SC EP:1213 The Hunting Shack

John writes "October 2025, there were a few of us sitting around the table in our off‑grid hunting shack, just enjoying each other's company. For context, we're deep in the PNW backcountry: no power, no civilization for miles, and no motorized vehicles allowed anywhere near the place. Out of nowhere we heard a thud on the side of the shack. My wife said, "There's something outside," but a friend brushed it off, saying it was probably just a piece of firewood settling in the stove. So we ignored it. A moment later, another thud, louder this time. Three of us got up, opened the door, and checked down the side of the shack where the sound came from, but there was nothing there. Convinced it was probably nothing, two of us headed back inside while the third said he needed to use the shitter (our name for the outhouse). We had barely sat down again when, just seconds later, he, let's call him "J" came sprinting back inside, not even making it to the outhouse. He blurted out, "There's something out there," and the fear on his face was real. This is a military veteran who's seen his share of things, and he said whatever it was made a deep exhale or grunt from just outside. So J, S, and I went back out. We'd only walked about 15–20 feet toward the shitter before stopping. The outhouse sits around 40–50 feet from where we stood, with no trees between us. Behind it, though, the timber tightens up. I saw it first. "What the hell is that?" I said. What I saw was a small red glowing light, pulsing faintly. A minute later J said, "What the hell is that?" he had finally locked onto it too. S still couldn't see it yet. The red light looked like a tiny, dim LED, pulsing on and off. The night was pitch‑black—so dark I couldn't see my hand in front of my face. Whenever I stared directly at the light, it would vanish, and I'd have to move my head around, almost like searching around branches for an angle. Then it would reappear… then vanish again… then reappear somewhere slightly different. https://sasquatchchronicles.com/strange-occurrences-and-a-red-light-near-our-hunting-shack/red-ball/ At one point, I saw three separate red lights at the same time, all at different heights but roughly eye‑level. Always single lights, never two together like eyes. That's when S finally said, "What the hell…" and he was clearly shaken. He'd been scanning the area with a thermal scope the whole time and seeing nothing until suddenly he saw what he described as a face, a circular white heat signature peeking from behind a tree or stump before disappearing again. After that, the red light on the far right appeared noticeably closer, now unobstructed by any branches. S kept saying, "Red… off… red… off… red… off…" in rhythm with the pulsing. We've had three other strange experiences over the past decade that we've never been able to explain, one was an extremely loud and heavy scream that terrified all of us, and the other involved a group of large ground nests. All of those seemed like possible Bigfoot‑related activity. Because of that history, it almost feels logical that these red lights might be connected. What I'm trying to figure out is whether you've ever come across anything like this, or if you know of any accounts describing similar red lights. I'm obsessive when it comes to researching things, but I keep running into dead ends, mostly references to red glowing eyes or floating orbs. This wasn't eye shine; there was no light source to reflect off of. And the orb stories I've found don't match what we saw either. This experience doesn't resemble anything I've come across in the short time I've been digging into it." https://sasquatchchronicles.com/it-was-staring-directly-into-my-eyes/michigan-dogman-custom/ We will also be speaking to Marissa, she writes "I've gone back and forth about writing to you because I'm not sure how relevant my experience really is but after hearing witnesses on your show describe encounters with dogman-type creatures, I can't help wondering if what we saw might fit into that category. My boyfriend, Brian, and I live full-time in a truck camper, traveling around the U. S. This happened in mid-July, when we were camped on BLM land past the Delta-09 Missile Silo, just outside Badlands National Park. It was a full-moon night, but we set up camp while there was still daylight. We made a fire, Brian cooked dinner and almost immediately after we arrived, I noticed something odd. A herd of cows in the distance suddenly came running over a hill, almost as if they were spooked. For the next several hours, as we ate and the sun went down, those cows made nonstop distressed sounds. We couldn't see them, but we could hear them, and it was eerie. One of my dogs refused to get out of the truck as well, which was extremely unusual for her. Eventually, once the moon rose, the cows went silent. The night was beautiful, so we decided to take a moonlit walk along the dirt road with our other dog. We walked maybe half a mile and then laid down to look at the stars. We'd been on the ground less than a minute when my dog gave an alert bark. We sat up, and about 60 yards ahead of us, we saw a large black figure. My first thought was that it was a cow until my eyes adjusted and I realized it had canine features. I tried to convince myself it was a coyote, even though it was far too big. We aimed our flashlights at it, and that's when everything turned strange. It had no eye shine at all. I've lived in the woods most of my life; every animal I've ever seen at night reflects light. But this thing's eyes were just… black holes. The entire body almost seemed to absorb the light rather than reflect it. No matter how many times we shone our beams on it, no more detail appeared. It just stayed this pitch-black shape, panting loudly far louder than you'd expect from that distance. I had the unsettling feeling that it was staring directly into my eyes and that it was intelligent, more so than any wild animal I've encountered. We yelled at it, but it didn't flinch or move. A normal coyote would've bolted. I told Brian, "I don't want that thing behind me," which is not how I react to coyotes at all. We started heading back to camp me walking forward, Brian walking backward to keep an eye on it. Later, when we talked it through, things got even stranger. There were two of them. I had been so fixated on the one in front of us that I completely missed a second creature off to our right closer, and according to Brian, noticeably larger. Brian isn't someone who believes in Bigfoot, dogmen, skinwalkers, or anything of that nature, but he said it felt like the one farther away the one I was staring at was in control of the closer one, almost like an owner and a dog. He also said its legs looked blurry or formless when the light hit them, which matched what I felt but didn't say out loud. As he kept watch, both creatures followed us for about a quarter mile, staying just far enough back, until they finally slipped into the hills. Almost immediately after they disappeared, the cows started up again with the same panicked cries from earlier. We've gone over this experience so many times, and we always land in the same place: those were not coyotes. They were something neither of us can explain. So I'm reaching out to ask have you heard other reports of canine-like creatures with jet-black eyes and no eye shine? Does this sound more like something people attribute to a skinwalker, or is a dogman encounter a possibility? I know humans lack eye shine, but these things were absolutely not human. I haven't been able to find anything online that matches, other than a general trend of strange reports from the Badlands. I'd really love to hear your thoughts on what we might've seen."

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:03Speaker 00

  It looked like somebody was bent over and had their head in the window of the deer blind and it either heard me or smelt me and he pulled his head out of the tent and stood straight up and that shocked me. They don't make people that big.

• 0:31Speaker 01

  The way it moved, almost as if it was gliding across the beach. I've never seen anything move like that in my life.

• 0:45Speaker 01

  They were screaming at each other in gibberish.

• 0:49Speaker 01

  It sounded like a language and they were chuntering away, back and forwards, back and forwards, back and forwards.

• 0:56Speaker 01

  I know what a bear looks like and there is no way on this planet that what I saw bears.

• 1:14Speaker 02

  911, what are you reporting?

• 1:16Speaker 03

  Jesus Christ, you better... Sir? See ya!

• 1:19Speaker 02

  Hello?

• 1:20Speaker 03

  Get somebody out of here.

• 1:22Speaker 02

  What's going on now, sir?

• 1:23Speaker 03

  That son of a bitch is about six foot nine, I don't know.

• 1:26Speaker 02

  Do you see him now, sir?

• 1:27Speaker 03

  Yes, I'm looking right at him. Uh-oh.

• 1:34Speaker 04

  Hi, this is Ian on the eastern shores of England. You better believe it, all around the world we're listening to Sasquatch Chronicles.

• 2:10Wes Germer?

  Welcome to the show. Tonight, we'll be chatting with John, and John comes to us from Washington, and he has this hunting shack out in the middle of nowhere, an area that's pretty notorious for sightings. And he had a very, very strange night, him and his friends and his wife. This happened back in October of this year, and I'll kind of let John go into it. And then we'll wrap up with Marissa. And Marissa was on vacation with her husband in South Dakota in the Badlands National Park. She describes running into a very large canine

• 2:50Wes Germer?

  looking creature that was jet black, even when they hit it with the flashlight. And I'll let Marissa go into that. If you've had an encounter, and you'd like to be on the show, shoot me an email. My email address is [email protected]. And if you get a chance, check out sasquatchchronicles.com. You can become a member and get additional shows. Let's jump into it tonight. I want to welcome John to the show. John, thanks for coming on.

• 3:24Speaker 06

  Thanks for having me. Recent listener, due to, I guess, an encounter that we had, little background, I guess. I'm 50 something years old, and we've been going out to this location for, or I've been going out there for 30 something years. It's very remote, miles from civilization. It's close to vehicle traffic. You have to hike in. It's in the Pacific Northwest, and not far from Olympic National Forest as the crow flies. Anyways, we've got an off-grid shack out in the woods that we use for hunting. And this, this took place October this year, 2025.

• 4:11Speaker 06

  It was after a long day and we'd eaten dinner. It was dark, sitting around the table, just chit chatting. There was, oh, there must have been half a dozen of us, I'm guessing. At one point, um, my wife said, uh, did you guys hear that? I think there's something outside and, uh, others had heard the thud and said, well, it's probably just a log settling in the fireplace and clunking on the side, which isn't unheard of. So we didn't really pay it much mind and a few moments later, there was another thud that we all heard.

• 4:56Speaker 06

  Um, right on the wall behind where my wife was sitting. And she said, did you hear that? Something's outside. And, uh, I guess that wall has a plexiglass window right about where we heard the sign, the sound. And anyways, three of us jumped up and went to the door and glanced down the side of the shack and there was nothing, nothing there. Nothing looked disturbed. So again, just thinking it was probably nothing. We, uh, two of us went back into the shack and the third,

• 5:35Speaker 06

  I'll call him Jay, uh, said he had to use the bathroom. We've got a, an outhouse separate from the shack out there. And he went that way and my friend S and I, we went inside and sat back down and it wasn't even a minute later. Jay came blasting through the door, eyes wide. You could see, I mean, he, something had him spooked and he says, something's out there. Like, what do you mean something's out there? And he said it. He was just about to the, the shitter out there and he heard a, like an exhale grunt.

• 6:20Speaker 06

  And it scared him. He's a, he's not easily scared. He's a veteran. Seen some, seen some stuff, to put it lightly, and not easily shaken. And I could see it across his eyes, so. The three of us went outside and took an immediate left, walking towards the outhouse. We went about, well, I'd say twenty feet and stopped, just kind of listened.

• 6:55Speaker 06

  And it was dark, couldn't even like see my hand in front of my face type of dark. We stood there for a little bit, let our eyes adjust, and then I saw, I said, what the, you know, what is that? It was a, no, red, red light. I'd say it was, you know, like, kind of like a glowing LED, like a more of a dim LED type light. Um, and from what I could gauge, it was, I'd say it was just beyond where the outhouse sits. Um, so it's, there's no trees between the shack and the outhouse.

• 7:40Speaker 06

  And then beyond the outhouse, probably twenty feet beyond, it starts a sparse, sparse forest. You can still see through it, but you know, there's some branches here and there. I'm, I'm guessing that's about where this red light was. It seemed to kind of confirm because that red light just disappeared. And I moved, moved my head in big circles, you know, like you would see beyond branches. Try to pick something out that's beyond the branches. And the red light was there again. Then it wasn't. I had to, you know, I'm just moved, just swiveling my head up and down and side to side.

• 8:22Speaker 06

  And I would say located again. And it went away again. And it seemed like every time I looked at it, it would, it would shift. And this whole time, you know, WTF is that? And uh, nobody else saw it in the beginning and I'd say it was probably two or three minutes and then James said WTF, it was the common, the common term that night. He's like, what is that? And I was like, I don't know. You see it? He said, yeah, I see it. And uh, so this light was not steady. It was pulsing. Almost an on and off, kind of a

• 9:06Speaker 06

  and it wasn't a flash. It was more of a fade on to off, on to off. And this whole time, we're seeing it. My friend, we'll call him S, wasn't seeing it. And it was, it seemed important for me to get him to see it. I've been a long time, we've been a long time friends since kids and Jay is a fairly new acquaintance to me and S and I, we've been together a long time. I really wanted him to see this just to verify I wasn't going crazy and seeing things and uh, I was holding, grabbing him by the shoulders, trying to position his face like where I would see these

• 9:49Speaker 06

  red, red light and uh, he just wasn't seeing it. And then I saw another, there was a second one distinct and it wasn't close to the first one, not like eyes would be horizontal and close together. This was farther away. And then a third I saw, at one point I saw three of these lights in three distinct different locations, all within, you know, my field of view in front, like if I was to hold my, my hand out at arm's length, I'd say they were all between.

• 10:27Speaker 06

  You know, about 12 inches or, you know, my, my hand, like I said, tip of my pinky and my thumb at arm's length out. And then right after, after I said, I see three, uh, yes, uh, joined the WTF party and, and audibly, I could, you know, I could tell by his voice that he saw something and, uh, he had a, a thermal scope with him. And, uh, this whole time he was looking where we were looking and not seeing anything on the thermal. But then all of a sudden he did, he saw

• 11:07Speaker 06

  something round, um, you know, as a black background, as a white heat signature setup and, uh, something glowing white, circular, almost, uh, it began to appear almost as if, uh, something was peeking behind a stump or a tree trunk or something from nothing looking left and appeared and then went right back where it came, he threw that thermal down to decide and was definitely spooked. And then at that point, um, he saw the red light.

• 11:49Speaker 06

  After that, and this, this, uh, this would be the right, the, the red light on the right hand side. And it was, um, closer. I didn't notice it get closer during this, but somehow I think it, it, it closed some distance and was closer and unobstructed by any branches. It was just a red light right there and right out there in front of us. At this point, it was probably, uh, oh, I'm guessing 20, 30 feet away, 30, 40 feet, maybe. He was saying red, off, red, off. And we were all verifying, we're watching this happen right then and, uh,

• 12:33Speaker 06

  So at some point, somebody heard, I didn't hear it, but they thought they heard something behind us. Um, and then we mentioned, we don't want to get flanked. We don't know what this is. So we kind of, we backtracked a little bit towards the shack, which is seemed like the safest place to be anyways.

• 13:01Speaker 06

  I, I never heard any footsteps or any sounds at all. And after we, we kind of checked our, our six there and nothing. We, uh, went back and they were gone. There was no more red lights. I don't know. I, I didn't hear Jay said that he thought he heard a, a footstep or two. I didn't hear anything. S didn't hear anything. I don't know what it was.

• 13:33Speaker 06

  Uh, we racked our brains into the wee hours of the morning, trying to figure out what the heck we just saw, what it could possibly be. And, you know, there's nothing logical. We had to start really stretching and reaching for

• 13:53Speaker 06

  some weird stuff. I'm, uh, I'm kind of new to this. I, I listened to some podcasts and interviews and stuff that since this experience, kind of searching for answers. And I noticed, you know, a lot of callers say, oh, I've been listening to you for a long time. Here's my story. I, I'm not that guy. I'm a, I'm a crazy researcher. I like to get to the bottom of things and I'm having trouble finding anything as anything similar to this. And I guess that's why I reached out to you. I heard a, an interview on Sasquatch Chronicles that the guy was talking about the red eyes and.

• 14:36Speaker 06

  You you had asked him something to the effect of uh how many red eyes did you see? And that struck me as an odd question. Made me, I don't know, it made me send the email to maybe help get some help from somebody that's heard more stories and done a lot more research than I have.

• 15:01Wes Germer?

  Yeah, I appreciate you reaching out, John. The lights do come up. People will describe balls of light. Uh, you'll hear red, you'll hear blue, um, you hear golden, kind of an orange dull color, many different colors. And a lot of times these lights will show up in areas where Sasquatch is at. But there is accounts of people just seeing the lights and nothing to do with Sasquatch as well. When this started, your wife had mentioned there's someone out there and she had heard something. Was something hitting this hunting shack that you guys were in?

• 15:40Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think something thumped the side of the shack and I don't know what it was, but it happened twice. Uh, I think that somebody just said, hey, I think it was a log falling in the fire that, you know, nestled up against the side of the wood stove. It made that thump and that seemed logical, but looking back, I don't think, I think it was two separate events. Something hit the side of the shack either with, I don't know if they threw something or or tapped it or I I feel like they wanted this encounter. They were, I feel like they wanted us to come outside.

• 16:20Speaker 06

  You know, and it's strange afterwards, you know, the three of the three of us that witnessed this were talking and I mentioned that I didn't feel, I didn't feel threatened at all. It seemed benign to me and they they both agreed. It was really strange. I looking back, I feel like I should have been a little more, I don't know, unnerved.

• 16:51Speaker 06

  Then then I really was, but I really didn't feel I didn't feel like it was hostile in any way.

• 16:59Wes Germer?

  Yeah, and I was telling you, John, before we started recording that I experienced that at the Browns property where it sounded like a truck at this metal building I was standing right next to, but there was nothing there. I almost wonder if you if what your wife heard was like a rock being thrown and hitting that shack you guys were in.

• 17:20Speaker 06

  Maybe a rock or a stick or a thump. I mean, it could have been a hand. It could have been a knock. I it was a knock. And it wasn't extreme. It wasn't whatever it was. It wasn't really hard, but it was enough to get our attention.

• 17:35Wes Germer?

  What intrigues me about your encounter is it wasn't one red light. You guys were seeing, what was it, three of them?

• 17:43Speaker 06

  At one point I saw three different lights. Yep.

• 17:47Wes Germer?

  And from your account, I get the impression they were pretty close. How far away were these lights and how big were they?

• 17:57Speaker 06

  Well, I would say from where we were standing.

• 18:03Speaker 06

  But I'd say probably forty to sixty feet.

• 18:09Speaker 06

  Wasn't that far. Um, as far as size. I'd it was small. It was small, almost like an LED light, um, and faint, like a dark red.

• 18:22Speaker 06

  Um, I've heard some I've heard some stories about these orbs and stuff and they all tend to be bigger, you know, softball size, baseball size, golf ball size. This was this was very light, very, very small, um, almost like an LED, but not an LED, not a red headlamp. Even a bright LED on most devices is too bright. Just a faint red.

• 18:52Speaker 06

  Dark red colored light.

• 18:55Wes Germer?

  And you had mentioned it going on and off, on and off. And even your friend S had said that he was saying red on red on. Was it pulsating or was it kind of dimming completely out and then coming back?

• 19:11Speaker 06

  It was pulsing. I would say it would just about get completely extinguished and then come back again. But it wasn't fast. Like say you were throwing a switch, you know, off on. It was more of a fade, you know, fade to dark and then fade to bright.

• 19:31Wes Germer?

  Yeah, that is odd. That's a very strange. And when Jay had the thermal or people out there who haven't used a thermal, you can set your different colors like white is hot or, you know, that sort of thing. And, and he had seen something come out from behind a tree was lighting up on the thermal. Did he say it was like a person peeking out from behind the tree?

• 19:56Speaker 06

  He seemed to think so. Yeah. He said it seemed like a head, you know, looking peeking out from behind something, a stump or a tree. And then going back. But, you know, he was scanning where those red lights were not seeing anything. There was nothing, no heat signature at all. And we did, uh, you know, after this was all done, we went back after they'd gone, we, we went back towards the shack. We checked our six, didn't see anything, didn't hear anything. Wandered back, no red lights. Uh, we wandered over beyond the, the outhouse with thermal.

• 20:33Speaker 06

  And there was a, there was a heat signature on a, it's like an old, old growth stump where it's, you know, it's kind of dirt and kind of, stump and just a big mound. And there was a heat signature on that stump and I, I don't. See where that could have come from other than something touching or leaning up against that, which is odd too.

• 21:00Wes Germer?

  Oh, so something was there, you know, in those thermals, if I lean up against a tree or put my hand on a tree and then I leave and you come walking up, you'll see where my handprint is on that tree for a period of time, or you'll see where I laid up against a tree. That is interesting, you know, yeah, I was wondering why your friend couldn't see the light, but he was actually looking through the thermal and he wasn't seeing that light.

• 21:29Speaker 06

  No, no, and I thought, so I'm not, at one point I took the thermal and I was looking towards the lights and I can't be sure, I thought that I may have seen a little bit, but nothing, just pinpoint on that thermal, but I, we tried to recreate it with LED lights and all sorts of stuff and you know, nothing comes out, nothing shows up on that thermal unless there's heat. It could be that I just had my second eye open, it was a monocular, you know, like a scope and I was seeing it with my, my one eye and not the other, you know, through the thermal. I can't confirm that we saw any lights or anything through that thermal.

• 22:13Wes Germer?

  Yeah, it's, it's weird, John. I've come to the conclusion that these balls of light will not show up on thermal. That story I was telling you about when I was at the Browns and I saw that bobbing light, I assumed it was someone with a flashlight walking towards us. One of the guys there had a thermal. He kept saying, there's nothing there. And I assumed that he was talking about, he couldn't see the person on thermal, which is a little weird, maybe a lot weird, but I had later asked him and he said, no, that light, I couldn't see through the actual thermal. And I've heard that now from eyewitnesses at least a dozen times.

• 22:58Wes Germer?

  They will show up on night vision. I have recorded them on night vision, but not thermal. You know, this hunting shack where you guys are at, has there been anything weird or strange that has happened while you're out there?

• 23:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's, that's one of three of the, we've had three major things out there, I'd say, among other little weird happenstance things. Um.

• 23:27Speaker 06

  So the earliest one was, uh, I wasn't there, but it's, it was my lifelong friends. I've grown up with these guys and I know them. They're my homies and, uh, they were out there during deer season. One of them successfully shot a buck. Um, we've got a meat pole hanging in the woods, in the trees, down the road from our shack. So they were down there in the dark, uh, hanging, hanging that deer. They were just hoisting it up off the ground. And, uh, there was a lack of a better word, I guess, a scream and it

• 24:07Speaker 06

  they said that that scream was so loud and encompassing that, uh, it, it felt heavy. Um. My buddy S was there. He said he looked immediately up like it was coming from up above. It just, it was so loud. Started low, ended high. All the octaves in between while it was happening and, uh, I think it was five grown ass men were terrified, armed, terrified in the dark. Just went right straight back to the shack.

• 24:47Speaker 06

  We hear, I hear that story every time I visit these guys. They're still talking about it to this day. It's something that's really stuck in their memory. Uh, they didn't, they didn't see anything that night. It was all just here, but it was, it meant business. It was terrifying, heavy, loud.

• 25:08Speaker 06

  Another instance was, uh, four years ago. I think it's four years ago. I was trying to do the math. Um, I was elk hunting, same place. I mean, this is a few, probably three miles from the shack, three, four miles. We, uh, making our way up a different route than we normally take. And, uh, coming through the trees and the brush, it was brushy. Kind of a changing, uh, from brushy, swampy, nasty, creek bottom to, uh, getting a little higher elevation where there's trees. We, uh, oh man, it's almost like we entered a.

• 25:53Speaker 06

  It ju- it just, it just changed the terrain and, uh, it seemed like a nice, well-worn path. And on this path, on the, the right-hand side was a, a nest. Um, it was, uh, green branches. A lot of them were, you know, thumb size, a little bigger. And they were, it was woven, woven branches into a perfect circle. Um, I'd say there was probably six, six, seven feet across.

• 26:34Speaker 06

  Um, and not too far up the path, you know, ten, fifteen feet from that was a second one, about the same size. And, uh, there was a, a third nest, a little smaller, maybe four feet diameter. The three of us, I was with my daughter, her boyfriend. We, uh, like, what on earth is this? What, what does this? It, it didn't take long before all three of us just had to leave. We just did. It all hit us about the same time. It was like, you know, we, we shouldn't be here. This, something's wrong. We, we need to go and we, we just left.

• 27:18Speaker 06

  I never went back to that place until, you know, with this recent, this recent encounter, it's, it's kind of made me want to go find those. I've, I've gone a couple of times. Um, I've got another, another ridge to check. Um, part of it's been thin since I was there. I'm hoping it wasn't thin buried. I still hold hope. I've got another, another ridge to check. I know the general area we were, but it's hard to pinpoint an exact location when it, you know, we were using a different trail than normal. So it's a little unfamiliar.

• 27:59Wes Germer?

  And John, when you say nests, would you describe what you were looking at?

• 28:05Speaker 06

  They look like a bird nest on the ground. Um, I'd say, you know, it's probably six, seven feet across off of the ground would be about, oh, 18 inches ish, a perfect circle. You know, if I was anywhere close to town or people, civilization, a park, a trail, I'd think, you know, somebody, this is a hoax. Somebody's out here making this and messing with people, but we're remote. There's, there's nobody out there where we go. And for somebody

• 28:42Speaker 06

  to do an elaborate hoax out there just doesn't seem, doesn't seem feasible to me. I don't, and I, you know, I've looked high and low on the internet to see what makes nests and, you know, besides birds, I mean eagles make big nests. This didn't make sense for an eagle. These are big branches and they were interwoven. You know, I stumbled across like the apes. It sounds like an ape might make a nest, but it sounds like they make their nests fairly crude and for the night and destroy them and move on. Nothing elaborate like this. This is definitely odd, bizarre.

• 29:24Wes Germer?

  Yeah, gorillas will make nests. They're not very elaborate, kind of like what you said. It's more of a bedding that they put down. But the nests, and we don't have gorillas in Washington state, but the nests that people generally find, much like you described, they're interwoven, they're very complex. I've never had a report of a Sasquatch making a nest, but I've had many reports of people finding these weird oversized nests. I guess is the best way to describe it, somewhere between what a gorilla would do and a bird. And people do come across them. Next time you come across them, would you snap a few pictures?

• 30:08Speaker 06

  I know, I look back, I'm like, why did we not take pictures? Why didn't we mark our GPS? It's so dumb hindsight. I don't know. I'm gonna try to go find them. I mean, I figure they've got to be, they were green then, they'd be dead now, but they were big enough, a guy should be able to see signs. What once was be twigs in a circle, I would imagine.

• 30:37Wes Germer?

  Yeah, I hope you find them. Many times people report they vanished, they're gone in an area where they were, which is weird to me, but you know, going back to that night when you guys were in the hunting shack and you're seeing these weird lights and whatever that was kind of poking its head around a tree. What's your take on those lights? What do you think that they were?

• 31:02Speaker 06

  Boy, I don't know what those lights are. I'm a logical thinker and I think between the scream and the nests and those lights, to me, it seems odd that it would be more than one thing.

• 31:24Speaker 06

  As strange as it is, it seems more likely that one thing is related to all of those incidents. I'm leaning, apparently I'm leaning towards Sasquatch these days.

• 31:39Speaker 06

  You know, I've always kind of, I'm born and raised here in the Pacific Northwest and 50 something years old.

• 31:47Speaker 06

  I've always heard the stories and I've never really been a believer or a non-believer. I've always thought there's a possibility that something is among us that we've never come across. I know that you don't find bears that die of natural causes ever in the woods. And Sasquatch has to be way more rare than a bear. And those lights, it seems weird that it would be something totally unrelated. When it's it's odd enough that something this strange happens. That to be unrelated seems it seems impossible to me. I guess I I guess I've kind of, growing up, I kind of believed that if there was a Bigfoot.

• 32:32Speaker 06

  It was more, I was more in the camp of a a holdover ape. You know, from a long time ago, it's just walking amongst us, very elusive and rarely seen. And, you know, after seeing these lights, I I can't, I can't just think that anymore. Biology doesn't explain that, that red light. And what it is, I don't know. Um, you know, there's theories out there. And again, I'm new to this, but I've seen some theories of interdimensional beings, you know, traveling interdimensionally.

• 33:14Speaker 06

  And what that means being able to appear and disappear in front of our, what we see with our eyes. Or or what, but there there's definitely something there. As far as I know, there's no creature out there that really produces light. I mean, except for, I think there's a deep sea fish that has that light that, you know, on its little stick or whatever to attract prey. And this wasn't, there's no way this was eye shine. There was no light. It was dark. The whatever those red lights were, were, it was being produced right there.

• 33:54Speaker 06

  Or being seen from a different dimension. I don't know. It's it's, I don't know what to think anymore.

• 34:03Speaker 06

  It's really making me question what is real.

• 34:08Wes Germer?

  Yeah, experiences like this will definitely make you question what is real. And even this whole topic, man, there's so many weird things that go on in this topic that eyewitnesses report. It makes me wonder too, when are you guys planning on going back out there?

• 34:25Speaker 06

  I'm hoping to get out there in the next few weeks. I know a couple buddies are ready, itching, ready to go. Busy time of year, got the holidays and we all lead busy lives.

• 34:39Wes Germer?

  Yeah, I would love to know if anything happens if you guys do go back. And I do think that these creatures are around that hunting shack. And it's probably just a matter of time before you have a run in with one of them. You know, the Olympics are notorious for sightings. And I know you're right out there in the middle of the Olympics and be careful while you're out there. Definitely let me know if anything happens, will you?

• 35:06Speaker 06

  Hey, you betcha. I mean, there was a couple of other little things like I've always noticed the, the trees broken off. It's just odd stuff, you know, where a perfectly healthy looking tree snapped at a 90 degree angle, you know, and growing up, I was always told, oh yeah, that's Sasquatch. And, you know, when I see those now out in the middle of nowhere, it really makes me think twice, you know? We had a, actually, the first trip out there, well, it'd be the second trip out there this last year, we, uh, we were done and it was just S and I, we were done loading our gear

• 35:46Speaker 06

  up at the truck. And he's like, did you hear that? I'm like, no, I didn't hear anything. And he said, it sounded like something banging a couple of rocks together, like not far from where we were. Again, I didn't hear it, but it's just all these little, there's little odd things that happen. Also on that same trip, it was We had parked our bikes on the road, on the gravel road and hiked down to where we went hunting. Hiked for half of the day and then came back to our bikes and I mean, it's probably nothing, but again, it's weird. And there was a stick propped up just perfectly on the front tire of my bike.

• 36:29Speaker 06

  And I know, and we parked it in the dark. We started hiking in the dark before even daylight. And I mean, sure, maybe it's possible that I ran over this, this stick and it was about as big around as my forearm, about 12 inches long. Um, maybe I hit this stick just right with my front tire and it popped up and leaned perfectly on the front of that front tire, but it just seems odd. Or maybe it fell from the sky, you know, fell broke and leaned up against, just weird stuff. I think, I, I, I think they've been watching. I think they watch, they watch us. I don't know. It's weird things.

• 37:10Speaker 06

  Has there been other people talking about it being a small as opposed to bigger orbs? I guess. Little small lights. I guess I'd be curious to listen to somebody else's encounters.

• 37:27Wes Germer?

  Yeah, I'll see if I can't dig up a few reports and shows I've done on it. Uh, I've done many shows on people seeing the lights. Quite for the last 11 years, I've been talking about the lights on people's property and I, I will say the average light that people see is somewhere between a softball and maybe a soccer ball. Uh, but I have had reports of them very small, much smaller than a softball. And then I've had reports of them much bigger. I had a state trooper on one time. He, this happened on the east coast. He almost hit one with this patrol car. He was on a back country road, kind of coming around a corner.

• 38:12Wes Germer?

  And he almost hit this ball of light and I asked him how big it was and he said it was about the size of a Volkswagen and I was like, was it a UFO? He's like, no, it was a ball of light. It was just this huge ball of light. He didn't know what it was and it went off floating off into the trees and it was gone. Strange, very strange. I've taken many reports of the lights and like I said, it's a weird coincidence. They seem to show up in areas where Sasquatch is seen, especially on people's property. But I, you know, I don't know what they are. I really appreciate you taking the time to come on and share it. Thanks so much, John.

• 38:57Speaker 06

  Well, I appreciate it too. It feels good to talk about it. I haven't really told many people. I told my dad, my son, and I don't know, it's just, it's weird. It's strange.

• 39:19Wes Germer?

  Next up on the show, I want to welcome Marissa. Marissa, thanks for coming on.

• 39:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, thank you for having me.

• 39:26Wes Germer?

  Yeah, I really appreciate you being here and you ran into something very odd and strange in South Dakota. You were in the Badlands and we're going back just a few months ago, back to July of this year. If you would, would you start from the very beginning? What were you doing and what happened?

• 39:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, so my boyfriend and I, we live in a truck camper, um, full time. So we were kind of doing a road trip. We're from New England, so we were headed out west. We were, um, just outside of Badlands National Park, um, down this road where the Delta nine missile silo is, um, just camped there for the night. We were going to go into Badlands, um, the next day. So we got to our campsite. It was still, still light out. You know, we had a campfire, made dinner and everything. And shortly after we got there, you know, I noticed this herd of cows kind of come running over, uh, this hill in the distance, which I found was a little odd. But shortly after

• 40:32Speaker 02

  that, they just started making like these really distressed, you know, like mooing sounds like.

• 40:39Speaker 02

  I don't know, it was very weird. It went on for so long that I got to be like really creepy because I had never heard. You know, I mean, I didn't grow up on a farm, but I grew up in kind of farmland and had just never really heard cows in such distress like that. Um, so eventually the sun went down. It was like a full moon. It's beautiful. You could see across, um, like, I don't know if you'd call it like desert or prairie, um, but. You know, he had this really awesome line of view, so we decided to go for like a moonlight walk. This was a couple hours after the sun went down and by this time the the cows had stopped, so it was like silent.

• 41:21Speaker 02

  Um, we did hear like the occasional coyote way off in the distance. You know, we were halfway prepared to run into a coyote while we were out. We took our our one dog with us on our walk, um. Our other dog did not want to get out of the truck for some reason, which was also odd, uh.

• 41:43Speaker 02

  He can be kinda, he loves to be in the truck. It's kinda like his, you know, favorite place to be, so. We weren't like super alarmed by it, but it was weird. So, yeah, we walked like maybe half a mile down this sort of dirt road. And just laid down to kinda like look up at the sky, you know? And, um, like less than a minute after we were laying down. Our dog let out like an alert bark, you know, so we both sat up right away and. Our eyes kind of adjusted and. You know, looking out and there was this big, just black like mass and.

• 42:22Speaker 02

  It was big enough that at first I thought it was one of the cows because they were like all black cows, um. And I was like, oh, is that a cow? And and my boyfriend Brian says, no, that's not a cow. And I'm like, oh. I guess it's a coyote then. And we shine our flashlights at it. And it had no eye shine, which, you know, I grew up in the woods, I've lived in the woods pretty much my whole life and. You know, I, every animal that's out there has a eye shine, you know, and I, I could tell that it was. Looking like directly at us, you know, it wasn't like we were looking at it from the side, like you wouldn't see its eyes or anything.

• 43:06Speaker 02

  So, you know, multiple times I would like take the light off of it and shine the light back and just nothing. It was like. As black as black could be, like, you know, you'd expect to shine a light at something and be able to see more. Detail of it, but it was just like looking at a black hole. And, you know, Brian and I were, we've talked about it many times since then, cause it was just, you know, we had no idea what. What it was.

• 43:36Speaker 02

  And I could see like ears on it, like it had, like that sort of canine type of.

• 43:43Speaker 02

  It was canine in that sense that I could see like big ears on it, but other than that, you couldn't make out like any features on it. And, and Brian has said it just looked like a black, like blob to him. You know, so I was like, kind of a little unsettled, like right off the bat, um. But at this point, you know, we were still thinking coyote, just cause, you know, you don't know what you're looking at, your brain is just trying to. Go with something that it, it knows, um.

• 44:15Speaker 02

  So I was like, what, you know, what, what do we do? I don't want this thing behind me, cause we had to walk with it at our backs back to the camper. So I walked facing forward with the dog and he was behind me, you know, walking backwards, basically watching it.

• 44:33Speaker 02

  So after a couple of minutes, you know, I I kept saying, oh, this thing, this thing. He's like, yeah, there there was two of them. I didn't even see the second one at all because I think I was just so transfixed by this thing, trying to determine what it was that somehow I completely like didn't even see the second one, but he says there was a second one, you know, like fifteen feet to the to the left of the one that I was looking at. And that uh, they followed us for like a quarter of a mile. The one that I couldn't see um, kind of like flanked us around to the side and the one that I had been looking at,

• 45:15Speaker 02

  which was further back, just kind of walked in the steady line, like following us, but you know, Brian's not like he he's not a big like Sasquatch believer or any of that sort of stuff um. So I found it really odd by the time, you know, we finally got back and he was like, he's like, those things didn't have legs like, you know, they were like formless, you know, he could tell that it was moving and he felt that it was moving in a canine sort of way where the sort of like, you know, bob a little bit back and forth, I guess, um, but could not make out any legs or any features on them whatsoever. And so after, you know, he told me they had stopped following us

• 46:00Speaker 02

  immediately after the cows started making their noises again. And it went on for another several hours again after that, by the time we got back to the camper. But yeah, I don't know. After they stopped following us, we never saw them again. I was so worried they were gonna like show up at the camper, you know, but they never did.

• 46:21Wes Germer?

  You know, when I very first read your email, I was thinking Dogman. But that's strange what Brian said about it not having any legs or you, when you guys first saw that one, how far away from you was it?

• 46:36Speaker 02

  Um, we've estimated it as about 60 yards.

• 46:41Speaker 02

  And, and the one that I didn't see that he saw, he thinks was closer than that. So they were close enough that, you know, we, we've actually tested it with our dogs in the woods. Like how far away can you see them with a flashlight? You know, how far away will their eyes shine? And they were, they were definitely close enough that, you know, you should have been able to make out features on them or, you know, see the eye shine.

• 47:06Wes Germer?

  You know, I've interviewed eyewitnesses that have run into, they'll report what they saw. The overall shape looks like a Sasquatch or they'll report what they saw had the shape of a very large wolf. And kind of the same thing, when they point a flashlight at it, it, there's, it's like a, like you said, a black hole. It's so dark that it's like the light just sucks it up. It's been a few years since I've had those reports, but you know, it's like, well, what do you make of that? When you were looking at this thing, I mean, the overall shape of it, I realize you couldn't see any details, but it, did it remind you of a canine?

• 47:49Speaker 02

  Well, like I said, I mean, I saw ears on the ones that I was like, the one that I was looking at. Um, but other than that, no, it was like,

• 48:00Speaker 02

  you could kind of make out that it had like a head and neck, you know? And then the, like a more slender kind of body, but no, I couldn't see any sort of legs or never got a side profile of it at all to see if it had, um, you know, like the muzzle of a dog or anything like that. You know, thinking back on it, I'm like, I don't know how much my brain was trying to fill it in as a coyote, if that makes any sense.

• 48:30Speaker 02

  But no, it was very bizarre.

• 48:33Wes Germer?

  How long did you guys sit there for? When, when you noticed it?

• 48:38Speaker 02

  Um, well, we had been.

• 48:41Speaker 02

  You know, we laid down, it was less than a minute of us. Laying there before our dog barked and we sat up and they were like right there and it was kinda like. You know, how the hell did these things get there so fast? You know, we had just been up walking, looking around. You'd think, you know. My dog would have sensed it way sooner. It was almost like they just like appeared there out of nowhere.

• 49:04Speaker 02

  We sat and looked at them for. Probably two minutes, I would say, not. Much longer than that. Before starting to head back is.

• 49:16Speaker 02

  You know, I just have this really like uneasy feeling about them where, you know, it's like the longer we look at them, like I have no idea what I'm looking at here. You know, I'm not scared of coyotes. We've. Seen them. By dozens of time. You know, like living in the camper and living, growing up in the woods, but. Yeah. So that fear I had of like, oh, I don't want this thing behind me that, you know, that's not my normal gut reaction to seeing coyote and. Cause we tried yelling at them to scare them off and they just kept. Very slowly advancing towards us. You know, coyotes don't really like sock people. Maybe they were trying to size up the dog or something, but.

• 49:56Wes Germer?

  The same uneasy feeling you had. Would you describe it? You know, like if a wolf showed up? Or was that uneasy feeling more than that?

• 50:07Speaker 02

  Um. I mean, I've never seen wolves, so I guess I don't know. How I would react, um, but. You know, I've had a couple. Incidents with like bears and stuff and, you know, I know that. Standing your ground is always the best way to go. You know, in those sorts of situations, but. Yeah, I guess the uneasiness was more of just. That. Being really unsettled because I had no idea what it was.

• 50:37Speaker 02

  You know, I had, I told a story to a friend and she asked like, oh, did it feel like an evil present, presence? Um, and I didn't feel that way. Yeah, it was more just. Being scared because I didn't know what it was.

• 50:51Wes Germer?

  Would you say what you saw was about the same size as a coyote? Or was it bigger?

• 50:59Speaker 02

  Way bigger, way bigger. I mean, it was easily wolf size, if not bigger than that. And I, as far as I know, there's no wolves in that area.

• 51:10Wes Germer?

  With the one that Brian saw, um, did he give you any more details beyond? It didn't have legs and kind of appeared like it was floating?

• 51:20Speaker 02

  Um, no, I mean, I guess that's kind of the biggest takeaway that he had from it was that it was just like a total kind of blob, I guess. Um, uh, one other thing I forgot to throw in there, we could hear it panting like a really deep like

• 51:43Speaker 02

  like super creepy. Again, I, I've never heard a coyote have that sort of a deep breathing, you know, maybe they do, but, um, no, it was like, at first we thought it was a coyote and then we kept talking. I'm like, that thing was huge. Like when I first saw it, I thought it was a cow. Like, you know, that's how big, like, I don't, I don't know that maybe it was actually as big as a cow, but way bigger than a coyote for sure.

• 52:11Wes Germer?

  You know, the Badlands comes from a Lakota word and it roughly translates in English to the Badlands. That's why we call that area the Badlands. But in this area, there's a legend and I wish I could remember what the word is, the Native American Jews. I can't remember it. I'm sure if I, I'm sure if I could remember it, I'd probably slaughter it when I try and pronounce it, but it roughly translates to the crawlers. And I've had a few eyewitnesses see them. I've read about them and they appear to be black as night, kind of the way you're describing it. So black, you put a light on it, you can't see anything, but just black.

• 52:54Wes Germer?

  And generally people will report them as reminding them of wolves or some form of canine. I've heard of them attacking animals. I've never heard of them actually attacking humans. But you know, I mean, dead people don't talk, but I have heard of them attacking animals in the area and it seems to be some weird entity. And again, when people report it, they'll often say it reminded them of a wolf or a canine or something like that. You know, you're describing a predator that's really not acting normal at all. And if there was two of them, that's concerning.

• 53:36Wes Germer?

  And I know in this area, you know, with the buttes and I would imagine if there was a lot of moonlight shadows could play tricks on your mind. You know, skeptics will often say that, but I don't think people are seeing shadows. Uh, like I said, I've taken a few reports like this and I've read about it. And my understanding is that something seems to be more paranormal. And I tend to lean that way, especially with what Brian said, when he saw that thing and it didn't have legs, like it was just floating.

• 54:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, like I said, I don't know how much of it was just my brain trying to fill it in as a coyote. You know, like, it's like I said, we had heard them that night. So if we had run into coyotes, we wouldn't have been at all surprised. But the way they just showed up out of nowhere and yeah, I mean, they were not coyotes. That's for sure.

• 54:28Wes Germer?

  Yeah, it's scary. It's very scary. I mean, obviously I wasn't there, but that would be my best guess on what you guys ran into. And I think it's good. You didn't engage with it. You guys just kind of up and left. And I, in those situations, I think that's the best thing to do. What's your take on Sasquatch? What do you think it is?

• 54:51Speaker 02

  Um, I don't know. I, I think I fall more in the camp of that it's something maybe interdimensional or, um,

• 55:04Speaker 02

  I think it would be hard for a species that big or any of these creatures, Dogman, anything like that to be um something physical. We haven't found, you know, any dead bodies or anything like that. I'm a believer in the paranormal and stuff, so I think it's possible that they could be some kind of interdimensional. I don't know, something along those lines, I guess.

• 55:29Wes Germer?

  It is strange for something that big not to be found at this point. But you know, that Badlands area where you're at, I mean, I've heard some weird, weird things in that area that people have run into. And I'm not sure why, why, why weird stuff shows up there. I mean, I realize it's called the Badlands, but it's quite beautiful. You wouldn't think that looking at pictures of the area, but it's strikingly beautiful there. And again, if I were to give you my best guess, that's what I would say you probably ran into. At the end of the day, I don't know. But you know, even with the way your dog was reacting, it's like your dog didn't want anything to do with it.

• 56:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, right. Yeah, the one dog not wanting to get out of the car. It was definitely strange. You know, like he had a bad feeling about that place. And my other dog that was walking with us, she's, she's not afraid of a thing, but.

• 56:27Wes Germer?

  Yeah.

• 56:28Speaker 02

  She definitely saw them. She or sensed them or whatever, because she was the one that barked at them, you know, and it's like, wow, if we hadn't had her with us and we'd just been laying on the ground, how close would these things have gotten to us before we even knew they were there?

• 56:43Wes Germer?

  Yeah, thank God she was there. I really appreciate you coming on and sharing it, Marissa.

• 56:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, thank you so much for talking with me.

• 56:53Wes Germer?

  And that's it for tonight, everyone. Remember, if you've had an encounter, shoot me an email. My email address is [email protected]. And if you get a chance, check out sasquatchchronicles.com. You can become a member and get additional shows. Until next time, everyone. You