Some folks here know of my interest in Sasquatch from another board, so I thought it might be interesting to see what the general feeling is on this board. If anyone has experienced odd circumstance while out in the field and cannot contribute such to human or known animal behavior, I would be interested in hearing about it.
I have a bit of history concerning this animal myself and am more than happy to share my own experiences.
Howdy Buckskinner,
It's been a long time since I made my way along the trail to Gray Beard's, so I figured it would be okay to post to this here old thread.
In any case, here's my story about my possible encounter with a sasquatch:
During the fall of 1977 a few friends and I decided to make a duck-hunting trip to Red Lake up in the Kamloops region of British Columbia.
We packed up a couple of camouflaged boats, 50 or 60 rubber mallard decoys, some grub, our shotguns and headed for the high country.
Once we reached Red Lake high on the Kamloops plateau, my friend Randy and I decided to hunt a marshy area on lake that we knew well from our eastern brook trout ice fishing trips during the winter. (Note: At the time the closest ranch or building was a good 10 miles away over bush roads.)
We had our boat loaded before first light and made for the marsh. Once there we set out our decoys and slipped the boat back into the high weeds and grass about 60 feet from open water. Hunting was slow due to warm weather and little wind. We would blow our mallard calls once in awhile hoping to entice a duck from the far end of the lake but nothing was moving. A few hours had passed and we had not fired a single shot.
Myself and Randy were both bored and staring out over our set of decoys on Red Lake when something suddenly but quietly surfaced just outside the edge of our flock of decoys. What came up appeared to us to be a human-type head covered in long, wet hair ... something what a person with long hair would look like if they surfaced while swimming. The skin under the hair as well as the eyes, appeared dark brown in color. Our view of this strange head was about even with the shoulders, although they did not break the surface of the water. The eyes (what you could see of them under the hair) looked dark (no white) like an animal's. The face had no expression or movement. It seemed to look at our decoys and us for maybe 10 or 15 seconds, and then slipped silently under the surface with a large swirl or wake and it was gone. Nothing else was seen or heard.
When we returned to Cliff Tuscon's ranch where we were staying, I asked him aside if he had ever seen anything like what we witnessed on Red Lake that morning. I'll never forget the look he gave me. I think he figured I was either piss drunk or on the verge of going crazy. In any case, old Cliff never saw anything like what I described in his 40 years up in that country.
My afterthoughts on the Red Lake incident:
Firstly, I would like to state to everyone that reads this that I honestly did not know I had possibly witnessed a sasquatch on the surface of British Columbia's Red Lake until many years after the incident had taken place.
Secondly, since Red Lake was considered fairly remote at that time, I doubt whether any duck hunters had ever tried what we had that day. At the time it was simply too much work for the rewards — but we were young, looking for fun, a little foolish and still fairly green. To tell you the truth, neither myself nor my good friend Randy had the foggiest idea of what the hair or fur covered head and partial shoulders of the creature we saw outside our flock of decoys could have belonged to. Thinking back, I firmly believe the creature (possibly a sasquatch) came in under water for a meal of fresh duck. Upon reaching the decoys it likely saw no feet from the ducks that it may have been used to grabbing from below, and then it likely saw the strings leading to anchor weights and knew something was wrong or badly out of place.
Last, but certainly not least, after surfacing the possible sasquatch most probably saw our heads just poking up out the weeds and quickly decided a long underwater swim was required to get the heck out of the country and away from us as fast as possible.
In closing, I would also like to say that the swirl or wake that I witnessed and the whooshing-type sound (like drawing a large canoe paddle or boat oar very forcefully through the water just below the lake's surface) that went with it when the creature departed was far too big to have been made by a beaver or any other aquatic animal or bird that I am familiar with in British Columbia.
