Sasquatch Chronicles Blog

A listener writes “The summer of ’86 was a hot one,my girlfriend and I were in Oregon, I was playing some gigs across the beautiful state of Oregon. My camper van was our motel on wheels. Every night after the gig, we searched for a new place to park our camper.

We particularly liked a place outside of the city of Bend, it had a beautiful waterfall but even that got tiresome so on a day I wasn’t playing we traveled around the area of Bend, nothing looked inviting so we kept driving out toward the desert area.

That’s when I saw an old sign that clearly was from a different era, the sign read (barely able to read it) the Skeleton Caves. I pulled over and looked at the map, nothing about it but on closer look it said “skeleton cave tours” but the road going to the cave had not been used in many years, almost grown over but I was feeling good about finding a cool place to camp for a couple of days, so off we went.

The road was a dirt road, it drove like you were on a washboard, slow go. Then we finally got to the cave.

My girlfriend started to get dinner started but first we went to the cave entrance which was actually a hole in the ground, there were steps going down to the cave. We walked into the mouth of the cave. It went down to total blackness so we only went maybe 25 or 30 yards, it seemed my flashlight was going dim so we went back to the camper, where my girlfriend returned to getting dinner which left me to explore the area.

Then I got a great idea, I had a little generator with me, I thought why not start the generator get my amp out and guitar and put the amp down in the mouth of the cave, then I fired it up, got down in the first 10 or 20 yards or so, put my guitar on plugged in and kicked it into distortion mode….damn …natural reverb!! I must have played for an half hour then I got my electric mandolin out and rocked out on that for about a half hour with distortion.

Dinner was getting almost ready so I packed up the generator and my equipment and started my dinner, we had the doors open everything was great then, off to the front of my van came the most guttural scream I have ever heard, it chilled me to the bone, I froze..my girlfriend seemed not to hear it! I thought its just my imagination, time for dinner, sitting in the camper eating and keeping my eyes toward where the sound came from…then I heard it again!

I then asked my girlfriend surely you heard that, no she said…in just a few moments I had heard two of the guttural sounds, that released what seemed to be a fight or flight instinct in me but I’m a young and strong man so as I was eating dinner. It was getting dusk, couldn’t see anything in the tree line, my head was like on a swivel, looking over here and over there, then I heard some small trees and bushes rustling behind us.

By this time I was so jumpy I started to shake a little, that’s when I heard another scream, for lack of a better term, in the same place as I heard it to start with. Then another scream further to my right, it seemed to be answering the first one and then from the tree line behind us, which was much closer to our camper, came a much deeper scream, I said to my girlfriend you must have heard that. I somehow managed to get the courage to get a couple of things I had sitting outside the camper packed up when all of a sudden all three places where I heard them ,started to scream first one, the another and the one behind us seemed to be communicating to each other! And getting closer.

The one behind us seemed to be the loudest, I grew up in a house with boys, testosterone was thick in our home, we were all afraid of nothing but this situation had me just about quivering.

Well I had enough of this, it was time to go, like I said fight or flight, now it’s flight! I told my girlfriend we’re leaving. I then remembered the road coming in here was a slow drive, washboard road and over grown trees and bushes, I realized it was going to be a slow couple of miles.

Started the van, turned it around and headed out of there but I heard what seemed to be almost child-like a repetitive scream, I looked to my right and saw small trees moving with what light I had left to see with, what in the hell could all of this mean, my mind couldn’t get it rationally understood. So off I drive to the main road, bad road was too slow, but I was going as fast as I could. Off to the left and off to the right my head looking back and forth, saw something moving the brush on my left, my headlights were the only light there was on that moonless night.

Both hands on the wheel I sped up the pace, not wanting to see what was in the bushes, finally we got on the main highway and drove about 20 miles before I found a spot to spend the night. I got out of the van walking off all the adrenaline I had in me.

I did not actually see what was screaming at me, but being in Oregon, my thoughts were it was Bigfoot! There is no telling how far that cave system went and what did they think when I played screaming rock and roll guitar and mandolin down in that cave. I never really thought much about Bigfoot, it was just fodder for movies and tv but now I am a firm believer.

So this story is a little different, it’s not a full sighting but an audible encounter. Years later the hair on my arms stand up just remembering that day.”