August 24, 2025 • 41 mins
In this episode, Fred from Alaska interviews Sonny Grant, a Tlingit native from Juneau, Alaska, who shares his lifetime of outdoor adventures and chilling encounters with the mysterious 'Wild Man'—commonly known as Sasquatch. Sonny recounts vivid memories of his first sighting in 1966 while hiking in Mount Juneau and a terrifying nighttime encounter near the West Glacier Trail.
He ties his experiences to Tlingit tribal lore and the stories passed down from elders, highlighting the deep-seated cultural significance of these creatures.
The episode transitions to a story about Greg, a European visitor, whose ski joring trip on the Iditarod trail turns nightmarish with a close encounter involving a massive, menacing 'Wild Man.' This gripping narrative intricately weaves cultural legends, personal testimonies, and the haunting mysteries of the Alaskan wilderness.
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00:00 Introduction and Guest Introduction 00:07 Early Life and Outdoor Adventures 01:02 First Encounter with the Wild Man 06:05 The Cannibal Giant and Tribal Stories 06:39 A Terrifying Experience in the Woods 16:02 Revisiting the Site and Overcoming Fear 17:05 Reflections on Size and Strength 18:28 Toughness of the Older Generations 20:22 Family Stories and Sasquatch Sightings 20:47 Interactive Map and Creepy Behaviors 21:05 Lured by a Baby's Cry 21:54 Oral History and Elders' Stories 22:25 Introduction to Greg's Encounter 22:58 Ski Joring on the Iditarod Trail 25:20 Strange Movements and Nervous Dogs 26:59 Eye Shine and Growing Fear 29:55 A Terrifying Encounter 33:44 Morning After and Dog Behavior 36:37 Returning Home and Lingering Fear
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/sasquatch-odyssey--4839697/support.
He ties his experiences to Tlingit tribal lore and the stories passed down from elders, highlighting the deep-seated cultural significance of these creatures.
The episode transitions to a story about Greg, a European visitor, whose ski joring trip on the Iditarod trail turns nightmarish with a close encounter involving a massive, menacing 'Wild Man.' This gripping narrative intricately weaves cultural legends, personal testimonies, and the haunting mysteries of the Alaskan wilderness.
Get Our FREE Newsletter
Get Brian's Books
Leave Us A Voicemail
Visit Our Website
Support Our Sponsors
00:00 Introduction and Guest Introduction 00:07 Early Life and Outdoor Adventures 01:02 First Encounter with the Wild Man 06:05 The Cannibal Giant and Tribal Stories 06:39 A Terrifying Experience in the Woods 16:02 Revisiting the Site and Overcoming Fear 17:05 Reflections on Size and Strength 18:28 Toughness of the Older Generations 20:22 Family Stories and Sasquatch Sightings 20:47 Interactive Map and Creepy Behaviors 21:05 Lured by a Baby's Cry 21:54 Oral History and Elders' Stories 22:25 Introduction to Greg's Encounter 22:58 Ski Joring on the Iditarod Trail 25:20 Strange Movements and Nervous Dogs 26:59 Eye Shine and Growing Fear 29:55 A Terrifying Encounter 33:44 Morning After and Dog Behavior 36:37 Returning Home and Lingering Fear
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/sasquatch-odyssey--4839697/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now one of your pudding. I got a string going
on here, something just because my dog. Something killed your dog,
my dog. We're flying through the air over the tree.
I don't know how it did it, Okay, Damn, I'm
really confused. All I saw was my dog coming over
the fence and he was dead. And once you hit
the ground like, I didn't see any cars. All I
saw was my dog coming over the fence. Happen? What
(00:38):
are you putting? We got some wonder or something crawling
around out here? Did you see what it was?
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Or was it was?
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Standing enough? I'm out here looking through the window now
and I don't see anything. I don't want to go outside.
Jesus quice, you better hello, get somebody out here.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
What went on out there?
Speaker 1 (01:06):
I thought of a bit of about sixty nine. I
don't know him out there. Yeah, I'm right away.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Oh hey, greeting is this friend in Alaska? Thanks for
joining me today. Today we are going to do an interview.
Go ahead and introduce yourself.
Speaker 5 (01:19):
My name is Sonny Grant was born and raised in Juno, Alaska,
a full plane kit. I was born in a wolf clan.
I was trained by my father to dear on to
see you on my uncles and my grandfather for fishing,
mosse Kilnetti power trolling. I've been outside since I was
very young. Some of the earliest photographs of I was
(01:42):
on a fishing boat or a little boat somewhere, or
I was hunting with my dad when I was like six.
I was very familiar with what's in the woods growing up.
I have a well known grandfather's names Austin Hammond, and
he would tell stories. We learned a lot. There was
a few times I talked with when we talked about
(02:04):
the cannibal giant and I was very young and I
was asking what it was and it says, it's a
wild man in the woods. I didn't know what to
think about that. As I was getting older, I think
must have happened in nineteen sixty six. The first sighting
I had, I was with two friends I loved going
out in woods with They were clinking as well. They
(02:28):
always had a twenty two and a pelat gun. So
I went with them and man, we hiked all over Gino.
It was amazing because I loved hiking and I found
the right people to be with. Many times we've been
up and our favorite destination was the top of Amun Gino.
If you ever seen a photograph of downtown Gino, you'll
(02:49):
see a big mountain that rises up to thirty eight
hundred feet, So it's a really difficult hike to go up,
but we would run all the way up. It m'd
have been like late July, I think when we went up,
because when we were to go up, we would always
(03:09):
shoot grouse our term again, which is a state bird.
So I really do do we eat anything we can
get our scope on. We would do it, and we
never shot things that we wouldn't eat. To me, that
was wasteful. I figure, if you're going to put something down,
you better use it. Many times we went up, we
all took turns shooting. That's where I learned how to
(03:33):
tether and clean our grouse and cook it. I just
learned by watching and then later learn by doing. But
this one time in July we went up, it was
kind of odd. We were getting near the top the mountain,
which is the hardest part of the high just like
endless switch back that's just going up, and we just
(03:54):
realized how quiet it was. Really quiet. Usually you'd hear
Tarmigan's mormots we'd hear other birds and and even insects.
We'd hear any of that. We finally made it to
the top and it was really warm out. We sat
down and we were talking that we didn't see anything.
(04:17):
We were talking about how quiet it was, and we
had some prode with us. We sat down, we started eating.
One of my friends saw something in a distance going
up as snow slope was a Calli slope. There's patches
of snow here and there. We looked at as though
it must be a black bear. He had a little
(04:39):
four power scope on us, a twenty two, and we
looked through it and we realized that thing was on
two feet walking up the hill and walking up really fast.
The reason why that stood out to us is we
did that tight from Salmon Creek Dam going up to
kind of like the northwestern a sent up mounta Gino.
(05:02):
Not too many people do that because there's no trail.
We just went right off the Chamma Creek dam and
just started headed up the mountain bushwalk a way up.
So we thought that was quite odd that this thing
was moving really fast, which we all knew how difficult
it was. Whenever you want it, you take three steps
(05:23):
and you go back two steps, so it's really difficult hiking.
We must have watched it for four or five minutes,
and so it took for it to go up that
slope that got up to the tree line. And in
Januar area, the tree line is around two thousand feet.
Some mountains are twenty one hundred feet. But it's all
(05:44):
very similar. To think about the tree line is the
trees at the treelane, they're all about six foot tall
than anything above that. There's nothing but shrubs and bushes.
There's no trees. That thing each the top, we noticed
it was really tall. It was much taller than the trees,
(06:07):
and we said, man, we all start talking that we
knew what it was. We didn't call it the hairy
man back then, but call it the world.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Man.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
There's a clicket term I just can't pronounce because I'm
not a native speaker. That we saw it, we knew it.
It was a sasquatch. Oh no, my friends start hiring
the twenty two. Of course, at twenty two it only
goes half mile three quarters of mile. The best just
trying to make sounds to make it turn around and
(06:37):
look at us. But it totally ignored us, and it
just kept going and once it passed the tree line,
it only took a few minutes when I reach the
top of the ridge and we watched you walk over
the ridge and then disappeared on the other side. That time.
That's sighting I'll never forget because it made me very
(06:58):
curious what these creatures was. I told my father my uncles,
and he told me more stories sightings that they've heard
and some of them have seen. That just started something
in me about being very curious of what this was.
We have a lot of stories in my tribe about
(07:20):
creatures in the woods, and the one we know the
most is the cannibal giant. And the cannibal giant is
I can fifteen, pretty tall. They catch you, they'll eat you.
In fact, there's a well known totem vo in southeast.
It's a cannibal giant hesehold and the man. The man
(07:41):
on the totem. The guy is dead and he's upside
down and this creature's holding them. We always knew about them.
We're told never to go in the woods, especially the women.
My purpose of going there was I wanted a videocap
to glacier. When you go there. It rumbles like every
ten minutes. And when I rumbles, there was ice moving.
(08:03):
I wanted to capture that on video. I must have
been there an hour and a half and I finally
got it on the video. I got the rumble of
the gray shirt and I saw the ice moving. I
felt hot. I finally got what I wanted. That's when
I realized how late it was. It was between four
and four thirty and the sun was getting ready to
(08:24):
just set way out in the distance of the sun
was just getting ready to disappeared behind these islands out
in lincolnal. I said, Man, I'm going to be in
darkness in no time. So I gathered everything I had collapsed,
my tripop in my pack, and I started heading back
(08:44):
as fast as I could. I probably piked a mile
down when I got caught in the darkness. It just
got so dark because I was in the woods and
I was so dark, I couldn't even see my feet.
I was wearing tennis shoes and they were white. I
couldn't even see my feet. So it was very slow going.
I knew that trail so well. I also stood still
(09:07):
for ten minutes to let my eyes suggest or I
could see something that wasn't much light continue down. As
I was going down, I heard something walking. I was
at a part of the trail where as I'm hiding
down that trail, on the left of me, there's this
little granite dome. It's not that igh, it's only like
(09:30):
thirty forty feet taller than me. When you go on
top of that dome. On the other side, it's a
mininol glacier. It just drops right down to the glacier.
And on my right there's this little valley that slowly rises,
and it's a really steep little valley to slope through,
like forty some degrees. Whatever is this thing of walking
(09:54):
down at the bottom going up the mountain. I was
listening to it and the sound of loud I couldn't
recognize what it was because it sounded more than three
or four footsteps. Usually if it's an animal, you would
recognize it, like a moose or deer. That deer and
(10:15):
you would only hear it if they're racing. But usually
deer a very silent as they run through the woods.
But you could hear moose, and of course bears you
just heard them because they just crashed through everything. I
couldn't recognize this. I knew the bears were ebernating, who
had no clue. Was too big to be a woos.
(10:35):
They're party quiet. I remember thinking, whatever you go on
or I'm going this way, which was down, and you're
going the other way, which is up. Stopped moving, And
when it stopped moving, I stopped because I was trying
to figure out what it was doing this only it
took one to two seconds of me stopping one owner
(10:56):
was started launching it. This thing was running up the mountains,
running up the side of the handle towards me. It
was crashing through a lot of brush. There's a lot
of Sitka Spress, Western End Block, Devil's Club, and blueberry bushes.
The reason why I know there's blueberries because many times
(11:16):
I've hiked down that little valley and infect blueberries. It's
really tough going through that brush, and this thing was
ripping through like a train. The fear just rose up
to me so great I even tasted it in my mouth.
I've never been afraid. I've come across many animals since
I was hunting brown beerries. Moose was surrounded by packslaars
(11:41):
and you're supposed to talk to them at least that's
what they teach us in my tribe. But this fear
was so great I just couldn't believe it. He had
realized it running up towards me. It only took two
three seconds to reach me. I remember having a literal
lamp on my Sony camcorder. Once you flip up, it
(12:03):
turns on, and I flicked it up. It wasn't a
bright light, but it's mostly even made to light subjects
five six feet away at the most. Whatever this thing
was like thirty feet or so. It was pitch black.
I saw it behind a western hemlock. That western hemlock
tree must have been like ten inches twelve inches in diameter.
(12:26):
It was still collar me, but yet it was down
the mountain, down the hill, so I was looking at
its size. I couldn't see any detail. I saw. It
was a blackness, a silhouette. I could see his head
and knows bob and behind the tree as it was
looking at me, And I saw his shoulders which was
(12:48):
like five feet in within it, I saw the length
of his torso, and I saw his legs which looked
like tree trunks. It takes me a long time to
describe what I saw but this all happened. But then
just a seconds and I yelled and whistled in the
end up running against my better judgment because you're not
supposed to run from animals, but the fear on me
(13:12):
was so great it just like all common sense went out.
And I was moving, and I heard these things moving
up to where I was as I was running, and
you got to realize I was running and pitch blackness.
I knew I saw that one, but I was wondering
where the other one was. Because when those twas split
(13:35):
up when they were running up the hill, I found
like two guys running, two big guys. That's when I
just left and I ran as fast as I could.
I ran into a tree and almost knocked myself out.
I felt the blood going down my fork kit. I
just kept going. Member was a random mile. There's this
(13:56):
little switchbacks which has you said, all chains for a rail.
So I knew exactly where I was and I just
followed that going down that Kevin going until I got
to the level ground. By the time I got to
the level ground, I stopped. I listened. I didn't hear
anything behind me. I was relieved about that, but I
(14:16):
was shaking so hard because when I first started running,
I heard it behind me. I heard some noise. I
just said, no, weird exactly. So I just started walking
back to my truck, which was at the parking lot.
Those of you who bend to Jannal It's nearest Skeeter's
campin on Mend in all Lake As where the starts
(14:38):
in the West Glasier Trail was. I made it back
back then I was a smoker. I wasn't a heavy smoker,
but I like cigarettes. I got in my truck, slammed
the door shut, blocked it. The chain smoked like six
cigarettes in a rail just because I was shaking so much.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
And stay tuned for more Sasquat Chatasy right back after
these messages.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
For shaking, I was involuntary. I had no control over it.
That I wasn't breathing night and I wasn't thinking right.
And by the sixth cigarette, they finally calmed down enough.
When I started my truck up and I left, I
told my best friend and my dad about this. They
couldn't believe it. They were freaked out because they know
(15:28):
me because my best friend I've hunted with them for
twenty five years and on many seagu hunting trips, many
deer hunting. I did a lot of outdoor things, and
of course my dad, which I've done many things with.
They both couldn't believe. The next day I went to
(15:48):
the ranger station at the min in Old Glacier. I
reported what happened to me, and the arranger I was
talking to says, these heard many reports of had in
that same area before. I wasn't the first one, and
he just wrote my information down. Greta, have you heard
(16:08):
of this book the Rainco Sasquatch.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Yeah, I know doctor Ali. I speak to him regularly
in contact with him. He's good guy.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
Yeah, I met him too at a Sasquat conference on
Jena last summer, Okay.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Was it after they got off the cruise there?
Speaker 5 (16:25):
Yeah, I ran off the crews doctor Meldrum, the scientist
from Idaho. Yeah, he was there Raincos Sasquatch. It was
an incident at the same place. Three women had a
little campfire at the beginning of the Westclincher trail Okay.
So there's been a lot of sightings there. Of course,
(16:47):
from that sighting, I really started the interest of learning
more about what I saw. I have to mention. One
more thing about this is I stayed away from the
woods for many years. Years. I would tell the story
maybe a couple of times a year. In first two years,
every time I started having a story, there would rise up.
(17:10):
It was the most puzzling thing. I never had that before.
I think he mentioned it's a primal fear. It just
takes over and you have no control over it. It's
just there. Yeah. Twenty seventeen, I happened to go close
to the beginning of the Westvio Glacier Trail. I was
and kind of going up a little ways, but when
(17:33):
I got to the parking lot, the fear rose up
in me again. I said, nope, I'm not going. Twenty
eighteen had to been in the middle of summer. My
brother Bulah went with me. We did the hike. I
think I did a lot of processing at that time
because I was finally was able to tell the story
(17:54):
without feeling this fear. My brother just agreed to come
with me, so we up the trail all the way
to the end. I couldn't find the spot where this
incident happened. It was on my way back that I
found it. Found exactly where I was standing and I
found a tree where this creature was, where the sasquatch
(18:17):
was standing behind. That was something else. I meant, it
was definitely healing, but there was something being there. So
when you saw.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
It during the daylight, did it give you a better
idea of exactly how tall it was?
Speaker 5 (18:31):
Yeah, that's what I was doing. I was doing measurements.
I didn't have a tape measure. I set off roughly
judging my footsteps how far I was from that tree.
I was about thirty feet. The tree is about fourteen
inches in diameter. It's a big western handlock. Just looking
at and seeing where I was, I'm still the same size.
(18:54):
I was guessing that it had been like twelve foot
babe taller. It was big. Showing my relatives that they've
seen him up to fifteen feet, I mean, there's some
really big ones down in Southeast, especially in the southern
part of Southeast.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yeah, that's what I've heard as well, some just crazy sizes.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
I myself have seen him roughly damn near the same
size thirteen fourteen foot and that's just massive. It's really
hard to wrap your mind around that. Just huge, so hulking.
What always threw me off is just how thick, hulking
they are just massive. When they get that size, it's unreal.
Speaker 5 (19:36):
I said. I remember sitting was as nice because I
could see his leg, but I saw how wide they were.
The kind of reminded me of my grandfather. My grandfather
was almost six foot and my grandfather snake name was
Cowboy Sean and he was extremely tough. End up fighting
(19:57):
off a brown bear when he was younger and he killed.
But we all have relatives who were really old fashion,
and he used to row his boat or trawling, laying
out the elebent lines out, just pull it up by
hand because they couldn't afford an engine or something to
pull up the gear. There was some of them rollder
(20:18):
relops were extremely tough, and it told me stories about
these creatures and it is always read an impression on
me that what they saw must have been amazing because
they were afraid. I had never seen fear any of
my relatives. Yeah, that speaks volumes.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
When someone that you know is a nobs kind of guy,
a rough and tough guy that turns in the lexus
you and says I was scared. That to me is
definitely something because guys like that man cheese. Like my grandpa.
They used to use a sailboat salmon fishing cheese. Oh man,
man pulling in by hand when they're getting a quarter
of fish or whatever it happened to be at the time.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
But yeah, just that level of toughness. It's really lacking with.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Our modern age and the way things they're easy, which hey,
all the better. I'm not knocking it is a totally
different life back then. Just hardcore. He had to earn it.
Speaker 5 (21:16):
Yeah, it was a different time because one my grandfather
warn't out hunting me out ago two bullets a week,
so I was during World War two, so that was
a shortage of ammal and you had to make sure
you were a good shot.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Well yeah, I never squeezed a trigger.
Speaker 5 (21:32):
Unless I knew it was going down.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
Yeah, I raised the same way. One shot, one killed
for what.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
You don't want the animal to suffer out of respect,
and too, animal was expensive here, it didn't want to
rest it anyway.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Those are the two sightings. At some point I'll be
in the interior and maybe we can talk more because
I have a lot more stories within my family and
I've been collecting stories. Yeah, definitely, I have three hundred
videos on My Life top all sasquatch. I mean, nice, hey, man,
you go everywhere.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
That's excellent though, because I'm doing basically the same thing.
But I add them to the interactive map. People who
are going to areas can have kind of a reference
guy to potential behaviors to look out for.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
The al hoots, the whistles.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
There's reports of them imitating people's voices, known babies. It's ooh,
that would be creepy. Yeah, would to get My cousin,
Elizabeth Ostrohawk. Her and another relative were lord out of
their apartment on Alaska Island by this thing imitating a baby.
They knew the cry of that level of cunning is
(22:39):
scary to you. A women's natural instinct against them is
just oop. That's high level predator stuff right there.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Man.
Speaker 5 (22:48):
Like I say in the next video, tell you more
mind clinker relatives and Yukon. I know it's not in Alaska,
but they're relatives also names, which is in the US. Yeah,
there's so many stories in that area going up to
Inlands Junction, a lot of stories on the highway just
in that whole area. Just amazing amount. Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 4 (23:11):
I'm happy to hear them, but if they're relativesm or not,
it's all part of your oral history. That's what this
is about, is getting those things out there because we're
losing a lot of it with a lot of the
elders that are passing away and the kids don't seem
to care as much anymore. It's not like that everywhere, however,
it is happening from an oral history when no one
else is talking about the oral history, and then you
(23:34):
no longer have a history.
Speaker 5 (23:35):
It's just one of those things. Yeah, yeah, all right,
stick with me a second here.
Speaker 4 (23:40):
I will definitely pick this up again here in the
near future and you can share those things with us.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
I wanted to share with you guys today. This guy,
his name is Greg He's from the Netherlands. He was
here in Alaska doing some ski joring with dogs. They
were doing the idit a Rod trail. Now, this was
a couple months before the idit Arod. The idit a
Rod's typically into February, beginning of March somewhere in there.
I don't pay attention that anymore. This happened about five
(24:07):
years ago, him and three others. I think it's from
the Netherlands or Finland. Somewhere in there. It was hard
to understand his English. A nice enough guy, so he's
ski during They're literally with their dogs ski jouring the
idit Arod Trail, beautiful pristine wilderness. They were about three
(24:28):
days into it. They had gotten a snow machine ride
between a couple different checkpoints because of the weather conditions
in between those checkpoints, and they were just north northwest
of Rainey Pass. There was a small little hamlet of cabins.
Speaker 5 (24:46):
He said.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
He wasn't quite sure where, and the language barrier made
it hard to pinpoint, but it's just north northwest of
Reney Pass, he guesstimated, about three four miles. Again, I
wasn't there. I don't know however, it was him and
a few others from the Netherlands as well, I think
a couple from Norway and Finland or something. Again, it
(25:06):
was hard to understand the guy. So what ends up
happening is they all break up into their own little
personal groups because two of them knew each other and
the other two knew each other and it was a
mutual friend of the other person kind of thing. So
they broke up into the individual little cabins. Most cabins
up here people unless they bear proof them and lock
them up for bears that will leave them open with
(25:28):
no food or anything, just as a shelter. I know
our cabins back home in Dillingham, up the Newshgak River.
We leave them unlocked so no one has to break
anything to get in, and leave some firewood in there
and some can goods dashed with a note on the
table because bears can't read notes on where the can
goods are. So anyway, I digress. They get there and
(25:51):
they're whooped, they are tired. They have their dogs. Each
of them had two dogs that were tethered to for
the ski drawing. So what they ended up doing is
there's three of these little cabins, all within eyesight of
each other. Now, these cabins there Caribou cabin style, basically
a skinned two by material little shed, basically glorified shed.
(26:13):
They call them caribou cabins. I don't know if you
guys have seen them. So they're in these things, and
these were strictly put there to be removable, and they
were part of a checkpoint at some point for the
idea UD officials or some shit. So now it's wintertime,
only one of these places still had a stove in it,
so they all warmed up in the one it's dark
(26:34):
out already, and they leave to go to their individual
cabins after they warmed up. So as he gets into
his cabin, he brings his dogs in. The dogs immediately
are circling inside of this little cabin, real nervous. He
didn't notice and being nervous when he was bringing them in.
He put them in, came outside and was smoking a cigarette.
(26:58):
Before calling it at night, he had said that he
was smoking a clove cigarette. One of the smells that
wafted past his nose was like he had a bad cigarette,
and so he figured, ah, this one's garbage. I want
to enjoy one. So he put that out, lit another
one and still had this funky smell and realized wasn't
a cigarette, it was something.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
Just out of sight. Now.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
He was on the end of this run of three.
So if you're looking at the three cabins, he would
be to the one to the far right. He's looking
off to the right hand side of this place, trying
to see what's going on. Now in wintertime, when it's dark,
if there's any ambient light, the snow will reflect it
and it'll have kind of a soft glow. And so
(27:44):
he's watching and he notices a shadow moving in the distance.
It's just moving back and forth. There's no wind. That's
where that tree is moving. Thought, not too much of it,
sparse vegetation, according to him, it wasn't heavily treed in
that spot with some trees, but not heavily treated. But
it was just dark enough to where he couldn't make
shit out. So he finishes his cigarette just periodically looking
(28:08):
over in that direction because he is getting the creeps.
Goes inside after a cigarette and is using one of
those little sternal stoves to heat up some coffee and
something to eat. As he's doing that, he notices dark
movement in front of the window just catches his eye
and he looks up. Not in there. Dogs were in
a corner. He said he heard movement. As the movement
(28:32):
was going around the cabin. The dogs were going to
the opposite corner each time from this movement. He's bewildered
at what his dogs are doing. He had spent good
money for his dogs, had them flown from Europe over
here to do this thing. He's really perplexed at what
the hell's going on now. As he's debating on what's
(28:53):
going on with the dogs, he catches movement on the
opposite window. He catches his eye something moved past. As
it moved past, he noticed just the slightest glint from
eyeshine from his lantern he had on in this little cabin,
and that glint caught his eye and gave him a feeling.
He said in his soul that all was not well.
(29:15):
He said he couldn't now. He was trying to explain
this with broken English. So I may paraphrase a couple
of things. It's not to take away from it or
add to it. It's just because of the language barrier.
He broke into Dutch. Periodically. He'd be talking and trail
off in the Dutch and I'd have to catch him anyway.
So he catches his glint of eyeshine and immediately feels
(29:37):
it in his soul, knows all is not well. So
immediately he starts banging, going around, banging on the wall,
yelling get away. All he saw was that glint in darkness.
He couldn't make out. He didn't see a face or anything,
just that slight glint from the light. So he grabbed
his little ski pole. It was winter time. There's really
outside of moose whatnot. They weren't carrying firearms. They weren't
(30:00):
even carrying bare spray.
Speaker 5 (30:03):
And stay tuned for more sasquatch out to see. We'll
be right back after these messages.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
They had their little ski poles. So he grabbed the
ski pole, and he had a little ice axe and
he grabs that, puts on his head lamp, turns it on,
goes outside. Now he thinks it's one of the other
little members of his team that are on this little excursion,
but he wants to make sure, so he goes out
and he's walking around and he's looking down on the
(30:33):
ground at these tracks and at first it just looked
like snowshoe tracks, and he's like, okay, it's one of them.
This is a familiar size. And then he gets around
two of the corners and he hears movement in the brush.
Off to his right hand side and not off his
left shoulder is this little cabin. So he turns and
leans back against the cabin, just to have a backstop
(30:54):
to lean back against, because when the snow falls on
these places, it leaves a trough between the structure itself
and the eve line of the roof. So he got
this trough that can be pretty deep depending on the snow.
He slid down in this a little bit, and he
was trying to get his foot back out as he's
leaning back, leaning back against the cab, trying to pull
(31:14):
his leg out of this little trough. Anyone who's been
up in Alaska or anywhere where it snows knows what
I'm talking about. That little trough that you'll pull you
under a building if it's real silicual slide under that anyway.
So while he's doing that, he's looking down, then looking around,
and the second time he looks around, he looks over
to his right a little more and sees the eye shine. Now,
(31:36):
this eye shine, he said, was what'd he say, three
and a half four meters which would be what nine
to twelve foot somewhere in there. I didn't do any
conversion map, but he said three to four meters tall.
As he was trying to figure out what the hell
he was looking at, this thing was swaying back and forth.
He said he wasn't breathing, taking his breath away, and
(31:59):
he's not but really frightened. So he immediately starts sidestepping
to go back around this corner to get around away
from this thing over here. He successfully gets back inside,
shuts latches a little door, basically sits down against the door,
trying to figure out what he was just saying, because
(32:19):
he said he saw a hairy neanderthal man, gray skin,
big face, the eyeshine was amber orange ish red, something
like that. He wasn't sure if he was hallucinating or not.
He came back in and the only thing that broke
his train of thought was his little sternal stove. He
(32:40):
was boiling something on. It was fizzing over, so it
got his attention. He shut off his little stove, and
that broke his train of thought on that shit he
just saw. Just momentarily, all of a sudden, there's a
fump against the door, a big, heavy thump, like something
was going to try to break in. But it was
just a single time bamp shook him up to his core.
(33:01):
He didn't know what to do, so he started yelling
for his buddies in the other cabins. Now one of
the other guys that he was unfamiliar with. He came
over with the nice acs and the other people followed
him with their headlamps, all looking everywhere. He's yelling at
him in Dutch or whatever they speak. Watch out, there's
a wild man. There's a wild man. They all start
(33:23):
looking around, and he was looking out the window as
they were searching because he was freaked out. He wasn't
going back outside as he was yelling at them through
the window to be careful. It was big. They all scatter,
They all scatter around, are banging on his cabin door,
so he lets them in. They all scurry in. Just
as they get in and shut the door. On the
back side of that little cabin was a big fam
(33:46):
He said. It sounded like the place was going to explode.
So this thing ran up and hit the cabin. Said
it was only hit once, but it shook the whole place.
A moment later was a very loud scream.
Speaker 5 (33:58):
He said.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
It's almost sounded like it was yelling into the wall.
The whole place was just kind of They didn't know
what the hell did What do you do with that?
You're a foreigner visiting Alaska to do the idit a
rod trail. You have days of beauty and unsurpassed scenery,
then all of a sudden you get into some rinking
ink cabins north northwest of Rainy Pass. Now it's all bad,
(34:20):
all bad. As they're trying to figure out what the
hell they're all looking at each other. This is different.
This wasn't a no brochure. They tried to coax the
dogs up. These particular dogs. I guess they're European hunting,
bear tracking dog or some shit who knows. The dogs
wouldn't do shit regardless. They were a bear dog, smart dog,
(34:42):
basically a smart dog. It wasn't doing nothing. So they
literally sat there. No one breathed, it seemed like, he said,
for a good while, good couple hours. After some time
it calmed down. The rest of the group decided they're
going to make a break for their cabins, keep an
eye out for each other, scream if they need help.
They'll settle it like that, because they all had their
(35:02):
own sleeping arrangements, So they gingerly went back out made
their ways over just as it was getting the light
in the morning. He didn't sleep at all. He was
dead dog tired, but he couldn't fall asleep, he said.
Just as it was starting to get light on the horizon,
he had happened to be staring out the window, kind
of hypnotized his zone and out staring out a window
and realized there was a big thing in the window.
(35:25):
As soon as he sits up, it moves out away
the window. So as it moves out of the way
of the window, the dogs light up, and this time
the dogs bark and come over by the window and
are yapping right ro ro. He hears heavy footfall in
the snow, moving away, not fast, but just moving away.
Don't and so on, So he's relieved that it's leaving,
(35:48):
so he decides he opens the door and lets the
dogs out. The dogs run out, and they tear off
in that direction, barking where he said he doesn't know
where they got their fearlessness from all of a sudden,
because all night they were cowardice little bitches over in
the corner. All of a sudden they're gung ho to
go after it. So he let them out. They run off, barking.
(36:09):
He hears them barking for a while in one area
and moving a little bit and barking and moving and barking.
Then they come scurrying back. A few minutes later. He
felt confident enough they had run it off. All the
barking and noise and whatnot lit up the other dogs
with the other teammates, and they started barking and shit
inside their cabins, waking everyone up. So, with the events
(36:32):
of the night before, they're all paranoid. They're up, they're
throwing on their shit, they're grabbing their little ice axes
and their little ski poles, and they're coming out to
look and help or whatever. Right, so when they open
their doors, the other dogs they take off. So there's
eight dogs total on this trip. All eight are now
off into the trees. Everyone there is trying to call
them back. Now when he notices his teammates come out,
(36:56):
he comes out of his cabin and starts telling them, hey,
they ran off, they were running it off. They'll come back.
So they sit around waiting and calling for the dogs periodically. Finally,
after he said it was after like two hours, the
dogs come back. One of them had a broken leg,
and the two of them weren't right. I asked him
to elaborate, what do you mean not right? He said,
(37:18):
they weren't acting like dogs. They would just walk in.
They followed the other dogs and trailed the other dogs
coming in but all they would do is walk in
a little circle. They were just stuck on something, so
those two dogs were worthless from that point on, he said.
So they ended up lasing up what they could the
two dogs that mentally they would follow, but they wouldn't pull,
(37:39):
so they at least knew they could tether them and
the dogs would follow along. The one with the broken leg.
The other teammate threw the pack style over his shoulders
until they got to the next spot to get out
of there. When they got to the next place, he
couldn't remember the name of the little village. There was
a language barrier. All he could say is wild man.
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Man.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
No one was understanding him, so they got him the
flight and all that kind of stuff to get the
dogs out of there and them out of there. He
hasn't been back here since. He has a hard time
scheduling over in Norway or the Netherlands, wherever the hell
he lives. I think it's Finland. I'm pretty sure. If
I'm wrong, man, hey, shoot me an email, let me
know if it's wrong or not. It was hard to
understand you, but yeah, I could imagine they spent quite
(38:22):
a bit of money to come over here. They got
similar terrain over there, but it's not Alaska, and they
wanted to do the idea or odd trail. Goodness, gracious, Yeah,
it's not a good feeling to be stuck in somewhere
not knowing what's going on around you. Trust me, it's
not a good feeling. Who do you go to with
this shit without coming across like a maniac or a weirdo. Anyway,
(38:45):
what's easy for someone who hasn't dealt with something like
that to chalk it up is that guy lost his
mind out in the woods too long talking to the birds.
It's not that kind of party anyway, until the next one.
Speaker 6 (38:57):
They say, oh home, but you can't stay and I
don't want to be a long world opensis.
Speaker 7 (39:34):
Chid the chart, that chart everything. Can you ride back?
Ride back?
Speaker 2 (39:40):
And the joy for me?
Speaker 7 (39:42):
Joy stay right, come it right away, Stills Still start
(40:08):
sat side side.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Stay stay State, Still stas Still Games and still Stills.
(40:51):
US States, Thames, steamsh
Now one of your pudding. I got a string going
on here, something just because my dog. Something killed your dog,
my dog. We're flying through the air over the tree.
I don't know how it did it, Okay, Damn, I'm
really confused. All I saw was my dog coming over
the fence and he was dead. And once you hit
the ground like, I didn't see any cars. All I
saw was my dog coming over the fence. Happen? What
(00:38):
are you putting? We got some wonder or something crawling
around out here? Did you see what it was?
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Or was it was?
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Standing enough? I'm out here looking through the window now
and I don't see anything. I don't want to go outside.
Jesus quice, you better hello, get somebody out here.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
What went on out there?
Speaker 1 (01:06):
I thought of a bit of about sixty nine. I
don't know him out there. Yeah, I'm right away.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Oh hey, greeting is this friend in Alaska? Thanks for
joining me today. Today we are going to do an interview.
Go ahead and introduce yourself.
Speaker 5 (01:19):
My name is Sonny Grant was born and raised in Juno, Alaska,
a full plane kit. I was born in a wolf clan.
I was trained by my father to dear on to
see you on my uncles and my grandfather for fishing,
mosse Kilnetti power trolling. I've been outside since I was
very young. Some of the earliest photographs of I was
(01:42):
on a fishing boat or a little boat somewhere, or
I was hunting with my dad when I was like six.
I was very familiar with what's in the woods growing up.
I have a well known grandfather's names Austin Hammond, and
he would tell stories. We learned a lot. There was
a few times I talked with when we talked about
(02:04):
the cannibal giant and I was very young and I
was asking what it was and it says, it's a
wild man in the woods. I didn't know what to
think about that. As I was getting older, I think
must have happened in nineteen sixty six. The first sighting
I had, I was with two friends I loved going
out in woods with They were clinking as well. They
(02:28):
always had a twenty two and a pelat gun. So
I went with them and man, we hiked all over Gino.
It was amazing because I loved hiking and I found
the right people to be with. Many times we've been
up and our favorite destination was the top of Amun Gino.
If you ever seen a photograph of downtown Gino, you'll
(02:49):
see a big mountain that rises up to thirty eight
hundred feet, So it's a really difficult hike to go up,
but we would run all the way up. It m'd
have been like late July, I think when we went up,
because when we were to go up, we would always
(03:09):
shoot grouse our term again, which is a state bird.
So I really do do we eat anything we can
get our scope on. We would do it, and we
never shot things that we wouldn't eat. To me, that
was wasteful. I figure, if you're going to put something down,
you better use it. Many times we went up, we
all took turns shooting. That's where I learned how to
(03:33):
tether and clean our grouse and cook it. I just
learned by watching and then later learn by doing. But
this one time in July we went up, it was
kind of odd. We were getting near the top the mountain,
which is the hardest part of the high just like
endless switch back that's just going up, and we just
(03:54):
realized how quiet it was. Really quiet. Usually you'd hear
Tarmigan's mormots we'd hear other birds and and even insects.
We'd hear any of that. We finally made it to
the top and it was really warm out. We sat
down and we were talking that we didn't see anything.
(04:17):
We were talking about how quiet it was, and we
had some prode with us. We sat down, we started eating.
One of my friends saw something in a distance going
up as snow slope was a Calli slope. There's patches
of snow here and there. We looked at as though
it must be a black bear. He had a little
(04:39):
four power scope on us, a twenty two, and we
looked through it and we realized that thing was on
two feet walking up the hill and walking up really fast.
The reason why that stood out to us is we
did that tight from Salmon Creek Dam going up to
kind of like the northwestern a sent up mounta Gino.
(05:02):
Not too many people do that because there's no trail.
We just went right off the Chamma Creek dam and
just started headed up the mountain bushwalk a way up.
So we thought that was quite odd that this thing
was moving really fast, which we all knew how difficult
it was. Whenever you want it, you take three steps
(05:23):
and you go back two steps, so it's really difficult hiking.
We must have watched it for four or five minutes,
and so it took for it to go up that
slope that got up to the tree line. And in
Januar area, the tree line is around two thousand feet.
Some mountains are twenty one hundred feet. But it's all
(05:44):
very similar. To think about the tree line is the
trees at the treelane, they're all about six foot tall
than anything above that. There's nothing but shrubs and bushes.
There's no trees. That thing each the top, we noticed
it was really tall. It was much taller than the trees,
(06:07):
and we said, man, we all start talking that we
knew what it was. We didn't call it the hairy
man back then, but call it the world.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Man.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
There's a clicket term I just can't pronounce because I'm
not a native speaker. That we saw it, we knew it.
It was a sasquatch. Oh no, my friends start hiring
the twenty two. Of course, at twenty two it only
goes half mile three quarters of mile. The best just
trying to make sounds to make it turn around and
(06:37):
look at us. But it totally ignored us, and it
just kept going and once it passed the tree line,
it only took a few minutes when I reach the
top of the ridge and we watched you walk over
the ridge and then disappeared on the other side. That time.
That's sighting I'll never forget because it made me very
(06:58):
curious what these creatures was. I told my father my uncles,
and he told me more stories sightings that they've heard
and some of them have seen. That just started something
in me about being very curious of what this was.
We have a lot of stories in my tribe about
(07:20):
creatures in the woods, and the one we know the
most is the cannibal giant. And the cannibal giant is
I can fifteen, pretty tall. They catch you, they'll eat you.
In fact, there's a well known totem vo in southeast.
It's a cannibal giant hesehold and the man. The man
(07:41):
on the totem. The guy is dead and he's upside
down and this creature's holding them. We always knew about them.
We're told never to go in the woods, especially the women.
My purpose of going there was I wanted a videocap
to glacier. When you go there. It rumbles like every
ten minutes. And when I rumbles, there was ice moving.
(08:03):
I wanted to capture that on video. I must have
been there an hour and a half and I finally
got it on the video. I got the rumble of
the gray shirt and I saw the ice moving. I
felt hot. I finally got what I wanted. That's when
I realized how late it was. It was between four
and four thirty and the sun was getting ready to
(08:24):
just set way out in the distance of the sun
was just getting ready to disappeared behind these islands out
in lincolnal. I said, Man, I'm going to be in
darkness in no time. So I gathered everything I had collapsed,
my tripop in my pack, and I started heading back
(08:44):
as fast as I could. I probably piked a mile
down when I got caught in the darkness. It just
got so dark because I was in the woods and
I was so dark, I couldn't even see my feet.
I was wearing tennis shoes and they were white. I
couldn't even see my feet. So it was very slow going.
I knew that trail so well. I also stood still
(09:07):
for ten minutes to let my eyes suggest or I
could see something that wasn't much light continue down. As
I was going down, I heard something walking. I was
at a part of the trail where as I'm hiding
down that trail, on the left of me, there's this
little granite dome. It's not that igh, it's only like
(09:30):
thirty forty feet taller than me. When you go on
top of that dome. On the other side, it's a
mininol glacier. It just drops right down to the glacier.
And on my right there's this little valley that slowly rises,
and it's a really steep little valley to slope through,
like forty some degrees. Whatever is this thing of walking
(09:54):
down at the bottom going up the mountain. I was
listening to it and the sound of loud I couldn't
recognize what it was because it sounded more than three
or four footsteps. Usually if it's an animal, you would
recognize it, like a moose or deer. That deer and
(10:15):
you would only hear it if they're racing. But usually
deer a very silent as they run through the woods.
But you could hear moose, and of course bears you
just heard them because they just crashed through everything. I
couldn't recognize this. I knew the bears were ebernating, who
had no clue. Was too big to be a woos.
(10:35):
They're party quiet. I remember thinking, whatever you go on
or I'm going this way, which was down, and you're
going the other way, which is up. Stopped moving, And
when it stopped moving, I stopped because I was trying
to figure out what it was doing this only it
took one to two seconds of me stopping one owner
(10:56):
was started launching it. This thing was running up the mountains,
running up the side of the handle towards me. It
was crashing through a lot of brush. There's a lot
of Sitka Spress, Western End Block, Devil's Club, and blueberry bushes.
The reason why I know there's blueberries because many times
(11:16):
I've hiked down that little valley and infect blueberries. It's
really tough going through that brush, and this thing was
ripping through like a train. The fear just rose up
to me so great I even tasted it in my mouth.
I've never been afraid. I've come across many animals since
I was hunting brown beerries. Moose was surrounded by packslaars
(11:41):
and you're supposed to talk to them at least that's
what they teach us in my tribe. But this fear
was so great I just couldn't believe it. He had
realized it running up towards me. It only took two
three seconds to reach me. I remember having a literal
lamp on my Sony camcorder. Once you flip up, it
(12:03):
turns on, and I flicked it up. It wasn't a
bright light, but it's mostly even made to light subjects
five six feet away at the most. Whatever this thing
was like thirty feet or so. It was pitch black.
I saw it behind a western hemlock. That western hemlock
tree must have been like ten inches twelve inches in diameter.
(12:26):
It was still collar me, but yet it was down
the mountain, down the hill, so I was looking at
its size. I couldn't see any detail. I saw. It
was a blackness, a silhouette. I could see his head
and knows bob and behind the tree as it was
looking at me, And I saw his shoulders which was
(12:48):
like five feet in within it, I saw the length
of his torso, and I saw his legs which looked
like tree trunks. It takes me a long time to
describe what I saw but this all happened. But then
just a seconds and I yelled and whistled in the
end up running against my better judgment because you're not
supposed to run from animals, but the fear on me
(13:12):
was so great it just like all common sense went out.
And I was moving, and I heard these things moving
up to where I was as I was running, and
you got to realize I was running and pitch blackness.
I knew I saw that one, but I was wondering
where the other one was. Because when those twas split
(13:35):
up when they were running up the hill, I found
like two guys running, two big guys. That's when I
just left and I ran as fast as I could.
I ran into a tree and almost knocked myself out.
I felt the blood going down my fork kit. I
just kept going. Member was a random mile. There's this
(13:56):
little switchbacks which has you said, all chains for a rail.
So I knew exactly where I was and I just
followed that going down that Kevin going until I got
to the level ground. By the time I got to
the level ground, I stopped. I listened. I didn't hear
anything behind me. I was relieved about that, but I
(14:16):
was shaking so hard because when I first started running,
I heard it behind me. I heard some noise. I
just said, no, weird exactly. So I just started walking
back to my truck, which was at the parking lot.
Those of you who bend to Jannal It's nearest Skeeter's
campin on Mend in all Lake As where the starts
(14:38):
in the West Glasier Trail was. I made it back
back then I was a smoker. I wasn't a heavy smoker,
but I like cigarettes. I got in my truck, slammed
the door shut, blocked it. The chain smoked like six
cigarettes in a rail just because I was shaking so much.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
And stay tuned for more Sasquat Chatasy right back after
these messages.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
For shaking, I was involuntary. I had no control over it.
That I wasn't breathing night and I wasn't thinking right.
And by the sixth cigarette, they finally calmed down enough.
When I started my truck up and I left, I
told my best friend and my dad about this. They
couldn't believe it. They were freaked out because they know
(15:28):
me because my best friend I've hunted with them for
twenty five years and on many seagu hunting trips, many
deer hunting. I did a lot of outdoor things, and
of course my dad, which I've done many things with.
They both couldn't believe. The next day I went to
(15:48):
the ranger station at the min in Old Glacier. I
reported what happened to me, and the arranger I was
talking to says, these heard many reports of had in
that same area before. I wasn't the first one, and
he just wrote my information down. Greta, have you heard
(16:08):
of this book the Rainco Sasquatch.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Yeah, I know doctor Ali. I speak to him regularly
in contact with him. He's good guy.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
Yeah, I met him too at a Sasquat conference on
Jena last summer, Okay.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Was it after they got off the cruise there?
Speaker 5 (16:25):
Yeah, I ran off the crews doctor Meldrum, the scientist
from Idaho. Yeah, he was there Raincos Sasquatch. It was
an incident at the same place. Three women had a
little campfire at the beginning of the Westclincher trail Okay.
So there's been a lot of sightings there. Of course,
(16:47):
from that sighting, I really started the interest of learning
more about what I saw. I have to mention. One
more thing about this is I stayed away from the
woods for many years. Years. I would tell the story
maybe a couple of times a year. In first two years,
every time I started having a story, there would rise up.
(17:10):
It was the most puzzling thing. I never had that before.
I think he mentioned it's a primal fear. It just
takes over and you have no control over it. It's
just there. Yeah. Twenty seventeen, I happened to go close
to the beginning of the Westvio Glacier Trail. I was
and kind of going up a little ways, but when
(17:33):
I got to the parking lot, the fear rose up
in me again. I said, nope, I'm not going. Twenty
eighteen had to been in the middle of summer. My
brother Bulah went with me. We did the hike. I
think I did a lot of processing at that time
because I was finally was able to tell the story
(17:54):
without feeling this fear. My brother just agreed to come
with me, so we up the trail all the way
to the end. I couldn't find the spot where this
incident happened. It was on my way back that I
found it. Found exactly where I was standing and I
found a tree where this creature was, where the sasquatch
(18:17):
was standing behind. That was something else. I meant, it
was definitely healing, but there was something being there. So
when you saw.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
It during the daylight, did it give you a better
idea of exactly how tall it was?
Speaker 5 (18:31):
Yeah, that's what I was doing. I was doing measurements.
I didn't have a tape measure. I set off roughly
judging my footsteps how far I was from that tree.
I was about thirty feet. The tree is about fourteen
inches in diameter. It's a big western handlock. Just looking
at and seeing where I was, I'm still the same size.
(18:54):
I was guessing that it had been like twelve foot
babe taller. It was big. Showing my relatives that they've
seen him up to fifteen feet, I mean, there's some
really big ones down in Southeast, especially in the southern
part of Southeast.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yeah, that's what I've heard as well, some just crazy sizes.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
I myself have seen him roughly damn near the same
size thirteen fourteen foot and that's just massive. It's really
hard to wrap your mind around that. Just huge, so hulking.
What always threw me off is just how thick, hulking
they are just massive. When they get that size, it's unreal.
Speaker 5 (19:36):
I said. I remember sitting was as nice because I
could see his leg, but I saw how wide they were.
The kind of reminded me of my grandfather. My grandfather
was almost six foot and my grandfather snake name was
Cowboy Sean and he was extremely tough. End up fighting
(19:57):
off a brown bear when he was younger and he killed.
But we all have relatives who were really old fashion,
and he used to row his boat or trawling, laying
out the elebent lines out, just pull it up by
hand because they couldn't afford an engine or something to
pull up the gear. There was some of them rollder
(20:18):
relops were extremely tough, and it told me stories about
these creatures and it is always read an impression on
me that what they saw must have been amazing because
they were afraid. I had never seen fear any of
my relatives. Yeah, that speaks volumes.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
When someone that you know is a nobs kind of guy,
a rough and tough guy that turns in the lexus
you and says I was scared. That to me is
definitely something because guys like that man cheese. Like my grandpa.
They used to use a sailboat salmon fishing cheese. Oh man,
man pulling in by hand when they're getting a quarter
of fish or whatever it happened to be at the time.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
But yeah, just that level of toughness. It's really lacking with.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Our modern age and the way things they're easy, which hey,
all the better. I'm not knocking it is a totally
different life back then. Just hardcore. He had to earn it.
Speaker 5 (21:16):
Yeah, it was a different time because one my grandfather
warn't out hunting me out ago two bullets a week,
so I was during World War two, so that was
a shortage of ammal and you had to make sure
you were a good shot.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Well yeah, I never squeezed a trigger.
Speaker 5 (21:32):
Unless I knew it was going down.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
Yeah, I raised the same way. One shot, one killed
for what.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
You don't want the animal to suffer out of respect,
and too, animal was expensive here, it didn't want to
rest it anyway.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Those are the two sightings. At some point I'll be
in the interior and maybe we can talk more because
I have a lot more stories within my family and
I've been collecting stories. Yeah, definitely, I have three hundred
videos on My Life top all sasquatch. I mean, nice, hey, man,
you go everywhere.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
That's excellent though, because I'm doing basically the same thing.
But I add them to the interactive map. People who
are going to areas can have kind of a reference
guy to potential behaviors to look out for.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
The al hoots, the whistles.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
There's reports of them imitating people's voices, known babies. It's ooh,
that would be creepy. Yeah, would to get My cousin,
Elizabeth Ostrohawk. Her and another relative were lord out of
their apartment on Alaska Island by this thing imitating a baby.
They knew the cry of that level of cunning is
(22:39):
scary to you. A women's natural instinct against them is
just oop. That's high level predator stuff right there.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Man.
Speaker 5 (22:48):
Like I say in the next video, tell you more
mind clinker relatives and Yukon. I know it's not in Alaska,
but they're relatives also names, which is in the US. Yeah,
there's so many stories in that area going up to
Inlands Junction, a lot of stories on the highway just
in that whole area. Just amazing amount. Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 4 (23:11):
I'm happy to hear them, but if they're relativesm or not,
it's all part of your oral history. That's what this
is about, is getting those things out there because we're
losing a lot of it with a lot of the
elders that are passing away and the kids don't seem
to care as much anymore. It's not like that everywhere, however,
it is happening from an oral history when no one
else is talking about the oral history, and then you
(23:34):
no longer have a history.
Speaker 5 (23:35):
It's just one of those things. Yeah, yeah, all right,
stick with me a second here.
Speaker 4 (23:40):
I will definitely pick this up again here in the
near future and you can share those things with us.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
I wanted to share with you guys today. This guy,
his name is Greg He's from the Netherlands. He was
here in Alaska doing some ski joring with dogs. They
were doing the idit a Rod trail. Now, this was
a couple months before the idit Arod. The idit a
Rod's typically into February, beginning of March somewhere in there.
I don't pay attention that anymore. This happened about five
(24:07):
years ago, him and three others. I think it's from
the Netherlands or Finland. Somewhere in there. It was hard
to understand his English. A nice enough guy, so he's
ski during They're literally with their dogs ski jouring the
idit Arod Trail, beautiful pristine wilderness. They were about three
(24:28):
days into it. They had gotten a snow machine ride
between a couple different checkpoints because of the weather conditions
in between those checkpoints, and they were just north northwest
of Rainey Pass. There was a small little hamlet of cabins.
Speaker 5 (24:46):
He said.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
He wasn't quite sure where, and the language barrier made
it hard to pinpoint, but it's just north northwest of
Reney Pass, he guesstimated, about three four miles. Again, I
wasn't there. I don't know however, it was him and
a few others from the Netherlands as well, I think
a couple from Norway and Finland or something. Again, it
(25:06):
was hard to understand the guy. So what ends up
happening is they all break up into their own little
personal groups because two of them knew each other and
the other two knew each other and it was a
mutual friend of the other person kind of thing. So
they broke up into the individual little cabins. Most cabins
up here people unless they bear proof them and lock
them up for bears that will leave them open with
(25:28):
no food or anything, just as a shelter. I know
our cabins back home in Dillingham, up the Newshgak River.
We leave them unlocked so no one has to break
anything to get in, and leave some firewood in there
and some can goods dashed with a note on the
table because bears can't read notes on where the can
goods are. So anyway, I digress. They get there and
(25:51):
they're whooped, they are tired. They have their dogs. Each
of them had two dogs that were tethered to for
the ski drawing. So what they ended up doing is
there's three of these little cabins, all within eyesight of
each other. Now, these cabins there Caribou cabin style, basically
a skinned two by material little shed, basically glorified shed.
(26:13):
They call them caribou cabins. I don't know if you
guys have seen them. So they're in these things, and
these were strictly put there to be removable, and they
were part of a checkpoint at some point for the
idea UD officials or some shit. So now it's wintertime,
only one of these places still had a stove in it,
so they all warmed up in the one it's dark
(26:34):
out already, and they leave to go to their individual
cabins after they warmed up. So as he gets into
his cabin, he brings his dogs in. The dogs immediately
are circling inside of this little cabin, real nervous. He
didn't notice and being nervous when he was bringing them in.
He put them in, came outside and was smoking a cigarette.
(26:58):
Before calling it at night, he had said that he
was smoking a clove cigarette. One of the smells that
wafted past his nose was like he had a bad cigarette,
and so he figured, ah, this one's garbage. I want
to enjoy one. So he put that out, lit another
one and still had this funky smell and realized wasn't
a cigarette, it was something.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
Just out of sight. Now.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
He was on the end of this run of three.
So if you're looking at the three cabins, he would
be to the one to the far right. He's looking
off to the right hand side of this place, trying
to see what's going on. Now in wintertime, when it's dark,
if there's any ambient light, the snow will reflect it
and it'll have kind of a soft glow. And so
(27:44):
he's watching and he notices a shadow moving in the distance.
It's just moving back and forth. There's no wind. That's
where that tree is moving. Thought, not too much of it,
sparse vegetation, according to him, it wasn't heavily treed in
that spot with some trees, but not heavily treated. But
it was just dark enough to where he couldn't make
shit out. So he finishes his cigarette just periodically looking
(28:08):
over in that direction because he is getting the creeps.
Goes inside after a cigarette and is using one of
those little sternal stoves to heat up some coffee and
something to eat. As he's doing that, he notices dark
movement in front of the window just catches his eye
and he looks up. Not in there. Dogs were in
a corner. He said he heard movement. As the movement
(28:32):
was going around the cabin. The dogs were going to
the opposite corner each time from this movement. He's bewildered
at what his dogs are doing. He had spent good
money for his dogs, had them flown from Europe over
here to do this thing. He's really perplexed at what
the hell's going on now. As he's debating on what's
(28:53):
going on with the dogs, he catches movement on the
opposite window. He catches his eye something moved past. As
it moved past, he noticed just the slightest glint from
eyeshine from his lantern he had on in this little cabin,
and that glint caught his eye and gave him a feeling.
He said in his soul that all was not well.
(29:15):
He said he couldn't now. He was trying to explain
this with broken English. So I may paraphrase a couple
of things. It's not to take away from it or
add to it. It's just because of the language barrier.
He broke into Dutch. Periodically. He'd be talking and trail
off in the Dutch and I'd have to catch him anyway.
So he catches his glint of eyeshine and immediately feels
(29:37):
it in his soul, knows all is not well. So
immediately he starts banging, going around, banging on the wall,
yelling get away. All he saw was that glint in darkness.
He couldn't make out. He didn't see a face or anything,
just that slight glint from the light. So he grabbed
his little ski pole. It was winter time. There's really
outside of moose whatnot. They weren't carrying firearms. They weren't
(30:00):
even carrying bare spray.
Speaker 5 (30:03):
And stay tuned for more sasquatch out to see. We'll
be right back after these messages.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
They had their little ski poles. So he grabbed the
ski pole, and he had a little ice axe and
he grabs that, puts on his head lamp, turns it on,
goes outside. Now he thinks it's one of the other
little members of his team that are on this little excursion,
but he wants to make sure, so he goes out
and he's walking around and he's looking down on the
(30:33):
ground at these tracks and at first it just looked
like snowshoe tracks, and he's like, okay, it's one of them.
This is a familiar size. And then he gets around
two of the corners and he hears movement in the brush.
Off to his right hand side and not off his
left shoulder is this little cabin. So he turns and
leans back against the cabin, just to have a backstop
(30:54):
to lean back against, because when the snow falls on
these places, it leaves a trough between the structure itself
and the eve line of the roof. So he got
this trough that can be pretty deep depending on the snow.
He slid down in this a little bit, and he
was trying to get his foot back out as he's
leaning back, leaning back against the cab, trying to pull
(31:14):
his leg out of this little trough. Anyone who's been
up in Alaska or anywhere where it snows knows what
I'm talking about. That little trough that you'll pull you
under a building if it's real silicual slide under that anyway.
So while he's doing that, he's looking down, then looking around,
and the second time he looks around, he looks over
to his right a little more and sees the eye shine. Now,
(31:36):
this eye shine, he said, was what'd he say, three
and a half four meters which would be what nine
to twelve foot somewhere in there. I didn't do any
conversion map, but he said three to four meters tall.
As he was trying to figure out what the hell
he was looking at, this thing was swaying back and forth.
He said he wasn't breathing, taking his breath away, and
(31:59):
he's not but really frightened. So he immediately starts sidestepping
to go back around this corner to get around away
from this thing over here. He successfully gets back inside,
shuts latches a little door, basically sits down against the door,
trying to figure out what he was just saying, because
(32:19):
he said he saw a hairy neanderthal man, gray skin,
big face, the eyeshine was amber orange ish red, something
like that. He wasn't sure if he was hallucinating or not.
He came back in and the only thing that broke
his train of thought was his little sternal stove. He
(32:40):
was boiling something on. It was fizzing over, so it
got his attention. He shut off his little stove, and
that broke his train of thought on that shit he
just saw. Just momentarily, all of a sudden, there's a
fump against the door, a big, heavy thump, like something
was going to try to break in. But it was
just a single time bamp shook him up to his core.
(33:01):
He didn't know what to do, so he started yelling
for his buddies in the other cabins. Now one of
the other guys that he was unfamiliar with. He came
over with the nice acs and the other people followed
him with their headlamps, all looking everywhere. He's yelling at
him in Dutch or whatever they speak. Watch out, there's
a wild man. There's a wild man. They all start
(33:23):
looking around, and he was looking out the window as
they were searching because he was freaked out. He wasn't
going back outside as he was yelling at them through
the window to be careful. It was big. They all scatter,
They all scatter around, are banging on his cabin door,
so he lets them in. They all scurry in. Just
as they get in and shut the door. On the
back side of that little cabin was a big fam
(33:46):
He said. It sounded like the place was going to explode.
So this thing ran up and hit the cabin. Said
it was only hit once, but it shook the whole place.
A moment later was a very loud scream.
Speaker 5 (33:58):
He said.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
It's almost sounded like it was yelling into the wall.
The whole place was just kind of They didn't know
what the hell did What do you do with that?
You're a foreigner visiting Alaska to do the idit a
rod trail. You have days of beauty and unsurpassed scenery,
then all of a sudden you get into some rinking
ink cabins north northwest of Rainy Pass. Now it's all bad,
(34:20):
all bad. As they're trying to figure out what the
hell they're all looking at each other. This is different.
This wasn't a no brochure. They tried to coax the
dogs up. These particular dogs. I guess they're European hunting,
bear tracking dog or some shit who knows. The dogs
wouldn't do shit regardless. They were a bear dog, smart dog,
(34:42):
basically a smart dog. It wasn't doing nothing. So they
literally sat there. No one breathed, it seemed like, he said,
for a good while, good couple hours. After some time
it calmed down. The rest of the group decided they're
going to make a break for their cabins, keep an
eye out for each other, scream if they need help.
They'll settle it like that, because they all had their
(35:02):
own sleeping arrangements, So they gingerly went back out made
their ways over just as it was getting the light
in the morning. He didn't sleep at all. He was
dead dog tired, but he couldn't fall asleep, he said.
Just as it was starting to get light on the horizon,
he had happened to be staring out the window, kind
of hypnotized his zone and out staring out a window
and realized there was a big thing in the window.
(35:25):
As soon as he sits up, it moves out away
the window. So as it moves out of the way
of the window, the dogs light up, and this time
the dogs bark and come over by the window and
are yapping right ro ro. He hears heavy footfall in
the snow, moving away, not fast, but just moving away.
Don't and so on, So he's relieved that it's leaving,
(35:48):
so he decides he opens the door and lets the
dogs out. The dogs run out, and they tear off
in that direction, barking where he said he doesn't know
where they got their fearlessness from all of a sudden,
because all night they were cowardice little bitches over in
the corner. All of a sudden they're gung ho to
go after it. So he let them out. They run off, barking.
(36:09):
He hears them barking for a while in one area
and moving a little bit and barking and moving and barking.
Then they come scurrying back. A few minutes later. He
felt confident enough they had run it off. All the
barking and noise and whatnot lit up the other dogs
with the other teammates, and they started barking and shit
inside their cabins, waking everyone up. So, with the events
(36:32):
of the night before, they're all paranoid. They're up, they're
throwing on their shit, they're grabbing their little ice axes
and their little ski poles, and they're coming out to
look and help or whatever. Right, so when they open
their doors, the other dogs they take off. So there's
eight dogs total on this trip. All eight are now
off into the trees. Everyone there is trying to call
them back. Now when he notices his teammates come out,
(36:56):
he comes out of his cabin and starts telling them, hey,
they ran off, they were running it off. They'll come back.
So they sit around waiting and calling for the dogs periodically. Finally,
after he said it was after like two hours, the
dogs come back. One of them had a broken leg,
and the two of them weren't right. I asked him
to elaborate, what do you mean not right? He said,
(37:18):
they weren't acting like dogs. They would just walk in.
They followed the other dogs and trailed the other dogs
coming in but all they would do is walk in
a little circle. They were just stuck on something, so
those two dogs were worthless from that point on, he said.
So they ended up lasing up what they could the
two dogs that mentally they would follow, but they wouldn't pull,
(37:39):
so they at least knew they could tether them and
the dogs would follow along. The one with the broken leg.
The other teammate threw the pack style over his shoulders
until they got to the next spot to get out
of there. When they got to the next place, he
couldn't remember the name of the little village. There was
a language barrier. All he could say is wild man.
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Man.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
No one was understanding him, so they got him the
flight and all that kind of stuff to get the
dogs out of there and them out of there. He
hasn't been back here since. He has a hard time
scheduling over in Norway or the Netherlands, wherever the hell
he lives. I think it's Finland. I'm pretty sure. If
I'm wrong, man, hey, shoot me an email, let me
know if it's wrong or not. It was hard to
understand you, but yeah, I could imagine they spent quite
(38:22):
a bit of money to come over here. They got
similar terrain over there, but it's not Alaska, and they
wanted to do the idea or odd trail. Goodness, gracious, Yeah,
it's not a good feeling to be stuck in somewhere
not knowing what's going on around you. Trust me, it's
not a good feeling. Who do you go to with
this shit without coming across like a maniac or a weirdo. Anyway,
(38:45):
what's easy for someone who hasn't dealt with something like
that to chalk it up is that guy lost his
mind out in the woods too long talking to the birds.
It's not that kind of party anyway, until the next one.
Speaker 6 (38:57):
They say, oh home, but you can't stay and I
don't want to be a long world opensis.
Speaker 7 (39:34):
Chid the chart, that chart everything. Can you ride back?
Ride back?
Speaker 2 (39:40):
And the joy for me?
Speaker 7 (39:42):
Joy stay right, come it right away, Stills Still start
(40:08):
sat side side.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Stay stay State, Still stas Still Games and still Stills.
(40:51):
US States, Thames, steamsh
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