BFRO #46475: Lone camper in his hammock has an eventful night near Sullivan

📍 Location

📝 Description

The Backpack tripDraft 9-8-2014 Background: Biologist at a major biotech company. No previous experience with Sasquatch or similar, but have seen a couple shows on television (1 episode of finding BF, and one episode of Survivorman). The Survivorman version was more honest in the �I don�t know what that was� category and peeked my interest; later reminded me of the structure I saw on the ravine trail here. I have many years camping experience, and some deer and turkey hunting, and grew up summers playing Dan�l Boone in the woods, so I am pretty comfortable in the woods normally. After this, I really have no interest in chasing BF � but would go there again only if I had a few capable buddies together for security. On August 31st, I went on a solo backpacking trip on the Wilderness Trail at Meramec State Park in eastern Missouri. The trail traversed a ~10 mile loop through the ~7,000 acres of protected wilderness with backpack campsites scattered along the exterior circumference of the loop. I started at the main trailhead at the MSP Cabins parking lot, traveling counterclockwise along the route. I was on the trail at 4PM sharp, a sunny day with chance of evening thunderstorms, highs in the mid 80s. Trail goes through a heavily forested area, typical Eastern white oak, hickory, with understory trees and shrubs, poison oak, etc. � significant areas of the trail were overgrown and thick annual weedy undergrowth, and many creek crossings (soil is moist under the rocks, but almost no areas with clean free-flowing water). After fifty yards or so there is a trail-use sign-in box; the box was pretty full of hiker slips so I gathered the rangers do not check it often. Heading clockwise, campsites 1&2 are about � mile in, and about 3.5 miles are campsites 3&4. I ran into two people (day hikers) on their way out near the sign-in box. Human sign became very thin after � a mile, and zero footprints or any human sign after the backpacking camp 2. I was very much alone after that, and evident with the thick weedy overgrowth (thought path was visible nearly always). As campsites 1&2 were in a hollow that was muddy & buggy I kept going to campsite 4, which was on high ground with much of the undergrowth removed, and excellent visibility. No sign of large mammal life save one whitetail deer buck I scared about 1 mile short of campsite 3. The site looked like it had not been used for a year. No footprints, disturbed anything, and the piles of logs were pretty covered in fungus. I decided to go a bit further on the trail looking for fresh water before doubling back to make camp; I was a running a little low on water to enjoy lots of drinks. After campsite 4, the trail heads steeply down into a ravine following a creek (the creek head is more or less at camp 4). Going down 150 yards or so down the trail in the ravine, its gets very dark and overgrown, and I got a sudden creepy feeling I was being watched, and I kept halting to listen as I may have been hearing echoes of my own pack squeaking. Trust your instincts. Not finding water, and the creepy feeling getting much worse, I turned around heading back up to make do with the water I brought in. Half way back up I noticed I had earlier walked right by a very strange �structure� formed out of 3-6� thick trees bent and broken about 6-12 feet off the ground. They were all bent inward towards each other from different directions, still with green leaves, and no other trees around showing wind stress or damage, and this being in a protected ravine, it made no sense. I�ve never seen it like that before, except maybe where one tree felled another, but not bent and broken midway up the trunk. Besides, there was no big fell-tree in sight. I shot a few quick pictures with my iPhone and quickly headed up to camp. Seems safer there being open and with a homey firepit, and a four-square around it of linearly-laid logs etc. After dinner, I went to bed about 9. The sleep setup is a camping hammock between trees maybe 30-35� from the fire, a bugnet bag surrounding the hammock (dark mesh also affords privacy), and a taught inverted V-shaped tarp over all in case it rains. I was just getting settled and then endless noises started. Noises I could not identify for the most part. Around 9:30PM, it was nearly pitch black with occasional wind gusts very high at the top of trees. Below me towards the deep woods ravine: and then two loud knocks in quick succession. I recall how loud, close, and how musical they were, not dull bark on bark, but like a baseball bat against a oak tree, or like the sound wood makes when it is being split by an axe. But nobody could swing an axe that fast, or just make two swings, much less there was no one within miles. The knocks were followed by sticks breaking underfoot, and then a loud snort or two like a big deer or horse maybe 20� from my hammock. I was frozen to move. Then someone shook my tarp very quick. I shone my light and saw nothing (but difficult to get good

🔍 Circumstances

No. Just me. Kind of prefer not to release the location if it means folks would go in there and disturb them. Depends. If they are real and there, let them be.

🌤️ Weather Conditions

Night. 10PM-4AM Pitch black in the woods several miles from civilization.

ℹ️ Additional Details

Night. 10PM-4AM Pitch black in the woods several miles from civilization.

🔗 Sources (1)

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