Ginger and I continue exploring a hilltop we climbed following tree-leans. On the reverse side of the hilltop, we find teepees of broken trees and a wallow with large tree structures. The trees are woven together in a fashion that defies wind, or snow-load. X’s surround the area.
I keep getting whiffs of bad odor, until Ginger alarms and I get the distinct smell of shit. It wasn’t either of us. I didn’t step in anything. We were at least a mile from the roads and trails. The scent was strong, like someone took a crap right next to us.
Ginger and I follow a path of tree-leans that lead to a mountain top with granite outcrops. I hear whoops as I leave the designated trail to follow the tree-leans up the hill, but in the wind, they are indistinct, so I am uncertain.
The tree-leans give way to tee-pee structures and X’s surrounding the hilltop. We don’t venture into the granite outcrop, but skirt around it looking for definitive structures to film. The outcrop seemed spooky. It’s where I thought the whoops came from.
Ginger and I continue exploring this hilltop in Episode 3, where we find more evidence and get a bit nervous.
In this initial episode of Gila Bigfoot, my brother and I drive through remote campsites in known Bigfoot country in eastern Arizona. Along the way we see trail markers. One trail is close to our campsite, so we follow it.
People unfamiliar with Bigfoot trails will say we followed leaning, wind-blown trees that just coincidentally form a distinct corridor through the forest. It’s coincidence the corridor of fallen trees is surrounded by forest without leaning trees.
Skeptics will say it’s coincidence the trees generally lean the same direction at a consistent angle, unnaturally stripped of bark and branches, not connected to root balls, or broken stumps.
And it’s coincidence the ground is scuffled, like something large moved through that corridor of leaning trees. Something that followed the tree-leans straight up the hillside instead of meandering on switchback paths like game trails typically do.
It must be coincidence they lead to a ridge where there is a ‘fence line’ of downed trees blocking an aspen grove that hides another trail I surveyed previously. A ‘fence line’ that has no apparent reason for being there; where there is no stream bank, or natural feature to explain how they formed a barrier, piled on top of each other in the same direction.
It’s just another coincidence the ridge trail leads to water at the points where the stream enters and exits the lake, where the land is swampy and shallow, where it’s easy to find crawdads and fish.
And of course, it’s coincidence we hear wood knocks from this trail in the middle of the night.
Following the 2017 conference, several of us decided to see the Grand Canyon. We left for Flagstaff as the Solar eclipse ended. We made several hikes over the following days. This film was taken by Andrew Fitts at a cinder cone in the San Francisco peak volcanic field, called Red Mountain. An article on the conference is here.
Ginger and I look for ‘squatter man’ in a variety of locations near Tucson, Arizona … without much luck.
‘Squatter man’
Archaic petroglyphs are found on every continent except Antarctica. They are figures pecked into rock. Typically they are found on rocks that have a patina of dark glaze called desert varnish, and the artist created the figures by pecking away the varnish to expose the lighter, native rock beneath.
Similar figures are also found in intaglios, like those at Nazca, Peru, and on other forms of carved art, like the ‘Rongu Rongu’ text of Easter Island, and even totems found in Siberia.
They were made by stone age people. Although when they were made can’t be dated by the rock itself, some have been found in association with campfires, or crusted with lake sediments that can be. They indicate some were made as long ago as 10,000 BCE.
What is remarkable is they depict the same variety of patterns – squiggly lines, concentric circles, spirals and other geometric shapes. Also animals, ladders, oddly elongated alien-looking figures, and of course squatter man – a stick-man figure with arms and legs spread in a variety of “hands-up, don’t shoot” postures.
Peratt Column
Actually, squatter man comes in several forms, sometime with a bird’s head, sometimes a fat belly. Yet these figures are consistently found everywhere, as if ancient people around the world had exactly the same idea.
How do the consensus scientists explain this? Some speculate that ancient man lacked imagination. Their emerging artistic abilities only allowed them to create these stick-like figures to represent people dancing and cavorting around the rocks, the animals they hunted, and simple geometric shapes that pleased them.
Others speculate that shamans made them after eating hallucinogenic plants, and the shapes are similar because their visions were created by the drug. I can tell you, these shapes are not what one sees with any magic mushroom, hallucinogenic cactus, DMT, or even LSD. I can speak with authority on that.
Alternative theories abound with the ‘Ancient Aliens’ community and UFO crowd. Of course they see evidence of aliens and UFO’s in every enigma from the past. Like the consensus scientists, they have a belief system to satisfy.
What they really are was discovered by a PhD., plasma physicist at Los Alamos Laboratories; Anthony Peratt, in association with Dave Talbott, one of the founders and principal researchers behind the Thunderbolts Project. Talbott showed Peratt one of these figures and he immediately recognized it depicted an extremely high energy ‘plasma instability’ like those created at Los Alamos for nuclear research. In other words, they depict plasma aurora like the Northern Lights, except at extremely high energy unlike we see today.
Squatter Man
Peratt performed an extensive investigation, engaging volunteers from around the world to document over one million of the figures. They documented the shapes, locations and orientation with respect to what direction the creators must have looked in the sky to see the glowing apparitions. His work is documented in a peer reviewed paper published by IEEE, the largest professional science journal in the world. This link will take you to Plasma Universe, his website, where you can find the paper and many more details about the phenomena.
The implications are enormous. For one, it explains why the same figures appear around the world – because people in the distant past witnessed them in near-earth space. It explains the enigma of such features as the Nazca Lines. Also, it means ancient people were experiencing an extreme event in the solar system, possibly from huge solar flares, or a large passing comet. Something energized earth’s magnetosphere with electricity that caused these auroral patterns to appear.
The event would have been catastrophic, because it means Earth would have been washed in deadly radiation. They point to a time in the past when catastrophic events occurred – a lost chapter in our past we don’t fully understand.
One would think archaeologists, historians and paleontologists would be thrilled about this discovery. One would think … but not so. They have totally ignored it because of scientific jealousy and because it doesn’t fit their paradigm. Who does this electrical engineer, Peratt think he is?
I talked to one “expert”, a PhD who actually studies southwest rock art for a living. He asked if Peratt had his silly paper peer reviewed by a proper archaeologist. I said no, because archaeologists don’t know diddly about plasma. I doubt one could be found who studied algebra, let alone quantum physics. It’s unfortunate, but consensus science shows less real curiosity about the cosmos than they do a need to protect their own theories and belief system. Science for many has become a pseudo-religion, not a method of inquiry.
Rocks in the deserts of North America have thousands of these petroglyphs. In this Electric Earth video, I’ll take Ginger on adventures to find some. It isn’t easy.
In previous articles, we discussed evidence of electromagnetic and hydrodynamic forces that shaped the landscape with arcing currents in an atmospheric surface conductive path. We theorized these currents sent bolides of plasma jetting through the atmosphere, blow-torching the ground below into craters and mountainous blisters, based on observed characteristics of the landscape.
The evidence on the landscape is in the form of triangular buttressed mountains and related land forms that display the shape of windblown deposits created by hot supersonic winds under the influence of shock waves. The triangular forms are created by reflected shock waves, heat, winds, molten rock and dust stirred by the blast of the arc.
Recent field examination of triangular buttress features on monoclines in the Four Corners region of the southwest U.S. provides some confirming evidence for the theory, some conflicting evidence, as well as new information to expand theories for Electric Earth geology.
A = Four Corners, B = Site of Investigation – Google Earth Image
Field Notes from Four Corners
“Four Corners” is a nickname for the location in North America where the borders of Arizona, Utah, New Mexico and Colorado meet. It is a region of splendid beauty, history, mystery and geology.
It is among the most ancient regions known to have been occupied by the earliest humans in North America. Blackened rock is decorated with archaic petroglyphs and pictographs. “Squatter Man” appears on random canyon walls.
It’s a region that suffered catastrophe, causing inhabitants to suddenly flee in a mass diaspora seven centuries ago. Cliff houses abandoned by the Anasazi Pueblo people haunt this region; derelict and silent in deep canyon clefts.
Through it flows the San Juan River, from headwaters at the Continental Divide immediately east of the region, to confluence with the Colorado River immediately to the west, before their joined flow cuts into Lake Powell and the Grand Canyon.
Yet the region is arid, desert plateau over 1500 meters above sea level. The geologic enigma of Monument Valley lies at its core. On a satellite image, it stands out like a bulls-eye on the landscape of North America.
Near the Navajo town of Kayenta, Arizona is the southern end of a monocline – a curvalinear ridge nearly 100 km long, that extends from Kayenta east, and then north to Horse Mountain in Utah. It’s named Comb Ridge. It borders Monument Valley on the south, and east, and is sliced by the San Juan River at the mid-point. A field examination of Comb Ridge was recently performed and is the focus of this article. As we will discover, it holds answers about the form of our planet.
Pressure Ridge (AKA, The Monocline)
Below is an image of Comb Ridge near the town of Kayenta, Arizona. It was investigated on August 13, and a subsequent investigation was made the following week of another monocline ridge, the San Rafael Reef in Utah, to compare and confirm consistency of findings. A report on the findings of the San Rafael investigation is forthcoming, however some photographic evidence from the San Rafael Reef is used in this article to illustrate findings consistent to both monoclines.
The Kayenta Monocline (pin denotes area investigated) – Google Earth image.San Rafael Reef, Utah – photo by author.
By mainstream reasoning, these are sandstone sediments that drape over the scarp of a deep basement fault, where one side of the fault lifts higher than the other leaving a linear ridge on the landscape. These ridges are often called hogbacks. They can be a linear hill stretching a few hundred meters, elevated a dozen meters in relief , or they can be a curvalinear mountain ranging more than a hundred kilometers long and a thousand meters in elevation.
Their most common characteristic is they display the layers of sediment exposed on one side along the steep and often jagged high end, and a shallower sloped and generally planar faced opposite side – a ski slope is the term often used.
Layered sandstone tilted to a consistent angle is characteristic of the monocline. Google Earth image.
They also display particular features that betray their true origin. Namely, triangular buttresses.
Triangular Buttresses near Kayenta, Arizona. Google Earth image.
Arcing current discharge will create a supersonic shock wave. A shock wave travels as a pressure wave though a medium until it hits a medium of higher density, and then it reflects. Shock reflections create standing waves in the general shape of triangles and diamonds, with other variables contributing additional effects that can modify the form.
Reflected shock waves from a bullet impact produce triangular wave forms in higher density material surrounding the impact.
These are not created in the same fashion as described in Arc Blast, however, at least not exactly the same. They are still created by supersonic shock waves and winds, only the cause of the winds is not an atmospheric arc, as described for an arc blast.
On-site examination of the monocline reveals no mountain core beneath, or behind the layers forming the buttresses as expected from an arc blast event. By all appearance, they are a windblown pressure ridge, against which the buttresses formed.
Mainstream theory holds that triangular buttresses on the monocline are either formed by seismic waves, or water erosion.
The seismic theory is nonsense, since the theory requires the triangles to form by shifting fault blocks and this simply does not comport with observation. That would create discontinuities and broken debris between shifted blocks and they aren’t present. The buttresses are monolithic layers and sheets without significant displacement at faults and cracks.
Seismic forces had nothing to do with forming them. Close examination of the hills and surroundings allows us to address water erosion more fully, and find evidence for a theory of electrical formation. Let’s begin with the survey.
Examining The Buttresses
Area of investigation near Kayenta, Arizona. Photo by author.Face view of the Kayenta buttress examined. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.
The dip of the stratified layers at the place of investigation was approximately 20 degrees, although other areas displayed both steeper and shallower angles of repose. The strike orientation (from center of triangles base to apex) was north – northwest. The hogback bends northward, so the strike near the north end is due west.
Water Erosion
Definite signs of water erosion were found on exposed sandstone walls in the creek that ran between the base of the buttresses. Evidence of significant flow in the wash showed to a height of about five meters above the creek bed.
Water worn sandstone in the wash at the base of the buttress – the only significant water erosion found. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.
Here is found the smooth, rounded, water worn rock one expects to see as the result of water erosion. Creeks flow between buttresses in this fashion infrequently, so are not the cause of their consistent triangular formation. This creek was used as an access to traverse through the monocline.
Elsewhere, water erosion was not evident other than superficial surface erosion and discolorations. Following are several examples that dispute water erosion as the mechanism that formed the triangles.
Wind Blown Rock
The edges of layers show the fineness of strata. Moisture may have caused clay to swell, contributing to the weathering, but smoothed edges from flowing water is not evident.
Finely layered, weathered sandstone on the uppermost layer. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.A thirsty investigator finds disappointment – where is the water? No evidence here. Kayenta, Arizona, photo by author.Apex of the buttress in the background is loosely consolidated, and should be easily carved by water, yet shows no evidence of water erosion. The underlying strata forms an uneven surface of harder rock with contours that could not physically produce a triangular shape by water erosion on the buttress below.The apex of the harmonic buttress is loosely consolidated and displays no evidence of shaping by water erosion. San Rafael – photo by author.Note the triangular definition of the highest peaks where the red and white banded layers appear – there is no watershed above to provide water for erosion, yet they are triangular buttresses. Also note, the lower harmonic wave forms are near perfect triangular layers over a chaotically channeled layer of rock – is there any plausibility to the notion that water, randomly flowing down these tortured channels, could form dozens of triangular buttresses in a coherent harmonic distribution that repeats in fractal form for miles? San Rafael – photo by author.Supersonic shock and wind is the only means of forming consistent repetition of harmonic wave forms. Mainstream theory of water erosion cannot do this (if you think it can, please reference some empirical evidence). San Rafael, Utah – photo by author
Layered Strata
Strata are sandwiched in thin, straight, even layers, as well as monolithic concretions.
A meter thick layer separates two monolithic layers. The layers’ edge has a molded wavy appearance, but the thin layer makes a straight line if viewed edge-on. San Rafael, Utah – photo by author.
The San Rafael Reef displays mixed bands of what appears to be white Wingate Sandstone of Triassic age, and red Navajo Sandstone of Jurassic age. How they mixed in alternating bands on triangular Buttresses is best explained by supersonic winds.
White layers of Wingate Sandstone streak through layers of red Navajo Sandstone. What caused them to mix like this?. San Rafael, Utah – photo by author.Loosely consolidated dirt and rock is sandwiched between fine, hard sandstone. San Rafael, Utah – photo by author.
Some layers are loosely consolidated sand and dirt in a mixed matrix including chunks of rock. Some are finely grained hard rock.
Still others are hard, flat and ruler straight layers of such thin, even depth, they appear as if electroplated onto the layer below. These layers are four to twelve inches of extremely hard rock, flat surfaced and scored with rectilinear fractures such that it resembles a brick wall. The rock even looks like baked brick, with smooth planar surfaces.
“Brick walls like this were observed as the outer layer, as shown here, and as intermediate layers on buttresses. San Rafael, Utah, photo by author.
Also in the photo above, small triangular red discolorations appear in harmonic reflection across the base of the “brick wall” at about knee height, as if spray painted on – they can barely be discerned in the lower right.
Some layers display plastic deformation, as if molten, or hot and plastic when deposited. Typically seen composed of fine grained, tightly packed, homogeneous, hardened sandstone.
Visual evidence of fluid plasticity when deposited – apex of the top layer droops over the preceding layers. Note the narrow gray pressure ridge alongside the road behind the monocline was also layered there by winds. Kayenta – Photo by author.The outer edge of the top layer displays an upward curl in places, indicative of plastic deformation, or boundary layer wind effects during deposition. Note the rough edged breccia on the lower layer shows no path, or effects from water erosion. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.
Shock Fractures
Striations and fractures appear throughout the buttresses. Typically they form at the same angle as the triangle, normal to it, or in checkerboard fashion as shown in the picture below, consistent with shock effects. Checkerboards appear in hardened strata that may have shrunk while cooling, creating a pillowing effect that widens striations at the surface. Water has superficially eroded striations vertical with respect to the hill, but horizontal striations are straight and clean.
Surface fractures appear in diagonal and rectilinear lines consistent with dissipating shock reflections.Deep parallel cuts are consistent with expanding shock waves. Kayenta – photo by author.
An Unexpected Find – Dikes
Facing the windward side of Comb Ridge is a vast windswept plain that drops into a river valley running parallel to the ridge. The plain is nearly featureless, except for the appearance of linear dikes radiating away from the ridge towards the river. The dikes are of a dark brown sandstone that resembles the Chinle Formation of Triassic sediments. The Chinle displays this amorphous, dark sandstone, that looks like petrified, boiled mud, throughout the southern Colorado Plateau.
Dikes on plains south of monocline. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.Dikes aren’t straight. They offset, curve, wave and lean. Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.Visibly similar to Chinle Formation (unconfirmed). This is about twenty feet tall. See the hole? Kayenta, Arizona – photo by author.
The appearance of Dikes, their location and orientation, are curious for mainstream interpretation, given that similar dikes in the region are attributed to volcanic action. Near the meeting point of the four corner States juts Shiprock mountain. It has dikes emanating from it in a “Y” formation (or “wye” – hint, hint). How do the dikes of Shiprock relate to dikes formed at a monocline?
Shiprock from overhead showing radial dike “Y” pattern.
Situational Awareness
The Comb Ridge dikes visible at the surface are highlighted in the image below. It is apparent the dikes are related to the buttresses. One might conclude these are shock induced features, given their relation to shock induced triangular buttresses. They radiate at angles consistent with the angle of the buttresses and appear to terminate at the ridge itself. Other curious features can be found along the dikes.
Blue lines show dikes readily visible at the surface. It’s apparent they radiate from the monocline.
Future articles will further explore the Kayenta monocline, the dikes and the Four Corners region in general. This will include examination of fulgarite and fulgamite evidence, wind pattern evidence from the orientation of pressure ridges and buttresses, and the cause of winds and other forces that formed the landscape.
Okay, I’m serious about Bigfoot. It may not make some people happy that I’m mixing the classical physics of Electric Universe with a crypto-legend like the hairy-man, but from my perspective, I’ll be seen as crazy by fewer people for believing in Bigfoot than in a Grand Unified Electrical Theory. Nobody understands magnetism, not even physicists, but everyone gets the boogey-man. My approach is to go for the truth and damn the torpedoes.
Besides, I saw one…it’s leg anyway. It screamed like a banshee and scared the shit out of me. So, how can I undo that. Enjoy the story.
The Bigfoot Hunter
What? You thought it was me? Not on your life. There isn’t a gun big enough to make me feel safe. I send Ginger out. She’s fearless – just look at that face. Here she is in her element:
Ginger on the trail of Bigfoot
You can see the determination. See the furrow in her brow… look out, Bigfoot! I have a theory they avoid people like the plague because we keep dogs. The hairy-men hate dogs.
The Hunt
Ginger and I traveled to a little known place in Arizona where the creatures are known to make an appearance now and then. I’m not saying where it is, but it’s a large mountain that looks like this one. We arrived and found a beautiful camp by the lake.
Now I need to give a little back-story as to why we came to this particular place. That is, besides the many reported sightings, encounters, local legends and Apache lore that attest to its presence.
I camped at this lake a few weeks ago with my friends, Bean and Bobblehead. During the night, around two or three AM, a pick-up truck left a campsite across the lake from us and roared past in a hurry. This woke me up.
A few minutes later I heard loud banging across the lake from the direction the truck came from. Each campsite is equipped with a steel bear-proof food storage container – you can see it in the picture of the campsite. The banging sounded like someone was taking a baseball bat to one of these steel boxes. There were three, or four loud bangs, a pause, more bangs, another pause and more bangs. Then a high pitched, “hoo, hoo” like a chimpanzee shout.
Soon after, Ginger crawled out of the sleeping bag and looked at the tent door. I thought she needed to potty, or get water, so I unzipped the tent. She immediately crouched low, dropped her ears and tail, and growled with deep, serious intent out the opening. She almost never growls and I’ve only heard her do that when fending off a mean dog, or one of the meth addicts in our neighborhood. I don’t know how she can tell a meth addict from anyone else. Same way we do, I guess, because they’re scary.
Anyway, she then turned around and slunk into the bottom of the sleeping bag. I didn’t hear anything, but I shut the tent real quick.
Now, I know this could have been some inconsiderate campers. Nevertheless, on the drive down the mountain I kept my eyes out for any strangeness. Deep, dark, old growth forests have plenty of weird things going on. Humans don’t generally notice because we are as incompetent in the woods as some presidential candidates are with State secrets. But there is strange and there is high strangeness. I saw high strangeness.
So did Ginger. She was the one who had to go back and see more. See, she’s been watching Bigfoot YouTube videos with me for years now. She fashions herself a canine BoBo.
It all started after my own encounter in California (read the “Encounter” if you want that story). When I began to research Bigfoot, Ginger was in my lap, soaking-up all the same information. It’s really quite astounding if you take the time with an honest, open mind to look into it. I know that is almost impossible to do – have an open mind that is – because most people don’t look into anything. They are told everything.
What everyone is told is that the “credible people” who say they’ve seen a Bigfoot are simply mistaken. They likely saw a bear and the “other people” are just nuts. Well there are those, no doubt. But what they don’t say is the improbability of so many hunters, hikers, sheriffs, forest rangers; people educated both in the woods and in schools, who swear they have seen one, or experienced some encounter that isn’t otherwise explicable.
Plus the fact there is absolutely no ecological, or biological reason they can’t exist. After all, we have fossils of large bipedal hominids and apes, we carry Neanderthal and Denovisan DNA in our genes, we have living gorillas, orangutans, chimps, several other apes, and more still being found as recently as the last couple decades, so it isn’t even improbable.
The other thing that pisses me off to no end is every time someone does a documentary on Bigfoot, they bring out some Biology professor in a bow-tie to tell us all how wrong we are to think there is an undocumented ape in the woods. I’ve never seen one of these professors who looked like they could keep a campfire lit, let alone find their way back from the privy without a GPS. We have millions of undocumented people in this country. Who’s to say there aren’t a few thousand hairy ones living where few people dare to go.
Well, Ginger knows all this. That is why she insisted we go camping at that lake again. We couldn’t take Bean, or Bobblehead and their dogs, because they just drink beer and this was to be all business as far as Ginger was concerned. I agreed, because I knew I could take some great photos of the Arc Blast features on the mountain. Besides, there is no saying “no” to Ginger.
We chose this particular campsite because it was the location we heard the banging. It was the farthest down the road, next to the dam and at least a hundred yards from the next campers.
We left on the fourth of July. This was strategic on two counts. First, all the holiday campers would be leaving that day and we like our solitude. Second, all the Bigfoot should be ready to raise hell now that the firework wielding, beer soaked campers were gone. We thought the Skeezamen ( a local name) might even venture to the lake now that it was quite after the long weekend. I can’t help but think that crawdads would be one of their favorite snacks – its one of mine.
The camp-site was outstanding, the closest to the lake, with a view and even a little landing next to the dam. Behind us the hill climbed to a peak forested with big Ponderosa and lots of fallen wood for the fire.
Our calculations were excellent as far as timing. We passed dozens of trucks going down the mountain. When we arrived at the lake there were only four other campers in the entire campground. We met our closest neighbors, who were staying over from the previous day. They kind of looked happy to see someone else in the campground.
After the usual chores of setting up camp, collecting wood and starting a fire, Ginger sniffed flowers while I relaxed with a cold refreshment and watched the setting sun turn the ripples on the lake monochrome. The evening was cooling, but I was still okay in a tee-shirt.
Two people were fishing the opposite shore in a canoe as I walked down to the landing to enjoy the breeze in the fading light. It was then I heard the chimps again. That’s when I took this picture with the camera pointing in the direction the screams were coming from. I tried to record the sounds, but all I captured was my own breathing.
The time before, what I heard was a “hoo, hoo” yell, like a playful chimp might make. This wasn’t playful. It was screaming, hoots and occasional low grunts that went on for about twenty minutes.
As I listened, Ginger sniffed flowers until I said, “Do you hear that?” She finally perked up and listened. Across the lake, the people in the boat were jostling about, trying to row back to the boat landing. I can’t say whether it was because of the screams, or because it was getting dark, but they seemed to be trying to hurry away from the other shore.
I heard other campers from that direction blowing air horns, as if to chase off a bear. The air horns were no louder than the screaming.
The noise ended. It was not coyotes. I cannot believe it was humans. It was way too loud and continuous. Who screams and hoots and growls for twenty minutes. I don’t think a human can even make some of the sounds we heard.
I built-up the fire and began fixing dinner. We didn’t hear anything else that night, except a skunk that invaded the camp and made a stink.
In the morning, I fired up a big coffee and loaded Ginger in the StRange Rover. It was time to go searching. As we drove out of the campgrounds, we passed by the creek that fed the lake. That was where the screams came from. It was dense forested wetlands that an army could hide in.
We drove about five miles to the end of the road and then followed a four wheel drive trail to some undeveloped campsites. This was a pretty wild area, but I didn’t see anything out of ordinary. We drove back another ten miles the other way. Here is where I saw the strangeness before. For about a five mile stretch near the lake, there were unusual tree breaks and tree structures I noticed the previous trip.
Strangeness
Trees fall over. Trees break; blown by winds, hit by lightning, wounded by fire. There are many ways a tree can fall and be left leaning against another, especially in an ungroomed, old growth area like this one. But there seemed to be a pattern.
Ginger and I scouted several areas where the trees seemed arranged non-randomly. There were several areas where there were these crosses formed from broken tree trunks. They faced the road squarely with lots of other disturbance around them; a profusion of broken limbs, stumps and trunks leaning against other trees.
Often, the trees were wedged between other trees.
So, yes..that can happen naturally, but what about this?
This one is wedged and bent sideways between trees. Here are more views of the same tree. It did not fall this way without help.
The top left picture shows the base of the tree stuck in the ground. The bottom left shows the broken tip wedged between the bigger trees. The big picture show how it crosses like a barrier next to the road.
There were more elaborate structures, too. These trees are bent to the ground and held down by logs.
There are two trees still rooted and bent over in arches, another laid over in the same direction and one pressed against the trunk of the center tree like a spring. Two logs are laid over all four to hold them down. Well, it seems odd to me. Ginger wouldn’t get out of the car. She was bored with tree structures.
I was fascinated though. My engineer mind tried to decode a plausible natural cause. It couldn’t. Here is another that defies logic.I suppose this could have fallen in a wind this way. If it was the only one like it I would even assume so, but there are several broken, bent or wedged in improbable positions like this in clusters. Note all the other leaning trees nearby. Here are more views of the same trees.Ginger was getting annoyed I was looking at trees. She wanted to look for Bigfoot. She doesn’t make the connection with trees because she’s a dog. Dogs don’t look up. If it had been a turd on the ground, or something fun to pee on, she’d have been more interested.
Here is another.Notice how the leaning trees are held down by the broken tree? They should not have been in the line of fall if this had been wind or snow. That’s how they always seem to fall in this particular area though.
Of course I didn’t get a picture of the best one I found. It was a large trunk of a tree wedged into a standing trio of live trees, but it had branches that wrapped both direction behind the other trees. In other words, it could not have fallen there without snapping those big branches. It looked like it was shoved between the trees, bottom first.
As I examined it, looking for the right camera angle, rock clacking began in the woods not far away. I left without a picture.
So all of this was pretty interesting to me, but Ginger wasn’t impressed. She wanted something to growl at. After an exhausting day searching the forest, we returned to camp and settled down for the evening. At least I did. Ginger wandered off on her own.
Bad Daddy
After all that time I walked in the forest, she sat in the StRange Rover and slept. Now she wanted to go hunting for the Skeezamen. What the hell, I thought. I’m pooped. I wasn’t too nice about corralling her back to the campsite. I even spanked her and it made her mad. So she trotted up the hill and disappeared.
It was dusk, so this action worried me. I climbed the hill after her, all the way to the top. The reverse side of the hill was a cliff. It dropped all the way to the valley floor. I’m talking a drop of about five thousand feet, nearly vertical. It was like looking into the Grand Canyon. If she went down that slope, I knew she wasn’t coming back up.
Not only are these woods legendary for the Skeezamen, but it has the largest bear concentration in the State, not to mention cougars, bobcats and venomous things of all types. I was worried.
Twice more I combed the mountain in the dark with a flashlight. I really didn’t care about any chimp noises at this point. I didn’t hear anything anyway. I even turned the light out to listen – for some reason I seem to hear better that way. Nothing.
I crawled into the tent and left the flap open and the fire burning so she could find her way back. I woke at first light to the sound of a crow. Crows are ubiquitous in these mountain. They caw all the time, part of the forest background noise. This crow was being answered by another. Every time it cawed, another answered. Only the answer was more of a cow than a caw.
It is said that Bigfoot like to mimic animal calls and even people talking, only they aren’t very good at it. They make the right tones, but can’t get the inflections right. I have wondered if this is true, or just an excuse made by TV Bigfoot hunters who don’t have any other “evidence” to point to – you gotta make a show.
This crow made me think twice about that. But I was in no mood to ponder. Ginger had not returned. I climbed the mountain three more times, crossed the dam and followed the stream as far as I could. No sign of her.
By eight AM, other campers were up cooking breakfast. I hoped she’d found shelter with one of them and was at their camp waiting for bacon. For a little dog, she can eat lot of bacon. I packed my kit and drove to each one. No one had seen her.
Brave Ginger
Ginger and I are very attached. She’s a weird dog, but also the smartest, warmest dog I’ve ever known. By warm, I mean warm. Mexican aristocrats bred Chihuahuas to sleep with because they were better than hot water bottles. This is how we sleep, with her curled against my back to keep us warm.
I returned to the empty camp despondent. I feared at this point she must be dead. There were too many wild and hungry things out there a city dog had no notion of. She’s never slept a single night outside of a bed.
I could not bear the thought of her lost on that vast mountain, alone, defenseless and scared. I could not bear the thought of leaving and never knowing. I realized, I would need to notify the Forest Service, the Humane Society and post flyers around the campground – all in futility. I decided I would wait until noon before leaving for the nearest town.
And then a miracle happened. She slunk out of the tall grass a few feet from me, head down, a bit torn-up and bloody and terribly frightened. I wiped my tears as she came to me. I thought she was afraid I would be mad. I wasn’t of course and promised her I’d never spank her – or any dog – again.
I don’t think that is what made her scared. After driving home with her in my lap, she was still subdued for days. She wouldn’t leave my side. I think she was traumatized being lost in the woods.
I don’t know where she slept that night. One camper who I’d talked to flagged me down as I left the campground and asked if I’d found her. He said she had approached his camp just after I’d been by earlier and he was looking to tell me. I said, thanks she was with me now and wondered from which direction she’d come. He pointed to the opposite side of the lake from the campground.
Apparently, she’d been lost in the ravine below the dam and came up on the wrong side, then circled the lake to get back. It was a close thing. She was really lost and likely only found her way back by the sounds and smells of the campground that morning. Really a miracle considering all the creatures out hunting food like her at night.
More Bigfoot hunting will have to wait for the fall. I don’t think I’ll take her next time. I’m investing in a .44 magnum and a hot water bottle instead. She wasn’t much good at finding the wild Skeezamen anyway. Or was she?
Location: Sespe Wilderness Area of Los Padres National Forest; GPS coordinates 34 deg, 32’.36” North; 118 deg, 52’.42” West
Nearest Town: Fillmore, California
Time: Spring, 2004
Event: Bigfoot Encounter
The Sespe is the longest remaining undammed river in California. It’s also home to the endangered California Condor. The condor’s Sanctuary lies within the Sespe Wilderness Area, which lies within Los Padres National Forest.
Although the Wilderness lies at the edge of modern civilization – the coastal mountains it protects stretch from Los Angeles to Monterey – it is the fourth largest acreage of roadless Wilderness Area in the lower 48 states. Within the Wilderness Area, no roads, or vehicles are allowed. Within the Sanctuary, additional protections apply for the condors. It’s one of the most protected pieces of land on the planet.
Fillmore sits at the edge of the National Forest, at the mouth of Sespe Canyon. East of town, a rugged forest road leads 20 miles to a place called Doughnut Flat. At Doughnut Flat, the road ends on the edge of the Wilderness Area, and it’s the beginning of the Alder Trail. There were no other cars at the trail-head when I arrived.
At the time, I lived in Fillmore. This is an area I’d been to before, since it’s almost my old backyard. From Doughnut Flat, Alder trail follows a meandering creek at an elevation of about 4,000 feet, before it drops down a steep canyon to join with a longer trail that follows the upper reaches of the river.
A mile in, the trail passes a cluster of trees. A big oak in the center has a campsite beneath. I hiked alone this day, and didn’t intend to go far, carrying only water and a walking stick. I stopped to survey the campsite thinking I might one day bring the kids, since it’s such an easy hike from the car.
I was disappointed to find the site trashy with beer cans and broken glass – being a mile from the trail-head, it evidently got heavy use.
As I poked around beneath the oaks, I heard heavy steps, and glimpsed the knee and lower leg of a man bolting from a brush-filled ravine not twenty yards away.
The knee and leg thrust forward in a run. The foot was obscured by grass, and the body was obscured by the branches of the tree I stood beneath. The leg was a uniform, dark grey color. I saw no cuff, or sock, or other feature, and he was gone up the canyon before I could think to move.
This disturbed me. He apparently bolted because I was there. Why was he hiding? I concluded the man must have an illegal camp, or pot growing back in the canyon – up to something he didn’t want known. I immediately gathered my things and left, hiking to my truck.
I returned a week later. Again, by myself, thinking whoever lurked in that canyon ought to be gone. I wanted to survey the situation – like I said, this is a trail I used a lot, a place I wanted to bring the kids. I might add, I am always very aware in the wild, especially by myself. But on this occasion, I half expected to run into someone, so was particularly aware. That’s one reason my memory is clear.
I walked beyond the trees to where I saw the man run and found a path. The path led up the shallow canyon towards an unusual blue-gray cut in the mountain that looked like a small mining operation from a time in the past. I found an old fallen windmill near the cut, and some rusted sections of a water tank confirming my suspicion.
I found no campsite, or trash, or other evidence of recent activity. I explored the artifacts and then continued up the draw, which led to a shallow saddle on a ridge. I had to scrabble up a rocky cleft to gain the ridge.
When I topped the ridge, I looked down into a lush green pocket valley, enclosed by cliffs on the opposite side; and on my side, a sandy slope covered in Manzanita. This verdant valley looked untouched and inviting – I could see no roads, or trails. The slope into it was bowl-like and negotiable, so I continued on, skirting the hillside looking for the best way down.
The path ended at the ridge, so I continued on game trails that wove through the chaparral. The Manzanita grew five feet tall, spaced such that I could wend my way through it, but not in a straight line. I could see over the top, but I couldn’t see through. The day was calm, clear, sunny and warm. I’d worked-up a good sweat climbing the ridge, hearing nothing but the sound of my own heavy breathing.
“EEAAAAAAHHHH” – a shriek filled the valley – I stopped in my tracks. The sound came from below, and was directed right at me. So sudden, so loud, and so…unknown was this sound that it startled me witless.
It’s perplexing to hear something you can’t identify – especially in the wild, without warning, where there shouldn’t be such a sound.
No living thing I know in those woods could make that ripping scream; no lion, bobcat, or condor could have carried that volume, or pitch. What entered my mind was T-Rex … from “Jurassic Park.”
The shriek gave me chills, but I knew there had to be a rational answer. My mind ticked through possibilities and came up with the best similarity – there must be heavy equipment in the canyon. Only the screech of metal-on-metal made any sense. I imagined a giant, rusty gate hinge. Only it wasn’t quite like that.
I listened for other sounds. I looked. Nothing moved. There was no sound, or sight of anything – nothing but a pristine valley overgrown with oak and pine along the narrow stream below. There were not supposed to be machines in the Wilderness Area.
The sound didn’t waft up to me, bouncing and distorting off the canyon walls. It hit my face, so to speak, like standing in front of a loudspeaker. Nevertheless, I rationalized the sound must have come from somewhere around a dog-leg in the canyon where I could not see. If I could see down there, I was sure there would be a backhoe, or bulldozer doing heavy work.
I continued across the slope to a rise that promised a view past the dog-leg. As I topped the rise the ground became steep and sandy and I had to dig in my boots to get a stance, which occupied my attention. When I looked – I had a perfect view. I saw the entire length past the dog-leg and the slopes all around. There was nothing there.
I stood for only a moment surveying the scene. Not a fly buzzed it was so still. And then a feeling came over me – I did not belong there.
This was far more than a feeling of being watched, or a case of heebie-jeebies – I’ve had those before. Some thing didn’t want me there. I struggled with this feeling – trying to swallow it. It made no sense, but it kept building almost to a feeling of panic. I turned and retraced my steps towards the ridge.
As I neared the ridge, I heard what sounded like footfalls behind me, in time with my own. I told myself it was my imagination, until I stopped at the ridge top, where I had to climb down the cleft, and I heard one more footfall that wasn’t mine.
I hurtled down the cleft in two bounds, and ran a good fifty yards. Then I heard another sound. It came from the ridge. I turned, thinking I would see whatever was coming down the cleft. There was nothing, except one branch swaying among some brush below the cleft. Just one branch.
I turned and made double time all the way to the Land Rover, roughly three miles, got in and locked the doors. Even inside, with the doors locked, I had the willies driving down the long road.
About five miles from Doughnut Flat, outside the wilderness area at a considerably lower elevation, there is an oilfield with active drilling and production work. As I passed through this area, I thought, what I heard was oil-field equipment. They must be drilling near the Wilderness close to where I was. Convinced I’d found the answer, I forgot about the incident … for ten years.
I am not prone to apprehension in the wilderness. I generally feel quite safe and competent on my own. I’ve spent many days and nights backpacking alone in remote areas, including several trips in this Wilderness. I have experienced weird feelings, like being watched, or that a place feels spooky on occasion. It isn’t unusual in lonely, remote places where creatures roam. But I have never been scared, even confronted by bears, and I’ve never felt compelled to leave a place before, or since this experience.
I never connected the sound with Bigfoot. In my mind Bigfoot – well, if he even exists – lives in rainforests far north, not down in the coastal mountains fifty miles from LA. It wasn’t until my interest in Bigfoot got sparked by someone I admire that the connection finally came.
I’m a fan of Survivorman, and think Les Stroud is an honest, sober guy with a whole lot of back country experience. So when he started looking for Bigfoot, I took it seriously.
Intrigued by his show, I looked through You-Tube for other info, where I ran across various alleged recordings of Bigfoot vocals. That’s when I recognized the sound.
I heard the same blood curdling screech of a rusty hinge, chorused with a resonant, guttural growl. It’s been described as many voices screaming, or many dogs barking in unison. Bigfoot researchers speculate it is a warning.
That is certainly what I felt. The memory of the event is quite clear. I had to look for one more thing.
I found the place on Google Earth. I found views from the same time frame. There is no road, no nearby oil field. Not even a trail in that canyon, or anywhere for miles around. I looked up sightings for the area on the BFRO web-site. There have been several in the Sespe, going back decades.
I also discovered a wealth of information about that one credible Patterson-Gimlin film that has been enhanced and analyzed with digital technology not available at the time it was filmed. There is incredible detail of body proportion and movement that cannot be human.
Whatever drove me out of that canyon made a hell of a noise I cannot associate with anything but a Bigfoot vocalization. Now that I’ve heard it, I can’t ignore it. I’m going back to that canyon, once I find somebody who’ll go with me..
Is it possible? Biker Entourage is motorcycles, psychedelics and the people who ride them? I feel more interconnected than a DMT flash. I feel more resonance than a 998 Desmocedici at 8500 rpm. I feel both!
Psi-rider…mount your café racer for a ride in my brain!
Take the on-ramp to my Cerebrum. Ignore the Temporal Lobe…it is closed for repair.
Beware off-camber twisties in the folds of the Frontal Lobe. There are potholes there.
Add power…add speed for the sweeper ahead,
Drag your knee in Basal Ganglia and up-shift with throttle-wide in the Corpus Collosum,
Do a wheelie in Medulla Oblongata, if you like, and burn rubber in the Occipital Lobe,
But, red-line the Hypocampus and downshift drift the Amygdala, echoing a thrum upon the Pons.
Then park in level C of the Cerebellum. I’ll meet you there.
I feel how I imagine a ride to the shooting range with Hunter S. Thompson – or pubbing with Peter Egan and Terence McKenna. Those things aren’t possible for Terence and Hunter, bless their souls – they will never know the experience of reading me, or having a beer with me.
But we can! Yes, you and me – reader and writer – as I still live and write. This can change at anytime, as you well know how it is with writers and motorcycles. But once written, it lives forever…and thereby my heart feeds you, as I feed on you like a parasite, too.
I digress. You are probably wondering who in hell I am. I am A. D. Hall, a writer and a traveler. May favorite rides are a Ducati S4RS and Mescaline – so visceral and erotic.
Psilocybin and scooters are a close second. The elves like scooters. I’d love to own an Indian and take Ayahausca some day – it seems a marriage of the gods, no?
I live in Arizona, which is psychedelic in itself, especially this time of year. I think the temp is 111, as I write, which means I can go outside for fifteen minutes and experience hallucinations. I do this on the scooter – the Duc would fry my legs. It produces total, irrevocable madness within twenty minutes, so I am careful.
As the swamp cooler blows a moist chill on my sweaty neck, and the cheap Canadian whiskey I bought last night yields it’s last precious ounce into my cup, I almost weep with joy. The emotion is real, if exaggerated – that’s what whiskey does to me – but let this be known; I wish to join this community.
I wish to pledge my considerable writing talent as a voice – to you, to us, and to those out there who have no idea what I’m talking about. It’s my humble opinion they need to understand. The whole world needs to understand.
Who can engage one’s mind with spiritual botanicals, or race two-wheeled on a smooth, curved mountain road, and still be bothered to commit jihad, or send thousands of troops to their deaths in foreign lands? It’s inconceivable. So like Jesus, we have a message. It is as important as his – the “do unto others…” one.
No ma’am, no sir! I’m not comparing myself to Him. I am but a disciple, no matter how arrogant my tone. That is a consequence of the cheap Canadian stuff…like I said. But the mission – the mission – let’s not lose our thread.
It is to Trip Others – a term I now coin – unawares, into a forced psychedelic experience for the betterment of mankind. My idea is to create and weaponize a psychedelic toenail fungus that pumps psycho-actives into the bloodstream, like a tic delivers Lyme disease, but with altruistic intent. Then disperse it in Moscow, Tehran, Beijing, Washington and other strategic places.
I am thinking of a Dr. Scholl’s type delivery system of our own patent, or perhaps Korean nail salons. There are many details to fix, and talks with the Koreans are not going well. Are there podiatrists among you?
San Francisco, Paris and London won’t need it. Those places are already enlightened – unless they want to volunteer. I figure, once we know how to make it we can grow enough for everybody.
That includes your city, Gotham – New York, New York! Grimy Atlantis of the Millennium. I have spent good times there. High times. If only I lived closer, my first instinct is to join you on a ride, side by side, somewhere Upstate to look for Bigfoot. We’re teaching him to ride out here. But let’s speak of that another day. Today, our topic is the Purple Armageddon.
Bikes are the instruments of distribution, of course. We can go any place on earth with the right, dual-sport bikes, and escape, too. You know traffic in these big cities. A rush hour attack and we own the split-lane! Get it? Is the picture coming to focus? Rebels with a cause – that’s us!
I implore you. I don’t have the mycological knowledge to do it myself. Nor could I be a lone superhero like Ewan McGregor, riding the globe dispersing the stuff and still get the coordinated mind-meld that’s most effective.
It will require a common temporal battleground, a Megiddo of the conscience. If we can get all of the world leaders into the same “room with the elves” – problem solved – that’s the plan.
That’s why a community like this needs me, for this kind of brilliant idea. So, now that we’re together – tell me how I can help you, so you can help me – let’s work together. Who is the Shaman of this new family of mine? Call me.
Before I close and let this sink in to your minds – I’ll assume it is momentarily stressed at the audacious criminality of our venture – let me say, fear not. The utter logic of it will eventually take hold and you will gleefully go forward, a battalion of ghost riders; Knights Templar of the Psychedelic Apocalypse – keepers of the Grail of Enlightenment – Onward Psychedelic Soldiers…Marching as to war!
Even if your ultimate fate is crucifixion in a stuck-up, unenlightened world, rest assured, I will carry the torch. I am shielded from crucifixion by fixion. A linguistic inoculation that protects me as a writer.
So relax, and let me offer a diversion while your mind assimilates. I published a book of complete and utter nonsense about a character that is struck by lightning in a thunderstorm while on an Amanita Muscaria trip, and the consequences that flow from this profoundly dark and damaging experience.
Why don’t you take it to the beach this summer, as the Psychedelic Apocalypse gathers headwind. Enjoy its hallucinogenic, raunchy humor where the characters happen to – have you guessed, yet – Ride Fucking Motorcycles! Yes, that’s right. I wrote a novel specifically for you! Ain’t that the fuckin’ tits?
It is my modest gift, for the listed price at your e-book retailer. Just follow my links below and see my website, other writings of mine, and the book: “Lapse of Reason.” It’s my debut novel.
Such synchronicity – meeting on the very brink of my book’s release – the world in crisis and needing us – social media to bind us – are the result of long-term psychedelic brain modification, on my part, yours, and the elves, without a doubt.
Trip safely my friends, and feel free to share your favorite psychedelic with me (in a plain brown envelop with no return address). Adios for now. Our plot shall thicken!
![IMG_1727[1]](https://andrewdhall.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/img_17271.jpg?w=845)
Ginger and I traveled to a little known place in Arizona where the creatures are known to make an appearance now and then. I’m not saying where it is, but it’s a large mountain that looks like this one. We arrived and found a beautiful camp by the lake.
Soon after, Ginger crawled out of the sleeping bag and looked at the tent door. I thought she needed to potty, or get water, so I unzipped the tent. She immediately crouched low, dropped her ears and tail, and growled with deep, serious intent out the opening. She almost never growls and I’ve only heard her do that when fending off a mean dog, or one of the meth addicts in our neighborhood. I don’t know how she can tell a meth addict from anyone else. Same way we do, I guess, because they’re scary.
We left on the fourth of July. This was strategic on two counts. First, all the holiday campers would be leaving that day and we like our solitude. Second, all the Bigfoot should be ready to raise hell now that the firework wielding, beer soaked campers were gone. We thought the Skeezamen ( a local name) might even venture to the lake now that it was quite after the long weekend. I can’t help but think that crawdads would be one of their favorite snacks – its one of mine.
Ginger and I scouted several areas where the trees seemed arranged non-randomly. There were several areas where there were these crosses formed from broken tree trunks. They faced the road squarely with lots of other disturbance around them; a profusion of broken limbs, stumps and trunks leaning against other trees.
There are two trees still rooted and bent over in arches, another laid over in the same direction and one pressed against the trunk of the center tree like a spring. Two logs are laid over all four to hold them down. Well, it seems odd to me. Ginger wouldn’t get out of the car. She was bored with tree structures.
I suppose this could have fallen in a wind this way. If it was the only one like it I would even assume so, but there are several broken, bent or wedged in improbable positions like this in clusters. Note all the other leaning trees nearby. Here are more views of the same trees.
Ginger was getting annoyed I was looking at trees. She wanted to look for Bigfoot. She doesn’t make the connection with trees because she’s a dog. Dogs don’t look up. If it had been a turd on the ground, or something fun to pee on, she’d have been more interested.
Notice how the leaning trees are held down by the broken tree? They should not have been in the line of fall if this had been wind or snow. That’s how they always seem to fall in this particular area though.
Ginger and I are very attached. She’s a weird dog, but also the smartest, warmest dog I’ve ever known. By warm, I mean warm. Mexican aristocrats bred Chihuahuas to sleep with because they were better than hot water bottles. This is how we sleep, with her curled against my back to keep us warm.
I don’t know where she slept that night. One camper who I’d talked to flagged me down as I left the campground and asked if I’d found her. He said she had approached his camp just after I’d been by earlier and he was looking to tell me. I said, thanks she was with me now and wondered from which direction she’d come. He pointed to the opposite side of the lake from the campground.
The Daily Plasma 