Sasquatch Chronicles Blog

I want to thank Stephanie B for sharing this in the Facebook group. Stephanie B writes:

I was driving to town one morning (we lived 32 miles from town). It was a bright Florida morning, the sun shone gold and lovely. As I turned onto our clay plowed dirt road I glanced in my rearview mirror by habit and saw a man lean forward and poke his head into the road, look to his left (which would be behind me), and then he glanced to his right. He saw my car and quickly stepped back into the trees. I slammed on brakes and stared agape at it because it was not a man but the face looked like a man’s face. Only it wasn’t a man!

The body was covered (not the palms of the hands or the entire face) in auburn hair. The hair reminded me of orangutan-colored hair. The hair was long and draped down its body. I hear people talk about the Florida skunk ape being black. What I saw was unquestionably auburn colored. I did not get a clear view of the legs from the thighs below partly because the undergrowth covered them and partly because I did not want to look away from its face. I was shocked and dismayed and too frightened to look down at it’s legs for more than a quick glance.

I couldn’t move. I just stared at it while it watched me from the scraggly Oakjack tree it had retreated behind. Now this is funny because the trees on that part of the trail and along the edge of the dirt road were only little Oakjack trees that didn’t afford much cover. (Directly across the road from the trail were planted pines, dark, and a bit thick.) The fellow then lifted his hand—that hand was like a man’s hand. The thumb I vividly recall worked like mine—and he pressed a branch aside and upwards and peeked at me. The way that hand worked was amazing. He used his thumb and fingers to ease that branch up and then he bent slightly and peeked at me from beneath the branch. I still smile at that memory because I think, “Did he really think I couldn’t see him through that scraggly tree?” I saw him. I was no more than 20 feet away. I say ‘him’ because of its height. It must have stood 8 foot tall but it seemed like 9 foot. No doubt, I feel like it was 9 foot tall because it was so frightening of an experience. Surely it could not have been that tall!

And the shoulders. Good grief! They were so broad. The arms hung long and muscular, frighteningly full of strength. The shape of the top of the head was what I’ve come to learn is called conical. It tapered up from the forehead and was covered in hair that draped down, but it wasn’t sharply pointed. The forehead was not so much flat as it was broad, wide and strong I guess. The jaw was square sort of strong and regally stubborn.

What I most recall is the face, so like a man’s face. The nose was . . . how can I explain it? It was like a man’s nose only broader, the nostrils more defined? Perhaps flatter is the word I’m looking for. The lips were well-defined and not covered in hair. I recall seeing hair that began about halfway down its chin like a goatee of sorts—a Bigfoot goatee, I suppose! But this goatee continued outward to outline the bottom part of the face and downward to blend with the hair on the short neck, shoulders, chest, and body. I don’t know if I’m wrong but I got the sense that the fellow was young because he appeared unscarred or not so scruffy as you might expect of a wild animal that had lived for several years in the woods and swamps, if that makes sense. I did not smell anything foul as I’ve heard of other sightings, but I was in my little Pinto car with the windows rolled up.

There’s no way what I saw was a bear. I know bears. No one could confuse an upright beast with the hands and face of a man with a bear. It wasn’t a man in a monkey suit either. People didn’t do that back then not where I lived. They knew better than to try any nonsense like that. In that neck of the woods, people shot first and asked questions later.

So after a few moments of staring at one another, I pulled myself together enough to drive forward to the next driveway, which was also on our 10 acres, and turn around. There was no way I was going to back toward the fellow so I could turn around and get a better look at it. I wanted to be driving at a fairly good clip when I drove by it because I was afraid. So, I turned around and drove back to the spot and it was gone. I did not get out of the car to look for tracks or signs of what I’d seen. No way! I realized then that the fellow had been on the trail that I often used, the trial I had thought was a deer trail. After that, I never walked in the woods again. I did not go and look for proof of what I saw. I only wanted to forget it. I still don’t walk or hike the woods. I can do without ever experiencing that again. I wish I’d never seen it. I wish I was blissfully ignorant of their existence.