My coworker explained that he had previously lived in Washington State, and that his good friend, Tim, was a real survivalist guy. Loved to hike Mt. St. Helen’s (this was years before it erupted) and he would often be gone for days at a time exploring the mountain, or whatever wilderness adventure he was on.
Remember, this is before cell phones so when Tim was off on his trips, he had no way to reach anyone. He would always tell his wife what areas he’d be going to, just in case, and how many days he’d be away. On this particular trip, he was planning to only be gone 3 days.
His first day on the mountain he was climbing when he suffered a bad fall. When his body came to rest, he determined that he may well have broken his leg. Not a full compound fracture, but at the very least a green-stick fracture (which is a twisting impact to long bone where it cracks much like twisting on a green twig, without breaking it completely through the skin. He knew he was in trouble and had no way to call for help. So, as nightfall was approaching, Tim decided to find what he could to make a splint on the leg, and built himself a make-shift lean-to as best he could from a seated position. He just wanted some type of cover for the night. He was also able to build a small fire.
As the night wore on and Tim contemplated what he would do come morning, he heard something rustling in the bushes. He knew it was something large given the noise and movement of the brush. To his shock and surprise, what he thought was probably a bear turned out to be a bipedal creature, a huge harry male which he figured to be easily 7′ or more, hard to gauge from his seated position. As this being moved quickly to stomp out Tim’s fire, he paid more attention and knew he was having a Big Foot encounter. This being, once the fire was out, began to come toward Tim and his lean-to. He said that it totally looked over the “construction” of what Tim had made, then turned his focus onto Tim. Tim remained very still, more than a little scared, but he didn’t want to startle his “guest” with any quick movements and he was in no shape to have an “argument” with this big fellow.
Suddenly, as if pulling up a small child into an adult’s arms, Tim was off the ground and barely had a chance to grab his backpack before this harry giant had him cradled in his arms and was walking away with him. Tim was well aware of the Big Foot sightings in the area, and had heard many stories over the years, often wondered why he had not had any encounters as much as he was always hiking and camping in the woods, but here he was…this was going to be his own personal Big Foot encounter, and what an encounter it turned out to be.
As the creature carried Tim along, he began to take stock of details about this male. He said the stench was very prominent, but once he got over that, he noticed that he was covered in dark fur, fairly long, maybe a couple inches in length. He also became aware that what he initially thought was hair on the creature’s face was actually moss from the trees. Tim supposed that the creature used the moss not only for camouflage, but also for warmth.
He said that before Tim knew it, this creature had not only gone up and over a portion of the mountain, but that they were totally now on the opposite side and were in a dry creek bed. The creature finally came to a stop and put Tim down in a low spot along what would normally be the edge of the creek. He just looked at Tim and walked away to lay himself down.
When Tim awoke the next morning he thought that he’d had one heck of a weird dream until he opened his eyes. First he noticed that the creature had fashioned a similar lean-to for him as the one he’d made himself the night before. Was looking it over and finding himself impressed that it had copied him near perfectly, but what was coming next Tim had no way to prepare himself mentally for. The large male who had brought him there suddenly was in front of him, and to Tim’s astonishment, it was not alone!
My coworker went on with Tim’s story. He said that what was standing in a semi-circle in front of him were no less than 5 Big Foot beings. There was a “shorter” male, Tim guessed him to be about 6′, looking a bit like a late teen or young male. There was a female, somewhere between 6′ and 7′ tall, he figured Mr. Big Foot’s mate, and two smaller ones, figuring them to be their ‘children.’ Tim was dumbfounded, not quite sure what to think or do, but decided his best course was to just observe and remain as calm as he could. Tim shared that these others also looked at his leg, the lean-to, checked out his backpack … like any curious person seeing something totally different from themselves. After they were done, the large male gestured with his hand as if telling them to move along. Tim said the female had the younger ones go with her and the two males headed off to a close by river.
Tim spent 5 days with this group. He was fascinated by their family structure and division of ‘duties.’ It seemed the female and children would collect food stuffs, berries, edible plants, that sort of thing. The males would fish. Tim was able to observe this and said that the smaller male would go upstream and begin splashing and thrashing in the water, he assumed to drive any fish downstream to where the bigger male was scooping up fish and throwing them up onto the bank. He said they kept this up until they had a pretty good ‘catch’ and then brought them to camp. Tim said that that the large one threw a fish at his feet and he got into his backpack to clean and prep it for eating. Tim also gathered up twigs and dry leaves around him to make a fire to fix his fish. This, apparently, bothered the big male as he came over and immediately stomped out the fire and let Tim know in no uncertain terms that a fire was not going “to happen.” So, Tim ate sushi that night, something he was not accustomed to doing.
As my coworker went on with the story, he said that over the next two days Tim described that the males were very competitive. He described how the young one had gotten a bit “full of himself” going over and picking up a large boulder and tossing it a fair distance. Then turned to the bigger male, as if to say, “Best that!” So, the large male picked up a bigger boulder and chucked it farther than the younger one had. After a few minutes, the younger one — not yet satisfied — went and pulled up a good sized sapling and pitched it toward Tim’s direction. The older one found a larger one and pulled it up and tossed it, too. Then they seemed to make grumbling noises at each other and the ‘match’ was over.
Tim was able to scoot himself to the sapling the younger male had tossed his direction and he spent the rest of that third day shaping it into a crutch. He was tired of scooting around on his backside. The older male was very curious when Tim got himself up and thoroughly checked out the makeshift crutch that Tim had fashioned.
On the fourth day Tim was getting around pretty well on his crutch, the large male was watching his progress. Tim went to sleep in his lean-to that night, and awoke on the morning of the fifth day to discover himself alone. He reasoned that his ‘hosts’ had decided that he was more mobile and they no longer needed to remain with him. He said nearly all traces of their stay in the wash was cleared away. If he had not been with them those 5 days, he would never have guessed anything had ‘camped’ in the spot had he just come upon it hiking.
He began to hike his way long the lower back side of the mountain hoping to find a road, or help of some sort. He knew he was several days overdue to be home so figured his wife had alerted the rangers and other authorities that he was lost, so he really hoped to find a search party looking for him.
He got his wish the next morning as rangers discovered him in the forest. They were quite shocked that he was so far from the area he’d told him wife he would be hiking, and also surprised he was in as good of shape as he was. He told ’em, “well boys, you probably won’t believe me if I told you about my last five days out here.” They responded that he might well be surprised, so he relayed parts of his adventure to them.
This happened in the mid-70’s. As most know, Mt. St. Helen’s erupted in 1980 so the landscape of the mountain has changed. Tim has stated that it is his belief that the Big Foot stay in dry beds to help erase any trace of themselves when the beds fill in rainy season. We all know that the State of Washington gets lots of rain. My coworker also shared that Tim has gone back to the mountain many times since his experience and has never had another encounter with the Big Foot. He has said that he feels their presence in the forest when he’s there, like they are aware of him … checking on him, but that they have not revealed themselves, again, to him. Tim also has decided that they can seem to camouflage themselves or even seem invisible if they do not wish to be seen.
This is my recounting of Tim’s experience as told to me by a coworker, the details are still vivid all these years later, and I hope the readers find it as fascinating a tale as I did when I first heard it.
