50: Staircases In The Woods! What Are They?!

Episode Transcript
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(00:03):
Unsolved. What is up everyone,Dylan speaking and thank you for joining me
on this episode of Creepy Unsolved.In today's episode, I am joined by

(00:27):
my co host Laura and our goodfriend Donnie to discuss the urban legend of
the staircases in the woods. Arethey sinister? You'll have to hang around
to find out. By the endof this episode, I believe we have
a great theory about what they mightbe. But before we begin, and
while I have your attention, Iwant to invite you to visit our website,

(00:48):
Creepy Unsolved dot com. It isyour one stop shop for all of
our podcast episodes, YouTube videos inthe Creepy Unsolved blog. Would you like
to support the show, You cando so for just two dollars a month.
That's less than the price of acup of coffee. Visitor patroon link
in the show notes below. Onelast thing before we begin, please reach

(01:11):
out to us. We'd love tohear from you. Recently I had to
listen to reach out to us andtell us that his favorite episode was The
Medieval Serial Killer. Do you havea favorite episode, a future story suggestion
or guest suggestion, or simply wantto say hi? Send us an email
at creep Unsolved Media at gmail dotcom. Now with all that out of

(01:36):
the way, let's begin. Ihad to stop listening to it. Oh
gee, thanks dull, and thanksfor the morning. You're good. I
wanted to keep talking. I didlisten to any Royal episode and I thought
it was really interesting. Yeah,I started listening to it, but I
was working and my ear protection headphonesA link go so loud, so I

(01:59):
couldn't Some podcasts are quieter than others, so I couldn't hear it, so
I had to stop it and changeit to another one. So I got
to finish that. But I seethat with a lot of YouTube videos too,
because I do odd stuff when I'mlistening to YouTube, and you know,
sometimes I'll be doing the dishes andshit like that and I'll be trying
to hear it over the water andI can't tea for ship, and it

(02:22):
don't help that I'm already like partiallydeaf in my left ear and I got
nightist and all that awesome stuff.So a lot of times with you know,
headphones too, it's a pain theass because I'll be out shoveling snow
beside the road and like I'll hearit for like thirty seconds and traffic go
by, Yeah I'll miss it andwind and all that stuff. Well,

(02:44):
you guys still have snow right now? Oh yeah, yes, yes,
you guys need to move out ofPA seriously. Well, actually a lot
of it melted to day up here. You know, I won't complain.
We had like one quick spur tofour inches of snow overnight. Yeah,
maybe shovel my driveway for like twohours, and then this morning it all

(03:07):
melted, which is a kick inthe nuts. So this Saturday, they're
saying we're supposed to get like sixto ten inches, which I don't believe
that shit, but you know,yeah, crazy your stuff has happened.
Well, I was at the dinnertoday and they we're talking about how we're
supposed to get like sixteen to twentyfour inches or like maybe I'm exaggerating.

(03:30):
Maybe it was like up to likesixteen inches. But then I checked my
phone while we were all sitting thereat the dinner and it dropped down in
like three to five inches, sowho knows. Yeah, that's a big
gap because you're going from like afoot and a half nothing. Yeah,
yeah, that's a lot of snowfall. But anyways, you know, we're
back as always. I'm your host, Dylan, and I have my awesome

(03:53):
co host Laura with me and thisis Creepy Unsolved. So on today's episode,
we're gonna talk about something strange inthe woods. But before we get
there, I wanted to introduce today'sguest, Donnie Cho So Donnie, Yeah,
Hi Donnie, So I just wantto talk a little bit about Donnie
before we begin. You know,Donnie helps me out on my YouTube channel.

(04:15):
He's been helping me out with researchand writing assistance, and he wrote
the script for the David Sneaden episode, so if you haven't checked that out,
be sure to check that out.He's working on a couple other scripts
for me too, so I appreciatethat. And we kind of met through
a mutual friend too, you know, from Laura and from our time on
Cisco Murdock's podcast, So be sureto check that out too. You're on

(04:40):
that what a couple times a month? Is it? Three? Four?
How many times a month you're onover there? Donnie? It's almost like
every week at this point. Iusually take a week off like three or
four times a month because sometimes I'lldo like mondays as well, what kind
of stuff are we talking about overthere? Over there we are talking about,
Well, the three of us aregoing to be on with her,

(05:01):
I believe this Sunday talking about theNazis and their influence on American business,
and then we'll be talking a bitabout Pearl Harbor. Yeah, that is
quite the rabbit hole to jump down. There's so many different avenues to drive
down and to explore that, anda lot of it doesn't come to surface.
You think of World War Two aslike like kind of a contained event,

(05:27):
and it's not. There's a lotof outside elements to it and stuff
that continued on through history that camea World War Two and you know,
Adolf Hitler in the Nazis. There'sa big lead up to World War Two
and different involvements from different countries youwouldn't really think of like America, Like
there's a lot of different companies inAmerica who actually supported the Nazis in Germany

(05:50):
in some way and for like monetarygains. And you see a lot of
different countries after World War Two goingon to use you know, I don't
know if I want to call themassets, but assets from World War two,
like scientists in different programs like yourSpace programs you see in multiple different
countries, in different research and technology. Yeah, and there's different degrees of

(06:15):
how involved certain companies got with Nazimovement. We always hear those rumors about
the obvious famous ones like Disney andForward, and we're gonna be touching up
on a lot of those companies andsee like how much they get involved and
how culpable they are and some ofthe atrocities that took place. And again
some companies more than others. Yep. And this is going to be the
monthly topic and we're gonna break itdown for different companies and continue down the

(06:40):
conspiracy rabbit hole. Yeah. Kindof moving on, I want to talk
about this weekend and my plans.I've had a lot of people telling me
to get out in the woods andlook for Bigfoot, and I'm finally breaking
down and I'm going to go outthere. So if anyone has any advice
for me, be sure to sendme an email at Creepy Unsolved Media at
gmail dot com. And I wantto ask you, guys, do you

(07:02):
have any tips or pointers for huntingBigfoot? Well, I would say maybe
maybe pack a couple of things youmight want to offer, is like,
I'll make good just in case youdo something to offend anyone into woods,
you know, a snack or apiece of fruit, or maybe a little
bottle of whiskey or something. Justbe like, what's sorry, guys to

(07:23):
all the wood spirits and entity's outthere? My bad. I'm just here
chilling, hanging out. I'm nothere to ruffle any feathers. It's especially
the faith that reminds me the fathetalking about offerings. Yeah, that's what
I was going to say. Don'twear red and you already have a string
against you. You're German, right, Pennsylvania Dutch German? Yeah, so

(07:43):
am I Yeah. And if youwanted to do offerings like that, honey,
I think probably candies, alcohol.Like Donny said, I know,
tobacco's one that people will offer.And I don't know if that's specifically fair
or if that's just I don't know. He's a good thing for chocolate,
do they? Yeah? I hearthat, beause you know they can't get
it there. That's the other thing, too, is too. Always if

(08:07):
you want to go into a spacelike that and you think something's around,
just say Hey, I'm just hereto share your space. I'm not going
to cause you any harm basically whatDonnie was saying, Yeah, I can
I agree more. We talk abouta lot about the Faye and different stuff
on multiple different channels and podcasts we'vebeen involved with. And it's a crazy
thought, but it's practical. Theycan be out there, and they might

(08:30):
be out there, and it kindof leads into today's topic. It's kind
of hitting it at a broad anglebecause there's a lot of conflict in this
topic, but staircases in the woodsand it ties into different theories like Missing
four one one, which if you'reinvolved in this community, I'm sure you've
heard of, and I'm going totalk about that a little in detail.
But today's topic is staircases in thewoods, and this leads into that portal

(08:58):
theory that you find with the Fayeor what they like. I've read about
this before. The Land of theFaye is actually called fairy. I don't
know if you've got guys came acrossthat. I think before. I think
where I saw it was in somebooks at Steve Stockton actually sent me and

(09:20):
I gotta remember the title. Ihave both of them books saved to my
desktop. But yeah, it's interestingbecause you hear Ferry all the time and
you don't think about it actually beingthe place. But anyways, I kind
of want to jump into this introI wrote for today's episode. I plan
on keeping this pretty open and justtalking through it, but I did write

(09:41):
an introduction to kind of set themood for today's episode, and we pulled
together a bunch of different stories tokind of talk about the phenomenon and get
you into the mindset of how thistheory came to light and the stories surrounding
it, and let you decide onwhether you think there's any grain of truth

(10:03):
to these or if they're just allhogwash. If you frequent YouTube channels like
David Politis, Missing Person Mysteries,Mister Ballin, or Top Mysteries, you've
probably heard the phrase missing four onone, a phrase that was introduced by
David Politis, a former police officernow investigative author. The missing four on

(10:24):
one theory, introduced by Politis,focus on exposing the strained disappearances within our
national park system in hopes of findinga common link in one day, delivering
the answers to those searching for thetruth. These cases are shrouded in mystery
and visit both sides of the spectrum. Some cases future persons who were there

(10:45):
one second and in a blink ofthe eye gone forever without a trace.
On the other hand, some personsdisappear for extended periods of times, days,
weeks, months, and sometimes years, only to one day reappear in
an area that was heavily searched byhundreds of people countless times. As you
can imagine, the missing phenomenon hasbrought forth wild theories and skepticism alike.

(11:11):
Multiple people bring forth compelling arguments thatpolite Is is no more than stretching the
truth to fit a narrative, explainingthat a lot of these cases can be
explained by well known aspects that Davidhimself might not be aware of. But
even where people think he is wrong, there are countless people that think he
is onto something. Some theorize feralpeople, wild men, or even bigfoot

(11:35):
lurking in our national parks and victimizingunsuspected hikers, like in the case of
Dennis Martin. Some subscribe to theoriesthat we might see as outlandish because it
is outside of our realm of whatwe conceive is believable, such as portals,
the Faye time slips, parallel universe'salien abductions. In today's topic,

(11:56):
staircases in the Woods, I thinkthat kind of builds the narrative for today's
episode. A lot of this staircasesin the Woods theories and stories tied directly
into Missing four on one. Fromwhat I've read, I've heard stories that
people climb these staircases that they comeacross in the woods. These are out,

(12:18):
like they talk about huge numbers,like forty miles out in the middle
of the wilderness, where there shouldn'tbe staircases, there shouldn't be houses,
there shouldn't be infrastructure or anything likethat. So a lot of people think
that these staircases are sinister and thatthey are portals or that there's steps to

(12:39):
another world. Some people even talkabout them being what alien launchpad for boarding
alien ships. So this kind ofties into the Missing four on one theory
that these staircases are taking people fromthe woods. Is there anything you guys
have to add to that? Well, I think a lot of the stories
do talk about how people experience strangethings when they are when they try to

(13:05):
get near or try to climb thesestairs, right, I also have a
theory which I will be exploring forthis show. Along with the notion that
they could potentially be portals or likebridges to the spiritual realm. This theory
might actually lend credence to that.But I'm going to explore the side of
how stairs have been used as objectsof ritual and some of the spiritual significance

(13:31):
of stairways and some of these lesserknown secretive orders, and to see,
if you know, maybe there's alink there as well. I definitely think
there could be, and I almostsubscribe to the historical aspect of these staircases
or that they are being used assome sort of altar. I'm not completely
sold that these staircases are portals toother worlds or anything along those lines.

(13:58):
You know, some stories talk aboutillnesses and sickness and dizziness and strange like
paranormal happenings around these staircases, ButI think that could almost be tied more
into what you're talking about with altarsand like cult like activities, but yeah,
or secretive groups where people practicing magicor using those stairs as like a

(14:20):
ceremonial item to perform some kind ofmagical ritual. Definitely. I think there
could be dark energy tied to these. I was just gonna say, I
kind of wrote down, you knowwhat makes these significant? All those strange
staircases have been popping up throughout history, which we'll talk about later in today's
episode. The popularity has grown withthe Missing Four on one platform, but

(14:43):
the popularity didn't start here. Itstarted, to the best of my knowledge,
and I think we can all kindof agree on this with a Reddit
posting in the No Sleep forum.So there was a posting twenty fifteen and
it was titled I am a searchingrescue officer for the US Forest Service and
I have some stories to tell.It's kind of hard to tell if there's

(15:05):
any truth behind these stories because noSleep Forum tends to be more fictional stories
and accounts. It goes on thereand says they're scary personal experiences, but
you know, it's the Internet,and it's kind of hard to differentiate between
what is actual, factual based storiesand what is completely made up. So

(15:30):
I did pull together some excerpts fromthem postings. But did you have something
to say before I continue on?Yeah, kind of, So when I
was looking into it, and Ispent a lot of time on Reddit trying
to search through some of the stuff, and I have to say, I
hate to say this, but Iwas kind of disappointed. I kind of

(15:50):
came to the conclusion that it seemedlike a lot of younger people were writing
stories. They were trying to soundcreepy, but they were just still young,
and it just didn't really play outand sound as good as they wanted
it to or come across as goodas they wanted to. I'm all about
the woo, and like I hateto say that, I feel like I

(16:11):
could debunk these stories. It's likea huge bummer for me after I looked
into it. But when you getinto Donnie's research and then a little bit
of your research, Dylan, itmakes it much more interesting and kind of
brings you to almost like a cliffhangeron the topic, almost yeah, I
know exactly what you're talking about.Like they almost try to oversell it and

(16:34):
put in way too much detail andmake it I don't know. You can
read a story or listen to someonetalk about like a paranormal event or activity
or experience or reciting and you canalmost pick apart what you perceived as false
and what is more truthful? LikeI feel like over detail definitely shows that

(16:59):
someone is making something up. Likeif you have so much detail in a
story, it's almost like you sitdown and think about it, you know,
when you have an actual experience.It's just like eyewitness testimonies. They're
almost like the worst thing to havebecause they aren't focused on that exact happening
or crime or whatever it may be. It's like they see it in split
seconds, so they're not gathering allthe details. It's like an in and

(17:22):
out type of thing. If youhave time to sit there and fathom and
think about it, almost like you'remaking it up. Yeah, that makes
a lot of sense. And togo back to the No Sleep forum,
I did see a lot of postsand comments saying that this is specifically meant
to be a nonfiction scary story,paranormal horror, just telling fiction stories.

(17:45):
But people are to act like itis true, so you are supposed to
respond in the comments and just goalong with it and basically for entertainment.
But that being said, a coupleof years wrestling, Actually, if you
think about it, it's kind oflike a yeah, I guess you're right.
I just laughed. I wasn't tryingto be rude, but that just
because I wasn't expecting you to saythat it's funny. Did a good job.

(18:11):
It's just like any any scripted thing, right, It's trying to gather
your attention, is trying to putyou in the story, trying to make
you part of it. So it'sa lot more fun watching TV when you
believe it. Right, So wouldyou say it's like on the level of
like creepy Pasta and Slenderman and allthat, Um, I don't think it's
that intense, right, Because Icame across this specific forum that Dylan is

(18:37):
talking about, and this supposed searchand rescue officer wrote all these stories down,
and I remember being on the couchone night I couldn't sleep. It
was like two three o'clock in themorning, like late, and I stumbled
across this and I read these storiesby this person and I was just like
sitting there, wide eyed, horrified, scared, and I was like,
holy shit, these are good stories. This is so creepy. And then

(19:02):
I think maybe months later I foundout that they were fiction. I was
super bummed out. But nonetheless,it's it's great entertainment. That person should
be an author. Yeah, I'dbe surprised if they're not. And you
know, I have I have acouple of their stories right here that I
am going to read through. Igot, I got more than I need,
So I'm just gonna read a coupleof them before we do that,

(19:23):
though, Can I offer like acounterpoint to maybe add to the plausibility if
their cases into woods? Yeah,it is all right, I will.
I will retract that then. No. I don't know about you guys,
but I've gone. You know,when I go hiking sometimes where I live,
every now and then into woods,you'll pass by something like a random

(19:45):
chimney from an old house or likean old foundation, And a lot of
times when you're in like a nationalpark, and you assume that, well,
at some point in history someone tolive here, a lot of people
will walk past these things without givingthem much thought. A staircase, by
myself, is just innocuous. SoI'm wondering about all the people who do,
perhaps potentially are like walking in thewoods, they see a random staircase

(20:08):
and they just think, oh,that's kind of funny, and they just
keep walking on and they don't thinkmuch of it because they've got other things
on their mind, like their hikeor their camping plans or whatever. You
know. I don't know if youguys can relate to that. When you
guys go hiking and you see arandom relic from the past and an old
brick wall or an old chimney,you just keep walking right. Yeah,

(20:29):
definitely, And you know I can. I have a story behind that.
So when I lived in Colorado,me and my buddy went hiking like all
day long. We what the heckwas It was a Cheyenne Mountain, might
have been Shyanne Mountain, And wefound this trail that took us all the
way to like the peak of amountain, and we're like, we're gonna
make it there in one day.And this is a summertime. I don't

(20:51):
remember what month it was, butit was hot out. We like eight
hours up these trails up in thewoods, and we reached snow. That's
how high we hike. We're upthere, We're like soaking wet, falling
in the snow and the creek bedsand ship and they're like, all right,
dude, we had to get outof here. So we decided to
run out of the hill. Wegot to the bottom in two hours.
That's how steep it was. Ifit tells you anything. It took us

(21:11):
eight hours to get up there,but it took us two hours to run
out. So we're running out andwe come across this cabin and it was
a pioneer cabin or whatever you wantto call it, where people traveling from
the east to west coast back inthe day, they'd be able to stay
in there and is free shelter,come and go as you please, whatever.
But the point being is that wesaw a cabin, and a cabin

(21:33):
stands out to you and it's coolas shit. When you see a staircase,
you're just like, like, I'mnot going to approach a staircase.
It's nothing that jumps right out tome. It kind of sounds lame.
So when you're saying like you mightjust walk by, totally agree with that,
Yeah, because I feel like Imight just walk by a staircase by
just happened upon it. Hiking intowoods. I'm the opposite of that.

(21:55):
When if I see old remains,I have to go over and check it
out. In my mind immediately startsthinking about what it was, what it
was like back in the day,the type of people that would frequent the
area. I just I just likeold stuff. Yeah, I can agree.
You know, I don't know ifit'd catch my eye, but I
can see where you're coming from onit. Yeah, like because I go

(22:17):
out and they explore abandoned places,but there's there's kind of more structure to
it, so it makes it moreappealing to me, you know what I
mean? Yeah, definitely. Withthat other way, I'll jump into some
of these stories that we're talking aboutnow. These are the quote unquote fictional,
nonfictional no Sleep whatever you may callit, whatever you may take it

(22:40):
story. These came out as madeup, but they are from a potentially
true role playing, possibly scripted,unscripted, whatever you want to call it,
true story something like that. Thiswas part of that original posting we
talked about that was first saw inthe No Sleep forum back in twenty fifteen

(23:00):
on Reddit, titled I am aSearch and Rescue officer for the US Forest
Service. I have some stories totell. Now. This is entry number
five, and this is kind ofwhat kicks off the Staircase in the Woods
scary story phenomena. It goes thisis the last one I'll tell, and
it's probably the weirdest story I have. Now. I don't know if this

(23:21):
is true in every search and rescueunit, but in mind, it's sort
of an unspoken regular thing we runinto. You can try asking about it
with other search and rescue officers,but even if they know what you're talking
about, they probably won't say anythingabout it. We've been told not to
talk about it by our supervisors,and at this point we've all gotten so

(23:41):
used to it that it doesn't evenseem weird anymore. And just about every
case where we are really far outinto the wilderness, I'm talking thirty or
forty miles, at some point,we'll find a staircase in the middle of
the woods. It's almost like ifyou took the stairs in your house,
cut them out, and put themin the forest. I asked about it
the first time I saw some,and the other officer just told me not

(24:03):
to worry about it and that itwas normal. Everyone I asked said the
same thing. I wanted to gocheck them out, but I was told
very empathetically that I should never gonear any of them. I just sort
of ignored them, and now whenI run into them because it happened so
frequently. Yeah, so that isthe first entry that really kicks off the

(24:26):
story of the staircases in the woods, And upon further questioning from users on
Reddit, the original poster would goon to address some of the questions that
the guy they're the people had,So entry number six goes like this.
So I lugged back on tonight andwas blown away by the staggering amount of

(24:49):
interest that seems to have generated.First off, I'll address a few things
that you guys brought up. There'sbeen an overwhelming amount of people monitoring the
similar charities between some of my storiesand those of David Politis. I assure
you I am not trying to riphim off in any way. I've got
nothing but respect for the guy.He's actually what inspired me to write this

(25:11):
because I can verify a lot ofthings he talks about. We do have
a lot of these strange missing personcases, and most of the time they
aren't solved. Either that or wefind them in places they have no business
being. I personally haven't been onmany calls like that, but I'll share
a few that I've seen. Ina story my friend told me about that

(25:32):
relates to this. There was alot of feedback about the stairs, so
I'll touch on this briefly and I'llalso include a story. They come in
a variety of shape, sizes,styles, and conditions. Some are pretty
dilapicated, just ruins, but othersare brand new. I saw one set
that looks like they came from alighthouse. They're a metal in spiral,
almost old fashioned. The stairs don'tgo up in infinitely or farther than I

(25:56):
can see, but some sets aretaller than others. Like I said before,
just imagine the stairs in your houseas if someone cut and pasted them
in the middle of nowhere. Idon't have any pictures. It's never really
occurred to me to try again afterthe first time, and I don't really
feel like risking my job over it. I'll try again in the future,
but I can't really promise anything now. This uh points out an interesting thing

(26:21):
with the pictures, because you know, with the popularity of social media,
there came a thing called TikTok.And I don't know if you guys have
heard about that. No, what'sthat? So TikTok is one of the
larger or one of the fastest growingsocial media websites that caters too are now
short attention span, you know,only we're only good for about what is

(26:44):
it thirty seconds? Now I canwhat's the stories? TikTok video Yep,
Yeah, with a new platform totell scary stories on a lot of these
staircases in the woods really took off. So it's kind of cool to see
how it evolved from him not beingable to take pictures to people on TikTok

(27:06):
finding all these staircases or alleged staircases, and videotaping them. I want to
read one more, and this isa long one. One of my first
jobs as a trainee was searching I'mguessing this is an outpost searching op for
a four year old kid gotten separatedfrom his mother. This was one of
those stories where we knew where wecould find him because the dogs were on

(27:30):
a strong scent trail and we sawclear signs that he was in the area.
We ended up finding him in aberry patch about half a mile from
where he had last been seen.Kid wasn't even aware that he wandered off
that far. One of the vetsbrought him back, which I was glad
for because I'm not really good withkids, and I find it hard to
talk to them and keep them company. As my trainer and I were headed

(27:52):
back, she decided to take meon a detour to show me one of
the hot spots where we tend tofind missing people. It's a natural dip
in the land near a popular trail, and people will usually move downhill because
it's easier. We hike out there. It's just a few miles away,
and we get there in about anhour or so. As we're walking around
the area and she's pointing out placesshe found people in the past, I

(28:14):
see something in the distance. Now, this area we're in is about eight
miles from the main parking area,though there's back roads you can take to
get closer if you don't want tohike that far. But we're on a
state protected land, which means therecan't be any kind of commercial residential development
out there. The most you'll eversee is a fire tower, makeshift shelter
that home. Most people think theycan get away with building, but I

(28:37):
can see from here that whatever thatthing is has straight edges. And if
there's one thing you learn quickly,it's that nature rarely makes straight lines.
I pointed out, but she doesn'tsay anything. She just hangs back and
lets me wander over and check itout. I get within twenty feet of
it, and all the hair onthe back of my neck stands up.
It's a staircase in the middle ofthe fucking woods. In the context,

(29:00):
it would literally be the most benignthing ever. It's just a normal staircase
with beige carpet and about ten stepstall. But instead of being in a
house where it obviously should be,it's in the middle of the woods.
The sides aren't carpeted obviously, andI can see the wood it's made of.
It's almost like a video game Clitchwhere the house has failed to load

(29:21):
completely and the stairs is the onlything visible. I stand there and it's
like my brain is working overtime totry and make sense of what I'm seeing.
My trainer comes and stands next tome, and she stands there casually,
looking as if it's the least interestingthing in the world. I ask
her what the fuck this thing isdoing here, and she just chuckles,
Get used to it, Rook,You're going to see a lot of them.

(29:41):
I start to move closer, butshe grabs my arm hard. I
wouldn't do that, she says.Her voice is casual, but her grip
is tight, and I just standthere looking at her. You're going to
see them all the time. Don'tcome near them, don't touch them,
don't go up them, just ignorethem. I start to ask her about
it, but something in the wayshe's looking at me tells me that it's

(30:03):
best if I don't. We endup moving on and this subject doesn't come
up again for the rest of mytraining. She was right, though,
I'd say about every fifth call Igo on, I end up running across
a set of stairs. Sometimes they'rerelatively close to the path, maybe two
or three miles. Sometimes they're twentythirty miles out, literally in the middle
of nowhere, and I only findthem during the broadest searches or training weekends.

(30:27):
They're usually in good condition, butsometimes it's like they've been out there
for miles. All different kinds andall different sizes. The biggest I ever
saw looked like they came out ofa turn of a century mansion, and
we're at least ten feet wide,with steps leading up at least fifteen or
twenty feet. I've tried talking aboutthem with people, but they just give
me the same response my trainer did. It's normal, don't worry about it.

(30:49):
They're not a big deal. Don'tgo close to them or up them.
When trainees ask me about it,I give them the same response.
I don't really know what else totell them. I really hope someday I
get a better answer, but ithasn't happened yet. So the reason I
wanted to read that story is becauseI feel like TikTok kind of destroyed the

(31:11):
scary sense of these staircases, becauseI've seen so many videos of people finding
these staircases in the woods and runningup them, completely countering what this guy
was saying. But maybe it's oneof those things where it only works when
it's done at a certain time orin a certain alignment, in particular time
a day. You know, Oh, that's a good point. A portal

(31:33):
isn't going to be open all thetime. No, maybe it's something during
the witching hour or some some eleveneleven eleven, or you know a series
of threes or something like that,or you got to climb up the steps
and do a certain thing or something, or even too how you said it,
TikTok and social media has destroyed itbecause I came across so many pictures

(31:56):
of just random steps in the woodsthat you could tell that were clearly part
of a park or a hiking trail, and they were supposed to be there,
and people were trying to claim thatthey were these spooky steps, and
I'm like, oh, this isa bummer, this isn't anything exciting.
Did you find any pictures that werelike sort of convincing though, or made
you scratch her head? There wassome weird ones if you search on the

(32:21):
internet, and I came across thisone that I saw a couple of times.
It's just very large, and itlooks to be like a concrete staircase,
and it just looks so oddly setthat I was wondering if it had
been photoshop. And I zoomed inand tried to look a little bit around
it, and there was a lotof leaf litter on the ground, and
it seems that the steps had theleaves on them also, and kind of

(32:45):
debris and the stuff that was thesame as the forest floor. So I
don't know what they were used forthough maybe there's something that I'm just not
aware of, but they seem strange. Yeah, it's kinda hard to fathom
what these steps would be used foractually like a concrete form of them,
you know. But now that Ifeel like we kind of set the mood

(33:07):
for where the story origidated with orfrom, and what they were composed of
in the urban legend built around them. But even with these urban legends in
with different stories, some people comeforth with true stories. And I actually
had a friend sent in a storyabout his encounter with staircases in the woods.

(33:30):
This next section we move into istrue stories. So I'm going to
start off of this, then I'mgoing to pass it over to Laura to
share some that she found online.This first story was submitted from a fellow
YouTuber. His name is Caucasian Sasquatch, which I think everyone in this podcast
knows him, and he has achannel on YouTube where he finds different channels

(33:54):
that he likes and he brings onthe creator and he kind of interviews them
about their channel and their content.So this is kind of why I got
the idea about staircases in the woodstoo. So he sent me this,
I'm like, let's build a wholeepisode around this. So his story goes
like this, I was about elevenor twelve. Pops and I were basically

(34:14):
hiking, hunting, trapping, andfishing our way across a plot of paper
plantation, thousands of acres of treesowned by a corporation somewhere point is no
one out there is supposed to beout there, including us, I guess.
Anyways, We're traveling south through theoriginal old growth cloud forest of Georgia

(34:35):
when we came to a largest clearingmaybe five acres and nothing but short grass.
In the middle of the unbroken darkgreen was a marble grand staircase.
Now there's old plantation houses all overthe south, and this staircase would have
fit into them. Into gone withthe wind or the great gap speed seamlessly.
So I'm walking towards the staircase whenI realize Pops isn't coming. He

(34:59):
is in the tree. I goback, and he asked me what is
wrong with this place? After lookingfor a few minutes, I realized what
he meant. No roads, noruins, no wells, no bits of
anything man made anywhere except an immaculate, gleaming white marble grand staircase, nothing
attached to it from nowhere to nowhere, No boards, nails, no shingles,

(35:22):
wire or rope. In fact,no wind or animals either. We
didn't discuss it. We walked straightback to the boat and went home.
Before I got married. I wentback was thinking a picture of it would
be really cool. Two weeks Icrisscrossed the area and I did occasionally find
tennis court sized patches of short grass, but somehow I had lost location.

(35:42):
Furthermore, it's not on Google Earth. I'm sure it's just an old plantation
house burned down during Sherman's March,But that staircase has always sort of haunted
me. If personally curious look intoToombsborough, Georgia. The staircase should be
twenty miles northeast of the extinct down, which has a few story of its
own. So, you know,this story kind of reminds me of a

(36:04):
lot of the different encounter stories thatwe hear about, you know, just
the deadness of the woods, thedreadful feeling, you know, stuff along
those lines, like the no windfactor, the no presence of animals and
wildlife and stuff that should be there. So maybe there is like a paranormal
aspect to it, or maybe there'ssomething more. Maybe it is a portal,

(36:27):
or maybe there's something lurking around theseluring people in. What do you
guys think about that? Well?I remember hearing a few stories a wild
back, a few podcast episodes ofpeople who encountered in like buildings that would
seem to appear in certain spots inthe woods, and these are woods that
these people are familiar with, andthen they're like, why is this building
all of a sudden here? Andthen they come back later and it's gone,

(36:50):
you know, and Caucasian Sasquatch.Yeah, his story sounded a lot
like that, right, because hesaid he went back looking for it and
wasn't there. Yeah, yeah,And you know, maybe that kind of
makes me think of time slips andlike parallel universes and stuff like that.
Maybe there was like a crossover andthat's why he saw it that day with
his dad. There's father got thatstrange feeling of it that he noticed first.

(37:14):
Maybe he was outside of crossing overand his son was more into it,
he was more allured in because hewas closer something than that, and
maybe his father pulled him out ofthat trance. Maybe he's in a trance
like state. Have you felt thatfeeling into woods? Before of like just
everything goes quiet and then you justyou're just thinking something that ain't right right

(37:37):
now. Oh yeah, definitely.And you know, I'm sure that this
on here quite a few times.Yeah, but with my my encounter in
the woods while I was hunting.But yeah, and it is. It
is like a trance like feeling.But I feel like your instincts sometimes get
the best of you and you cansnap out of it. Yeah, that's

(37:58):
a weird feeling, man, LikeI remember I felt it for the first
time when I was over at theburn brain manor when i'd step outside like
late at night, I like fourin the morning, to smoke a cigarette
and I'd be like out in thewoods right outside my building. I'll just
look around and then it almost feltlike I don't know if you can relate
to this, but it almost feltlike you were on another planet. Yeah,
yeah, sure, Like it shouldn'tbe this quirt right now. The

(38:20):
silence is almost palpable. There's likethis weird feeling in the air. There's
no bugs or insects, even thoughit was the middle of summer with mine,
I felt like I was being moreor less haunted, like I was
being stalked like I was someone's preyalmost, And did you notice that there
was like no sound around. Yeah, all the animals just went silent,
right, m Laura, you feltthat too, Right. So I've felt

(38:44):
some really weird things in the woods, and I've had some moments where I've
been really scared, but I've neverbeen out out there in the woods hiking
and had the forest go completely silentaround me. But I did have something
that was similar to that within theway Dylan said that he felt like he
was being hunted. I went toPandemonium, which is an old town in

(39:08):
Pennsylvania. I think this was likelast fall. I don't even remember anymore
since COVID everything just runs together.But I was out there at night,
and I was next to this graveyardof this old town, and I was
with someone and they were kind ofinvestigating around, and I was kind of

(39:29):
standing more closer to the vehicles becauseI was pretty freaked out because I just
felt scared. Now, I hadbeen there during the day and I wasn't
I wasn't really that scared, butwhen it's nighttime, it just changes and
it gets just weirder. So anyways, I was probably like four feet away
from the edge of the woods.When I was standing there and dead silent,

(39:49):
we would hear nothing in the woods. But then if we would like
go to move walk around to changepositions, you would hear something creeping towards
you in the woods, like movingaround, and then we'd stop and we'd
listen for it, and then it'dbe dead silent, and then we'd move
again. And it kept happening likeit was so creepy, and I started
to realize that I was hearing stuffmoving while I was moving, and it's

(40:13):
like, holy shit, like it'strying to cover its movements while we're moving
so that we don't hear it.Is the sense that I was getting from
it. It scared the shit outof me, It really did. I
can imagine it felt like you're activelybeing stopped, right, and that's exactly
what it felt like. It feltlike if I was this other thing that
was trying to get me. Itwas like, hey, let me move

(40:35):
while they're moving so they can't hearme. And yeah, it got I
swear to god. It got tothe point where I was like, this
is what's going on. So Iwould intentionally move and make noise and movements
and you would hear it. Itsounded like a squirrel in the woods almost,
you know how it moves with theleaves, but larger, not super
large, but bigger than like asquirrel. It was crazy. That place

(40:57):
is creepy. I have some otherstories from that, but yeah, we
should definitely go out there sometime becauseit's there's some weird stuff there. Now,
my next story I picked out.It ties into being stalked or watched
by an animal or something along thoselines, and it's from the Stairs in
the Woods forum on Reddit. Theoriginal user has since been deleted. I

(41:19):
guess that's what it means when youhave the user in the brackets and the
delete on there. So this storyis titled When I was young, I
stumbled across a random staircase in themiddle of the woods. I was the
only one there for what seemed liketen minutes, but I would later find
out that I'd been gone for twohours. What happened to me? So
this happened to me when I wasthirteen years old, and I've never heard

(41:44):
of anything like this happening to meanyone ever since. I've never told anyone
about it. Me and my bestfriend were playing in the woods behind my
house. We were playing hiding seekwhen I stumbled upon a staircase that led
to nowhere. I'm assuming it's thestairs of a torn down house or cabin
or something anyways, and not thinkingabout it, I climbed up it.

(42:06):
When I hit the top, Ijust started to look around and I felt
really odd, like I was beingwatched or an animal was stalking me.
I then noticed that the sounds ofthe forest had completely disappeared. It was
completely silent. Then the wind pickedup and I heard it transform into a
scream that made me snap back intoit. It was my mom and my
friend. Apparently I had been therefor just two hours and nobody could find

(42:30):
me. And went back in andthat was it. I've never told anyone
about what happened, nor do Ihave any explanation. I don't really believe
in the paranormal or anything, butthis story is one hundred percent true to
the best of my memory. Mymom and friend will still say I was
lost in the woods for two hours. Any explanations that is wild, I

(42:55):
mean that would suggest that it's somekind of portal or pocket dimension, or
you'll give some plausible ideas. Sowhy so many people go missing so very
randomly and suddenly. And he saidthat nobody else saw the staircase, right,
Yeah, he saw it by itself. That's crazy, Like I couldn't
even imagine experiencing a time slip.That's so weird. It felt like ten

(43:17):
minutes to him, but it wastwo hours later. It really makes you
wonder what happened during them two hours. Yeah, if it's true, then
this could actually explain a lot ofstuff, or a lot of reasons why
people go missing. I mean,there's probably no concrete explanation as to why
that phenomena exists or how it couldexist. I don't know, Laura,
what do you think. I don'tknow. Is something being done to you

(43:40):
so that you forget, or isyour brain shutting it out and blocking it
out that it's so traumatic that youcan't remember it, like an abduction story
or something. Yeah, And whichis weird because the time thing just made
me think of I just recently hearda story about saying how alien abductions.

(44:00):
It's kind of like the twenty inback stories where they pick you up and
drop you back off, but it'sas if no time has even passed twenty
in back is so wild. Ididn't know about twenty in back until I
listened to the Confessionals episode. Yeah, I don't mean too okay, So
we all learned it from there becauseI was like, if this is something
that I completely missed out on.No, yeah, yeah, that's some

(44:22):
scary shit. But I feel likeI've heard that term before. And then
after I listened to Tony's episode ofThe Confessionals, I was like, Oh,
that's what that means. I couldn'teven imagine. So for those who
don't know what a twenty in backis, this is how I understood it.
You get abducted and they use yourmind for twenty years, and they

(44:45):
like put your body on hold,so like you live out twenty years of
your life as essentially a slave tothe aliens or whatever. Do they go
more into like New World Order Illuminatithing about it or is it just that
was that specific episode It goes intolike all of it actually a New World
Order Illuminati group in league with extraterrestrielswho are in war with another set of

(45:09):
extraterrestrials. And a lot of thesepeople in these twenty in backs they report
being recruited, oftentimes to fight orto assist in the war effort, and
then when their service is done,they get taken back to when they were
a kid and when they were firstabducted. Yeah, the soldier for them
is kind of the shit end ofthe deal, going out fighting for them,

(45:29):
it's like the lowest level. Butthen you get like different I don't
know, I don't want to callthem tears, but different jobs that you
can get involved with and get theend of the whole deal. You're supposed
to what extend your life by twentyyears? Is that talking about you live
twenty years through your mind or doyou live twenty years longer than you're expected
to originally? Well, I don'tthink they originally have the memories. I

(45:52):
think the memories are like unlocked.Later in life, through some kind of
regression or whatever happens, they startremembering all the stuff that happened, and
there, I guess their previous twentyyears, you know, outside their current
timeline. I guess it would bethe best way to put it. Get
it gets so you guess a littlewild. It starts talking about time travel

(46:13):
and then then you get us upthinking of time is linear. It's like
there's like, right, and lefthand turns and all the down sideways and
shit like that complicated math it is, man, I can't that stuff is
really it just trips me out.I don't like to think about it.

(46:34):
Yeah, I think time travel storiesare some of my favorite ones though,
Like of all the mysterious paranormal storiesand anyone that involves time travels, I'm
all for it. Give me liketime slips is that you're are you talking
more like time travel, like likemultiple timelines and being able to move into
the future or the past. Yeah. Yeah, I've heard stories where the
people go in another country and theygo on vacation and they find this hotel

(47:00):
and it's all hustling and bustling,and they check in for the night and
then check out, and then Iguess they go back the next day and
it's all run down and the spiderwebs and everything, and it's like this
hotel hasn't been opened in two hundredyears. Like, you know, I
love those stories. Fucking wild arecrazy. It'd be cool to experience something

(47:21):
like that, you'd be complete mindfuck so. But the other part of
that scares the shit out of me. How many people here. Maybe here's
another thing. That could die intothe missing people. How many people get
stuck there and don't come back outinto the time they're supposed to be in,
and we never hear from them again, and they're just stuck in another
parallel universe or another time, rightman, That's that's wild. It'd probably

(47:45):
drive you insane. Do you imaginelike waking up to like I had nightmares
about that ship before too. Ithink that'd be the worst thing, to
wake up and not be yourself.Do you imagine that, like you wake
up and you're someone else and youknow of your family and you can't get
back to them, or even ifyou could, they don't believe it because
you're not yourself. That's nightmare shit. But anyways, I think we got

(48:07):
some more stories, so I'll letyou take it from here, Laura.
All right, So now in someof my research, I went to read
it and I will just start intoit now. Some people have experienced strange,
sudden illnesses when encountering these staircase stories, and this story is an example

(48:28):
of that. True story. Staircasein the woods in South Georgia, Me
and my brother were enjoying a rideon our family golf cart and we found
a random trail, like you couldtell something has been here before, and
we got curious, so we wentto check. It was decently easy to
get into. There were a coupleof bushes we had to step over.

(48:51):
Then when we saw it, Istarted to feel nauseous. Curiosity got the
best of me, so I checkedit out and there were a couple of
steps missing. There was basic usuallynothing living around it. All the bushes
were dead and a small tree.This staircase was in the woods by Georgia's
Crooked River. The water was probablytwenty feet away from it, so at
first I thought it was like somethingto see the water. I wanted to

(49:15):
see if it had a good pier, but when it got to the top,
you couldn't see anything. It wasall covered up by trees. The
trees were very big and old looking. I started feeling awful. I walked
down the stairs. Then me andmy brother went to our friend's house like
we had originally planned. I haven'tfelt any better since this. I think

(49:37):
I might need to go back andresolve this somehow. I don't know what
to do, so I would saylike with this story, it kind of
has similarities with previous stories with thisbeing in like an open field and with
the underlying feelings of sickness, whichit kind of leads me back into what

(49:57):
we talked about earlier about maybe darkmagic being present or something like along those
lines. I think in this storyhe went a little bit further. He
said, like, all that vegetationaround it was also dead too. Yeah,
that just speaks a death. Yeah, nothing would even grow around it.
Yeah, good catch there, Donnie. I didn't even pick that up,
And I think that it almost leadsinto what you were talking about with

(50:22):
when we begin this show about thedifferent historical aspects of it in ritual magic
and stuff like that. Well,the angle I started going at it was
what if someone was building these stepsas a form of magical beacon, spiritual
beacon, adair way into the spiritrealm, which is a mooteef that comes

(50:43):
up a lot in ancient history andancient religions. I think the most famous
example of this would be the storyin the Bible of Jacob's Ladder. I
don't know if you guys are familiarwith that. It's in Genesis Genesis twenty
eight tenth or nineteen. Basically,Jacob, he's the guy that screwed over
his brother Esau and running away fromhim. And when he's on the run,
he goes to lie down. He'slike camping outdoors. He goes to

(51:06):
lie down, puts his head,uses a rock as his pillow, and
he gets his dream where he seesthis the way the Bible says it or
the way people understand it, It'slike this ladder where on one side they
see angels descending up into heaven andthen a bunch of angels descending down the
ladder, kind of like how escalatorsgo up and down yep. And then
he talks about seeing God at thetop of the ladder. This particular story,

(51:30):
this is like the imagery that alot of people invoke when they do
talk about stairs. Another group thattalks about them a lot are the Stonemasons,
and everyone's got opinions about them,everyone's got ideas about them, but
they are a secretive organization that alot of people know. There's different levels
of initiation. Now. One ofthe things I was able to find was

(51:51):
that there's a specific ritual for Stonemasonswhen they go from like level two to
level three. I there's thirty threelevels in But when you're like a new
initiate, and let's say you're like, okay, I want to reach level
three. What they do is theyhave a special ceremony that involves a set
of stairs. And the reason whystairs are so important for Stonemasons, well,

(52:15):
one is because a lot of whatthey deal with is building an architecture,
right, so staircases are very importantfor that. But the other thing
is that staircases are often used asa metaphor like spiritual ascension, and that's
like a motif that shows up alot in a lot of different cultures.
That's why whenever you look at theseold temples, they always put like these

(52:37):
massive staircases that go up to thealtars, right, because that's supposed to
be a symbolic gesture that you haveto climb these steps in order to attain
a certain level of spiritual enlightenment toeven be able to be allowed in front
of that altar. You have thoseMayan temples where they have those huge staircases
and they're just covered in hiros androoms. Another example is the Etruscan pyramids

(53:06):
of Bumzaro that we were looking atearlier. Bomzaro is it's a town in
central Italy and they believed they foundlike this pyramid like structure. It's not
really a pyramid, it's just thatone side of slope and that's the stair
side. And they believe it wasmade by the Etruscans, who were like
native Italians before the Roman Empire showedup. They think that this thing was

(53:27):
made like in seven hundred BC,right when Rome was first starting, and
so far they believed that it wasa religious structure. It was a very
angular, it was carved from volcanicrock. Again like these stories, it
was found deep into woods, andthey believed that it was used as a
site for possible human sacrifices. Wow. Yeah, So when I'm looking at

(53:53):
all of this, especially with theStonemason stuff, another real interesting thing that
I learned was that according to Stonemasons, whenever they use steps in any kind
of ceremony, the number of stepshas to be an odd number, because
if it's an odd number, thefirst foot you step, you use to
step on is the last foot youstep off. So you take your first

(54:16):
step with your right foot and thenyou make your last step with the right
foot. That's that's on purpose.That's why they specifically make it odd numbers.
And different lodges. In different groups, they use different size steps.
I've heard some that were like fiveor fifteen steps, others were like thirty
three. But the rule of thumbwas always it's got to be odd numbers.

(54:36):
What's the reasoning behind the steps havingto start with? It's supposed to
represent that each step is like astep you take to attain growth and enlightenment.
That's why you're moving up. Eachindividual step is part of like what
they see it as, like thehero's journey. Okay, that you are,
I guess it's where the idea oflike stairway to having that song comes

(54:59):
from. You know, you're you'regoing on this path upwards to attain a
certain level and reach the other sideof the spiritual role. That's why it's
always represented as stairs and not abridge, because it's it's something about like
growth and climbing and upward movement.Is there symbolism behind the foot though,
with starting and ending with the samefoot? Uh? Yeah. They were

(55:22):
very careful to say that if itwas an odd number, the whole process
would be invalid because it was basicallythe idea of you finished as you start.
Yeah, okay, that makes alot of sense. So one of
the things that I was really curiousabout these stairs in the woods, see,
like you know, the one frustratingaspect of this for me is I

(55:44):
wish there was more data. Iwish people in these stories would include the
number of steps. Yeah, thatthat I'm sure that's something that hasn't even
been recorded, like unless unless youknow a meaning behind the steps that I'm
sure it's completely over look and maybeit's like a significant number. And if
people did talk about how did mentionthe number of steps, and if they

(56:07):
all turned out odd numbers, thenmy wheel starts spending and I'm thinking maybe
this is some kind of Masonic ritual. Yeah, definitely. I wonder if
there's there's almost false staircases out there, if you go down that rabbit hole,
if you're thinking of them as aMasonic like statue or staircase or altar

(56:28):
or whatever, if they almost havefake staircases, that if they don't have
an odd number of steps so nothinghappens. Yeah, But there is also
a link to the portal theory,because I mean, essentially, when we
follow the portal theory, what isits stating at the end of the day
that these steps lead to a possibleother world right, well into spiritual analogy

(56:52):
of it, it's the same ideayou climb these steps to enter the spirit
realm or the Kingdom of Heaven orwhatever your faith system. Maybe, but
it's an interesting link. And Ididn't notice that staircases are an important symbol
for a lot of these cultures.Yeah, I could agree, I can't.
I wonder if there's a link.I can definitely see symbolism in staircases.

(57:13):
Just like you said, it's likea it's a journey. It shows
growth, This shows accomplishment. Italmost you know, with the footing,
it shows a full circle. It'sshowing that you start a journey and you
see it through and to the end. You know, you're you're showing a
full circle, an accomplishment with startingwith the same foot and ending with the
same foot, and you're overcoming afeat like tackling a staircase. It's you

(57:37):
know, it's not a simple task. It is a simple task, but
it's showing a challenge and you're raisingto the next level. Yeah. And
I was looking at like old picturesof like the Temple of Solomon, and
they actually have like their main altaroutside the temple like in front of it,
and it's all it is is justa staircase that leads to like a
platform with an alter ontop of it. And again, the reason why the

(57:58):
staircase is supposed to be there issupposed to be symbolic, like you have
to ascend to be there. Sobecause it was hard for me to wrap
my head at first, like whywould it just be staircases? Right?
Because you hear all these stories andthey don't have any other debris, no
other walls, no other structures,no pillars or nothing, no foundation.
So what is it about the staircaseitself that's significant? Well, a lot

(58:21):
of these ancient groups, these freemasons, they see a lot of significance in
it. And I don't know,if we had more data, we could
figure out the link, not justthe number of steps, but also where
are these encounters happening. What's thelocation? Are they occurring on any lay
lines for example? Maybe that couldlead to potential ideas of wortals. Is

(58:43):
there a pattern to where they're located? Also, what direction are they facing?
Are they facing east west? That'sanother thing I wanted to know.
I'm sure that Teddy Roosevelt was aFreemason or something wasn't they. I can
only imagine he was a president ofthe United States. He was a man
of power, and he created theAct to protect the National Parks and stuff,

(59:06):
right, yeah, and these arefound within the National Parks, or
a lot of these stories are foundwith the National Parks. I wonder if
there is some Masonic ties to this, and if you get into that theory
about the National Parks and the ProtectionAct, and that self goes so deep.
But I wonder if there's a tiethere with Freemasons and protecting these altars,

(59:30):
or if there's a tie with likelay lines, because I don't know.
If you watch that Hellier documentary thatthey were talking them awful lot about
how a lot of these paranormal activitiesseem to take place on the same latitude
lines. That'd be an interesting thingto discover. Oh yeah, if you
totally take David Politis is missing forone one map and you line it right

(59:51):
up with the Cave system, it'sthe Cave system, and I believe it
is lay lines. They all fallright on top of each other. It's
not a coincidence, definitely. Now. I wanted to ask if during your
research into the Masons that you lookinto the Illuminati, it's from my understanding,
it's it's the Illuminati stemmed from forthe Freemasons. Well it's it's kind

(01:00:16):
of It's a tough topic to researchbecause a lot of it gets caught up
in semantics and warnings. There isa means like a being stream Wikipedia version
of the Illuminati, which is notwhat people are referring to when they're talking
about like these new World Order secretssocieties that are behind the Jersey theory now

(01:00:37):
like jay Z and Beyonce. Yeah, not like that that, Like the
original Illuminati was a lot more benignand it was just a bunch of it's
a bunch of collectuals. Yeah,pissed off French dudes. It didn't want
to be part of the Freemasons,so they started their own party. So
it's hard because whatever organization is outthere and doing all the stuff that a

(01:00:59):
lot or theorists are accusing them of, they're probably not going around calling themselves
the Illuminati. I believe that's moreof a catch all term. So it's
real tough to research into because again, you get thrown out by some antics
a lot, especially when you lookinto these things. But with Freemasons,
people have like so many different opinionsabout them because, for one, there's

(01:01:21):
thirty three levels. So just becausesomeone says they were involved in the in
the Masonic order, you don't knowwhat level they were, right, Are
they like an initiative or are theytop of the food chain. And they're
very compartmentalized as well, and thelodges, it seems like, are also
very like independently run. Yeah,it's hard to, especially with an organization

(01:01:42):
that big, to fathom that they'reall ran the same exact way. So
it's almost like they all have theirown little twist on specific to you know,
that lodge or that geographical location.A lot of their philosophy, though,
is pretty interesting. It does kindof lead into the realm of the
supernatural and the weird. That's awhole other rabbit hole. I couldn't even

(01:02:07):
begin to figure out all of theirsecrets or you know, get them down
so that I completely understand their philosophy, because I mean, frankly, it's
it's a lot of stuff to getinto and a lot of hidden stuff.
All right, Well, I thinkit's a perfect time to go over theories
because it's getting pretty late tonight,Solarea, do you want to run us

(01:02:29):
through some of these different theories thatwe jotted down during our numerous conversations throughout
the two weeks leading up to this. I know we had some good ones
that kind of take a more idon't know, practical away from the paranormal
realm of how these staircases may gotthere, and then we lead into different
urban legends. Yeah, so Ithink some of the things that I was

(01:02:52):
thinking about, and this is justreally simple that the staircases that the foundations
are missing sometimes when buildings and housesdecomposed and a road away, but a
staircase is in a building and it'sprotected by the outside of the building.
So therefore, yeah, it isgoing to be one of the last things
to go when you have ruins ofa house or an old building. So

(01:03:15):
I also think that urban legend isa big part of this too. And
maybe after we just had this wholediscussion, if these stories did spark from
the Reddit No Sleep forum, maybethat person wasn't the kind of research that
Donnie had just went over and that'swhere they got the idea of let me

(01:03:37):
start these stories of these staircases inthe woods and it just kind of took
off, just like the creepy pastawith the hatman thing, and it just
kind of blew up and they weren'texpecting it to do that. So I
think some of my theory is that, yeah, maybe some of them are
just urban legends, and then thatkind of on the wou side, like
Dylan touched on earlier, our goodfriend Steve Stockton had mentioned they be in

(01:04:00):
a joking sort of manner that maybethey are these launch pads for UFOs that
you can walk up and you canboard a UFO in the middle of the
woods, which I particularly like thatone. I think it's fun. That's
about it for me. I likethat the loading dock theory. Yeah,
that's a fun theory, and it'sit's it's almost like they place them there

(01:04:23):
like because they're alluring and it's likea launchpad sucks you up into a spaceship
or something. Yeah. But oneof one of the theories I thought about,
and it only makes sense if it'sin the right location, was that
they were almost like a lookout towerfor like a lost hiker or something like
that to try to get like avantage point to see another trailhead. You

(01:04:45):
climb up these stairs and it takesyou above the foliage and you can see
out if you're lost. But youknow, like Donnie said before, they'd
have to be extremely high a lotof these forests they're so dense. So
even if you did get up aof the foliage a little bit like you,
you're not gonna be able to pinpointtrails unless they're closer than where they're
finding them. Because if you're twentymiles out, you know how well you're

(01:05:08):
going to see a trailhead or cutpath unless the path is so wide,
like there's a lot of tree coverage. But I have seen different stuff similar
to this, but is more forlooking off in great distance and just admiring
the beauty of nature. Like Ithink there's a spot in Virginia and you
can climb these staircases and you cansee across state lines. And that was

(01:05:31):
one of the theories I thought couldkind of theorize with this story, but
I still think that that's debunk Ilike the staircase in the building that was
the last standing part of a houseor the building and it just outlasted the
weather in the erosion. But thenyou get down to the foundation, like
we talked about before, and thefoundation's gone. But a lot of these

(01:05:54):
stories talk about staircases that look immaculate, like they're out of the Great Gap
Spee, or there are a spirallighthouse staircase and stuff like that. So
even then, it's still like someonepicked up a staircase and placed it there.
Then you jump into the kind ofwhat you said about Reddit and this
guy coming up with these stories.It's like, did someone go out there

(01:06:15):
and build staircases? The troll peoplebecause of this? So that's my thoughts
on there. As far as beingportals and stuff like that, it's it's
weird. It's hard to fathom.I think there's more dark magic around them,
and that's why you feel squeamish andyou feel sick to your stomach,
and you feel like you need toget away, and you almost have like

(01:06:35):
a trance, kind of like theangle Donnie was getting with with rituals and
the Masons. And that's about allI got to say about it, Donnie,
what are your thoughts? Yeah,if they do exist, and if
there are a bunch of them scatteredin the woods that people are finding,
well, there was the theory thatI mentioned that there could be possible structures

(01:06:58):
used for rituals for secrets societies bythe Masons and maybe other such groups,
because it is a common motif anda lot of cultures throughout the world have
been using stairs and these as spirituallysignificant metaphors, the climbing and the ascension,
and that comes up a lot.Another theory I had was maybe just

(01:07:21):
they can't control the location of aportal. So you know, when we
think of portals, we don't thinkabout their actual orientation. Maybe there's like
portals that are like forty thirty feetoff the ground, and so the naturally,
well we got to make a staircasebecause they don't choose what the orientation
is of the portal. They can'tmake the portal ground level because the portals

(01:07:43):
are just gonna be where it's gonnabe. That's a very wu theory.
Another one that I was thinking wasI kind of help but thinking like maybe
it's like sun worshippers, you know, like they pointed towards the sun.
Because I've seen some of that stufftoo, where when it's face certain way,
you know, it's supposed to peopleare supposed to line up on the

(01:08:03):
stairs and when the sun comes out, it's supposed to hit all of them,
and it is. There's some correlation, it seems, with some cultures
that worship the sun. And alsoI was going to bring this up in
the planning phase. But you knowabout the Korean elevator game, right,
Yes, I've heard about it.I don't know it in great detail.

(01:08:23):
I know, so there's a Lambyou know about, Alisa Lamb. I've
heard a little bit from that.The theory about the Korean elevator game is
that it's a very specifically done ritualor spell where basically you have to like
go up a couple of floors andthen go down one and go up three
and go up and maybe the wholeway of unlocking the portal with these stairs

(01:08:45):
and the cases in the woods islike you got to climb up three stairs
and then go down too, andthen up five, and it's like a
very specific combination you got to followin order for the portal to open up.
And then when people just go upwithout knowing that specific combination, that's
why they start feeling ill and sick. You're almost got to play like dance
Dance Revolution on the kind of likethe Crean Elevator game. That the same

(01:09:09):
idea, that's the same goal theCrean Elevator game is if you do it
right and the elevator doors open,you were out. You kind of you
step out into a new dimension.Yep. Yeah, that's a that's cool.
It's a pass code. That is. That is a good theory.
That's kind of like what I saidearlier about maybe you have to get up
to the top of steps and dosomething, but right maybe it is the

(01:09:30):
steps are like you're doing something toactivate it on the steps jack Up's ladder.
What I mentioned earlier, it waskind of maybe it was alluding to
that in like some secretive spiritual waylike the angels going up and going down,
you know, because it kind offollows that motif of like the communication
between our realm and the spirit realm. It basically that's how it works,

(01:09:51):
right, There's spirits and entities thatare going up into the spirit world and
then down and acting upon our worldfrom there. That that would plain why
some people have time slip experiences andstuff like that, and some people got
TikTok are able to run off themand run down them and slide down the
railings and nothing happened. I mean, it would sound that the reason they're

(01:10:14):
experiencing these time slips, it's moreaccidental. I don't think they know the
set pattern or the set steps orthe code unlocked this. It sounds like
it was a mistake, but itis definitely an interesting angle on the whole
thing. Okay, So that you'resaying it being a mistake brings me into
something that I've just been thinking aboutthe whole time we've been talking about this.

(01:10:35):
What if Because my first thought ofwhen when we were sending pictures back
and forth and we saw these ancientruins of these stone steps that were created,
you know, and the lines werecarved in the stones so that when
the human sacrifices and the blood coulddrain in this and that. So,
now, think about it. Ifyou are doing some kind of ritual and

(01:10:59):
you have a group of people,you want to be higher than the rest
of your crowd that you're speaking to. So the way to do that is
to create these steps to get uphigher so that everybody can see you and
around you. So what if it'skind of a tolba and this energy of
walking up these steps to do theserituals has created the whole forum for going

(01:11:23):
up staircases. Is that is thatstupid? Or is that like, you
know what? Okay, Like,I don't know if that that's really dumbing
it down and kind of taking itall the way back to the basics.
If that's even a theory. AndI don't even know if that sounds really
dumb or not, so any ofyou guys to tell me if it does.

(01:11:45):
I think, you know, definitelythat's the theory. I'd go with
that. It's ritual based and theseare altars like that. It just sounds
like it that makes the most senseto me right now. Like, I
don't I don't think they're ruins ofold houses and stuff like that. It'd
be too obvious. No, especiallyif there's no foundation, then you can

(01:12:08):
pretty much rule that out. Idon't think they're loading docks for UFOs.
I don't think that. I thinkthey're definitely something to do with dark magic
and rituals, and maybe there's alsoI mean, I'm not a UFO expert,
but they do seem pretty advanced.I don't think aliens are going to
be like, oh man, wedon't have our set of stairs, we

(01:12:28):
can't load boxes on our UFOs.Now we're screwed. It reminds me of
like sims or something, and they'rejust dropping stairs. When you think of
like colts and rituals and stuff likewhere do they take place. They take
place deep in the woods, rightout of sight, out of mind like
that. That makes the most senseto me. They're like twenty miles on
the woods. Like I've heard storiesof people driving down dirt roads out in

(01:12:53):
the middle of nowhere and watching blackcloak people while across dirt roads in front
of them, carrying about or whateverit may be. This shit takes place
deep in the woods. If they'regoing to have like some sort of sacrificial
altar, that'd be perfect for itbeing some imacke that like marble staircase and
shit like that. That would almostmakes sense. And what's what's always the

(01:13:15):
purpose of these kinds of ritualistic sacrificialceremonies. It's to connect to whatever entities
over on the other side. Andthat the fact that the staircase is often
represented as the thing that that connectsour world with their world. You know,
keep in mind, we don't theydon't use the concept of a bridge,

(01:13:36):
right. People think about the bridgeto the other side. But they
don't think about it like that becausethat would imply that they're on the same
plane. It's got to be somethingwhere you got to go up into it
again, the whole motif of thestairway to Heaven. Definitely, And I
think that's a good note to endon right there. I want to leave
it open for everybody who's listening,So if you've made it this far into

(01:13:56):
the podcast, you know I appreciatethat and thank you for hanging around.
I know all of us definitely wantto hear your thoughts and theories on the
staircases. That doesn't just have tobe the staircases in the woods. It
can be the different staircases throughout timethat we talked about. But we'd love
to hear your theories, So pleasesend us an email at Creepy Unsolved Media
at gmail dot com. Where wego. I want to thank you,

(01:14:19):
Donnie for spending almost two hours withus and just rambling on about everything related
to staircases, and I think Ithink we figured this one out honestly.
Like that, that's a good noteto leave on. That's that's a good
theory in my mind. Any lastwords from you Laura before we close it
out. No, I think that'sabout it. And like Dan said,

(01:14:41):
if you made it this far,thank you. We'll see you next time.
All right, Thank you Hi bigguys. That as if for this
one. Thank you so much forjoining us. If you have questions about
today's episode, or if you'd liketo reach out to us directly, you
can do so by sending us anemail at Creepy Unsolved Media at gmail dot

(01:15:05):
com. Until next time, besure to check out our awesome content by
simply visiting Creepy Unsolved dot com.If you are active on YouTube, be
sure to check out our channel overthere under the name Creepy Unsolved. Also,
while you wait for the next episodeof Creepy Unsolved, be sure to

(01:15:27):
leave us a rating and review.This will help our podcast grow. Until
next time. This is Dylan signingoff.

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50: Staircases In The Woods! What Are They?!

NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal