A listener writes “When I was about 13 yrs old we lived in an old farm house at the end of a dirt road. It was surrounded by fields that were used for crops before we moved there and at the time mostly only for hay.
There was also a gas pipeline that went along the back of the fields. There was fun for me because there was a barely used access road on it and it was a perfect path for me to ride my bike and play on.
We had a couple Australian Shepherds and the neighbors had a Chow that ran loose all the time. The whole time we lived there, (about 5 yrs) they would randomly go crazy and take off across the fields out to the woods. A short time later, they would come back and would act funny, kinda geeked out . We never figured out what it was that caused them to be that way. I can remember my dad and I standing out in the backyard at night and would listen to them as they went out. I don’t know what he was thinking and he didn’t share his thoughts, but I assume he was always worried about somebody coming up to the house to rob us.
We owned a convenience store in town and we always had a decent amount of cash in the house. As a kid, I didn’t think too much about it and wasn’t really worried about anything in the woods because I was out there all the time. One evening, just before dusk I decided to go out and walk the pipeline. They had just bush-whacked it so all the tall grass was laying over which caused me to take high steps as I walked. Entrance to the woods on either side of the pipeline was protected by dense undergrowth that was a result of the regular bush-whacking. As a result, I couldn’t really see anything past the undergrowth. It was just about to be dark and I needed to head back. Just before I turned around the go back home, I thought I heard a steps just on the other side of the undergrowth, so I stopped immediately…nothing. I started walking again and maybe five steps and I heard the steps again and stopped.
That’s when I heard the most god awful sound that I have ever heard. I have tried to explain it to people and I can’t really figure out a way to. It sounded like a baby that morphed into a woman that was demonic and sounded like she was in being stabbed. It was right beside me on the other side of the undergrowth, it terrified me and I took off. I ran the quarter mile or so at a full sprint back to the house and told my parents…they laughed it off and said I just spooked myself. Looking back on this reaction, I guess they just didn’t know what to say because I wasn’t the type of kid to scare easily. I have been told that bobcats can make a crazy sound when they are in heat. Recordings that I have heard of this do not match what I heard that night. I chalked it up to that because it was a the only rational explanation I could come up with. Another experience of interest in the same area probably happened about a year later. I was out again in the woods behind my Jr. High School.
There were old bicycle trails out there that I rode on a lot, so I was familiar with the area. A classmate of mine said that he heard there was a homeless man that lived in those woods. I had been out there a ton and had never seen any evidence of anyone other than the old bike trails, so I was looking for some evidence. I walked down to the creek and as I approached I saw a structure. It was shaped kinda like an igloo, domed with an entrance on the side. Larger branches made the structure and smaller branches covered with dead leaves filled in the gaps.
I don’t remember seeing any cut ends on any of the branches/logs so my assumption is that it was made with dead fall trees. It was about 8’ in diameter and about 4 to 5’ tall. I checked it out and but didn’t crawl inside for fear that if there was a homeless nearby that he might take offense. As I walked along the creekside, I noticed a box turtle on the small sandy bank. I continued to walk and I was guess I was about 20 yards up the trail, I heard brush moving like something was on the move and a huge sound like something hit the water in the creek, like a large stone had been thrown in. I ran back down to where I saw the turtle and noticed it was gone. As I’m looking for it, I noticed there was a heel print in the sandy bank. It was going into the water only the heel part was visible. My assumption at the time was that the supposed homeless guy took off after I left his area and tried to move to a different spot and as he tried to jump the creek he stepped into the creek which would explain the water sound.
This picture shows the areas I have mentioned above. If you look up the coordinates (35°21’56.24″N, 81° 6’44.53″W) on Google Earth, you will see there has been a lot of clear cutting over the last few years. All of that area was wooded when I lived there. I’ve also drawn out my stomping grounds around the house as far as playing in the woods was concerned. That area was about a mile wide and half a mile deep. The few things that I have mentioned above when examined as individual events don’t seem that important, but if you look at them as a whole, it is a little more interesting. If you look around and follow the wooded areas, they connect for miles. My question is; do you think they (Sasquatch) could live this close to small towns as long as they have wooded areas to travel in? Have you ever heard of a rash of sightings in populated areas? Deer do it all the time around here.
The second unexplained experience happened in 1999. My cousin and I were on our way back from my brother’s graduation from App. State. We were driving down Hwy 321 from Boone to Lincolnton around 2 A.M. and saw something large in the median. The highway used to be divided with a large grass median in some areas, I think it has been changed since then. It was brown and large, (maybe 5’ tall) we just caught a glimpse of it as we passed. It was odd, because what I could see wasn’t shaped like a bear and bears here in N.C. are black bears. I asked my cousin if she saw that and she said “yes” with a terrified look in her eyes. I said “do you want to turn around”? She begged me not to and we left it at that. If this wasn’t a bear, what was it? Do they eat carrion? Maybe it was eating roadkill…?
The third thing happened just over year and a half ago…Feb. 2013. I thought nothing about this until I started listening a few weeks ago. Four of us wanted to go out for a quick little one night camping/backpacking trip. We went up to South Mountain State Park, we are lucky because this is just over an hour away and it’s easy. Boy scouts use the first couple sites a lot because they aren’t far from the parking area, we decided we didn’t want to deal with all that and reserved a spot in the campground the farthest away from the parking lot. I think we walked about 5 miles in. Being that is was Feb. and cold, we had the whole place to ourselves. We only saw one person on the trails as we hiked in. We were set up in camp around noon and spent the rest of the day gathering wood and talking shit to one another.
As it began to get dark we decided to eat…mainly because we were freezing and night was coming fast. After we ate, we sat there around the fire and the shit talking continued. We began to hear noises off in the distance. Hoots and hollers, they weren’t real close to us, but I guess they were over a ridge or two. We would hear them and then nothing for a few minutes, then again, this went on for about half hour. We all heard the sounds at the time but we really didn’t think much about it. You hear stuff in the woods and I think we all figured it was just other camper somewhere out there.
This really didn’t make much sense though since we only passed one person that day and the time of year isn’t for the faint of heart. My buddy kept saying he could see something off in the distance, but we would shine our lights over there and see nothing, so we gave him shit about it and laughed. We all went to bed when it started to lightly snow. Nothing else happened. Like I said earlier, I didn’t think too much about it until I started listening. I did a search for “bigfoot sightings in nc” and found out that there have been sightings in both Burke County and the adjacent Cleveland County. So much so, that they have a nickname for the Sasquatch, “Knobby”. Do you guys have any info on N.C. sightings and/or have you ever researched anything here? The pic below shows where we camped during the experience described above. (35°35’41.46″N, 81°40’37.82″W)
I have heard a couple people say “boogers” on your show. That is a common term around here. I have heard my dad and many older people in my family say “don’t let the wooly boogers get ya” or “watch out for boogers”. I never thought to ask what the hell a booger was. Also, it’s interesting to me that I hope this message didn’t take up too much of your time and if you read it, I hope found it interesting. Sorry for any grammatical errors, it’s late and I’m too tired to proofread.”