Sasquatch Chronicles Blog

A listener writes “Wes, It’s taken me a while to get my experience on paper and to start sharing it, but I wanted to put it our there to see if there have been any similar encounters in the area. I listen to your show regularly and haven’t heard much from the WVA/VA/MD area and think people should be aware of it and willing to share any experiences they’ve had in the area.

I call this an experience because I didn’t actually encounter anything, but the experience has changed how I approach my time in the forest. I’ve been aware of and intrigued by the sasquatch phenomenon for some time and well aware of sighting videos, pictures and recordings.

I live in MD, and it is underrated in how easy and quickly you can get out into the wilderness in the mid-Atlantic region.

In late July of 2014, I was going through some personal issues and decided to do some backpacking to help get me through it. My goal as I headed out was two-fold: to do my first solo backpacking trip and to complete at least a portion of it at night. These are two things I had wanted to do for some time and my backpacking partners were never keen on a night hiking experience.

I had chosen a portion of the George Washington National Forest on the border of WVA & VA for this trip, as I was aware of a trail running up a ridge to a trail shelter. Originally, I had mapped out a one night loop of about 16 miles and headed out on the morning of July 30th and planned on using the shelter sight as my camp for the night. This shelter was about 7-8 miles into the hike and as I hiked up the ridge two things became very clear.

The first was that the circuit would become an in & out hike, as the trail I had planned to use on the back side of the loop was no longer marked or maintained and I would have to hike out along a too busy mountain road. The second was that the trail leading up to the shelter was rarely used, as indicated by the overgrowth, maintenance and lack of human traces. For me and what I was looking for this trip, that was perfect. In fact, I saw not a single person from the moment I entered the forest boundary until I left the next morning.

On a beautiful, clear afternoon I reached the shelter sight around 2:30 p.m. There was a fire pit, a bear pole for food bags to be hung on about 50 yards behind the shelter and the shelter itself. A logbook in the shelter confirmed my assumption of usage, as the last entry was more than a year earlier. I also quickly discovered that the shelter itself was riddled with ticks, so I went about setting up my small tent rather than sleep in the shelter.

This sight was slightly off the trail at the top of a ridge at about 2400 foot elevation. The trail runs north to south with the shelter facing south. Almost immediately to the east, the ridge dropped off into a thick, lush looking valley.

There seemed to be a little more leveling on the west side of the trail before it dropped into another valley. Other than the ticks keeping me company, this was an almost perfect spot to chill and spend the evening. Knowing that I would be heading back out the way I came in, I planned on waking at some point around 3 a.m. to start my hike out and cross the night hike off my list. So, as dark began to drop, I fired up the fire pit and cooked my dinner, just enjoying the forest around me. Shortly after full dark, I retired to my tent for a few hours.

I did wake up in the middle of the night, not sure exactly what time. I climbed out of my tent to use the bathroom and check the skies, trying to gauge when I should pack up and head out. As with the afternoon, it was a beautiful, clear night. I stood facing south, just to the side of my tent, about to make up my mind to pack up and head back down the ridge. No sooner had I decided that was what I was going to do when I heard it from my left, coming out of the valley just to the east.

What I heard was a primal scream of the sort of power and volume that I had never experienced before in the wilderness. I’ve experienced bears, coyotes, fox, deer and elk vocalizations during my backpacking endeavors. This was not that. While it was difficult to determine distance from me, I could tell it came up to me from the valley to the east and not terribly close. I resolved immediately that I wouldn’t be venturing out into the night, as previously planned.

I climbed back into my tent and waited for sunrise. I heard nothing else the rest of the night and headed back down the ridge, more quickly than usual, at the first sign of daybreak.

While I had never experienced such a sound in the forest before, I did know that I had heard things very similar to it. While I can best describe it as a “Whooooooo” sound, the guttural nature of it, combined with the volume and power, sounded much like recordings of various alleged sasquatch vocalizations I’ve come across both before and since. Returning home, I searched not just for sounds but for other reports in the area that might be out there. While I’ve been hard pressed to find any, I did discover that just a few miles from that sight, in the valley that was to my east, is a rather large deer management and protection area. This area is restricted to muzzle loading, iron sight hunting and not easily accessible to humans.

Since this experience, I will not take another solo backpack trip or go unarmed. Truth be told, if I had read the 411 books prior to this, I probably would not have done so to begin with. Also prior to this, I had hoped to someday have a sighting of this creature that I believe is out there in greater numbers than people think. After this experience, I may not be so sure that’s an encounter I want to have. The power of whatever I heard was clearly conveyed by this vocalization and I am still dumbfounded by the volume and ferocity of it.

Thank you, Wes, for what you do. You not only allow people to share their experiences in a safe space, but it serves as a resource for those that enjoy spending time in the wilds of America. There are things out there that we can only begin to grasp and anyone that spends time in the wilderness needs to be aware of them. Keep up the good work and let me know if you have any questions or want additional details.”