rain drop and we both agreed that we should leave and that maybe that the altitude was messing with us.

To this day I don’t know if it was altitude because I heard those voices and I still remember that conversation vividly.

Username: Sten_Gustoffson

Nothing compared to some of the stuff people here mostly in the states come across like cougars, bears, serial killers or people out of the cast of Deliverance but a couple of creepy encounters.

Used to live at the edge of a large area of forest, it would take about four hours hiking to get from end to end, west to east or south to north.

Once about 30-40 mins hike in we found a blood trail in the snow that went for a good mile or two up and down very steep gradients, we finally found the end point where there was chunks of meat around and bits of sinew and meat hanging off branches and bushes, found no skin or pelt of a probable deer going by the amount of remains and the most common animal here.

We think it may have been a lynx cat which are usually in the mountainess parts of the country to the south, the odd bear can be found in the far eastern corner, but this is only 30 mins drive from Prague.

We often have unregistered hunting for deer going on but this was too frenzied and they usually butcher it at home.

We heavily walked these woods every weekend and most week nights and saw nothing like it before or since. Wolves have been reintroduced in nature reserves but only recently, this is around 2010.

Another one hiking and camping in Italy's Abruzzo mountains(were they have brown bears and wolves) with my girlfriend who we just found out was pregnant that week. Had a nice walk through the mountains and visited some hermitages cut into the rock faces.

Later on when in the forests making our way through the trail it absolutely pissed down with rain, it was coming down the tree trunks in rivers.

We only had hammocks and a tarp we tied to the trees and the ropes got wet which soaked into the hammock creating a puddle where your arse was so not the most comfortable night, I kept waking up and dropping off but my missus is a heavy sleeper and can sleep on a chickens lip.

About half way through, 0300-ish probably I heard a wolf howling about 200 metres away I made it, asked the missus if she heard it, no response.

A while later another howl about 100 metres away, asked the missus again still no response. Was thinking fucking great the three of us are going to get eaten by wolves and Im not even comfortable.

Didnt hear anymore howling after that luckily, got up and made our way into town the next day. We looked up the wolf and bear activity before we went, they dont usually bother people the wolves just piss off the local shepherds but still when you're tired, wet and your arse is hanging there at the wolf's mouth's level you dont think of that.

Username: _ovidius