A drawing of my first encounter.

[Doug]

This is a drawing of my first encounter.  Late 70's, so no cell phones. I have explained it before, but thought a drawing of it would help. I will post the drawing and then post an explanation a little later. 

[Doug]

My family and myself went on our annual Easter picnic with a group of families to the upper Mill Creek Park located mid way up the Oregon coast on the east side of the Coastal Range west of Dallas Oregon. The park no longer exists and is now a grown over clearcut, but at the time it was in old second second growth Douglas fir as well as old growth fir and hemlock. Once we were there for a while, my buddy Jeff and I decided to explore the steep hillside across the road from the park by using "elk highways" going along the hillside. These elk trails were cut into the bank and about 3 feet wide from decades of use by elk, deer, bears and all manner of critters. The park was located at the confluence of Mill Creek, Cedar Creek and Camp Creek many miles into the wilderness. The hillside in that particular spot, was very steep and filled with layers of forest duff. If you were to descend the slope, you would take a step and slide 3 to 5 feet, then take another step and slide another 3 to 5 feet on down to Camp Creek, causing quite a swath of fresh earth displacing the forrest duff. The foggy coastal air and this fresh dirt lent to preserving a butt, hand, forearm, and heel prints into the bank very well. We came across such prints and were amazed at the size of them. Standing in the heel prints the butt print as high as my shoulder blades and much wider than my back. Its forearm, from elbow to wrist, was a bit longer than my entire arm from my shoulder to my fingertips and the palm of the hand was bigger than my entire hand with my fingers stretched out as far as I could stretch them. The fingers were fairly long and spread out wide. I don't remember thinking the thumb was out of proportion. But why would I analyze that, not knowing what to look for? It had come off of the upper road, sliding down this hillside, came to rest with it's heels onto the elk trail, which caused it to suddenly stop, falling backward onto the freshly disturbed  bank with it's butt and forearm and pushing off with it's hand and continued on down to the creek. We tried to rationalize every scenario we could think of, but nothing fit. Was it a giant hunter? There was no hunting season going on and the heel prints were not boot heel prints and the butt print had a distinct crack as if naked and not clothed. I giant fisherman? What fisherman would go through the difficulty of descending such a hillside, when they could easily access the creek from the lower road. And the whole naked butt, no boot print thing too. We later concluded that it had to be a bigfoot. A very uncomfortable conclusion, but the only one that made sense. I never told anyone about this for a long while.

 

The thing that cemented to me, that this could only be a bigfoot, is what my mom had to say about 3 days later. She came into the room my brother, dad and I, were sitting and said she heard on the news that a fly fisherman was fishing one of the creeks by the upper park the day after our picnic and when he came around the bend of the creek, he saw a giant bigfoot standing in the creek.  I think that is all I have on this.

[bipedalist]

11 hours ago, Doug said:

My family and myself went on our annual Easter picnic with a group of families to the upper Mill Creek Park located mid way up the Oregon coast on the east side of the Coastal Range west of Dallas Oregon. The park no longer exists and is now a grown over clearcut, but at the time it was in old second second growth Douglas fir as well as old growth fir and hemlock. Once we were there for a while, my buddy Jeff and I decided to explore the steep hillside across the road from the park by using "elk highways" going along the hillside. These elk trails were cut into the bank and about 3 feet wide from decades of use by elk, deer, bears and all manner of critters. The park was located at the confluence of Mill Creek, Cedar Creek and Camp Creek many miles into the wilderness. The hillside in that particular spot, was very steep and filled with layers of forest duff. If you were to descend the slope, you would take a step and slide 3 to 5 feet, then take another step and slide another 3 to 5 feet on down to Camp Creek, causing quite a swath of fresh earth displacing the forrest duff. The foggy coastal air and this fresh dirt lent to preserving a butt, hand, forearm, and heel prints into the bank very well. We came across such prints and were amazed at the size of them. Standing in the heel prints the butt print as high as my shoulder blades and much wider than my back. Its forearm, from elbow to wrist, was a bit longer than my entire arm from my shoulder to my fingertips and the palm of the hand was bigger than my entire hand with my fingers stretched out as far as I could stretch them. The fingers were fairly long and spread out wide. I don't remember thinking the thumb was out of proportion. But why would I analyze that, not knowing what to look for? It had come off of the upper road, sliding down this hillside, came to rest with it's heels onto the elk trail, which caused it to suddenly stop, falling backward onto the freshly disturbed  bank with it's butt and forearm and pushing off with it's hand and continued on down to the creek. We tried to rationalize every scenario we could think of, but nothing fit. Was it a giant hunter? There was no hunting season going on and the heel prints were not boot heel prints and the butt print had a distinct crack as if naked and not clothed. I giant fisherman? What fisherman would go through the difficulty of descending such a hillside, when they could easily access the creek from the lower road. And the whole naked butt, no boot print thing too. We later concluded that it had to be a bigfoot. A very uncomfortable conclusion, but the only one that made sense. I never told anyone about this for a long while.

 

The thing that cemented to me, that this could only be a bigfoot, is what my mom had to say about 3 days later. She came into the room my brother, dad and I, were sitting and said she heard on the news that a fly fisherman was fishing one of the creeks by the upper park the day after our picnic and when he came around the bend of the creek, he saw a giant bigfoot standing in the creek.  I think that is all I have on this.

 

Amazing, I think many people would trade their sighting just to see a Bigfoot butt crack in the hillside ecotome, lol. 

 

No seriously, the fisherman confirming the scenario would be a cool read if in the BFRO or other database? 

 

Do you recall whether the fisherman could detect gender, and are you certain that could not have been cleavage of another sort?  Just funning you here of course.  Thanks for the report and drawings. It is possible @joebeelart is familiar with this sighting and/or stomping grounds.  Joe? 

Edited Friday at 02:13 PM by bipedalist

[OkieFoot]

Doug, thanks for the drawing and the backstory. I recall a pic somewhere of what was thought to be a butt print in mud and I think one or two hand prints next to it. 

 

 

[georgerm]

Thanks for the report Doug and I could visualize your climb along the elk trail and what an interesting find. Here in southwest Oregon the upper regions of Elk River near the town of Port Orford look the same as the attached picture of the area that you were in called upper Mill Creek Park. 

 

[joebeelart]

Sorry Bipedalist, nothing on that area from me.  The late Peter Byrne frequented those haunts, but he's gone with all his knowledge and intuition.  He invited me to his house for a mid-week look-a-round in about 2008.  I learned he was much more than a writer.  Two of his associates still frequent the hills in that area, and to the north.  I've worked the Alsea valley and to the south, but mostly the area between Mt. Hood and Mt. Jefferson, and the Gifford Pinchot between Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Adams. 

 

Once in the forest SSW of Estacada I had Ray Crow and two of his foreign guests along.  We found a fresh slide very similar to the one described and drawn by Doug!  It had a "butt print," skid marks, hand holds, and foot imprints when it stopped it's slide.  Then it ran with long steps down a logging road shoulder, crossed the road and jumped into tall trees from an embankment.  Ray and his guests took a lot of time to detail the event and he reported it in "The Track Record."   My recollection of the event is logged on one of the computers the FBI "seized" { through no fault of my own, so I can't give the Forum drawings, etc.}  Maybe someone can look it up in the "Track Record."  We probably scared the Bigfoot while it was picking huckleberries and we approached on a hairpin curve.  I still go up there and wander.

 

Found an academic paper on chimpanzees using rock on trees to communicate.  I want to look a little more of that up and I will share on the Forum.

 

Regards, and as Peter used to end, Joe here   

[joebeelart]

Well, I even surprise myself sometimes:  The hillside skid sighting is Reference 56, page 143-146 in my book "The Oregon Bigfoot Highway."   Unfortunately, I only put one photograph in the book.  I wrote a short comparison to the "Skookum Cast" from the Gifford Pinchot.  I also made a note on what Dr. LeRoy Fish thought of our sighting and photographs.  Other photographs were on my website that somehow became defunct.  

[Trogluddite]

Great backstory. Unfortunately, I'm a terrible aficionado of art, so when I first saw your drawing I thought you encountered a Bigfoot face down in a creek somewhere.....

[bipedalist]

Well Joe @joebeelart, I have the Track Record on CD somewhere in this mess I call a house, will check into that next time I come up for air, lol!

 

Thanks for surprising yourself and sharing.  The FBI couldn't have done it to a nicer guy; about that defunct website, I sure wish Paul Harvey was present for the rest of the story!  Peace out! RIP Peter!  

 

PS I almost got flattened by a rabbit hopping white tailed deer in  the middle of a trout stream recently so just be glad you were a little late on that hairpin turn scenario, lol!

 

PPS The deer made it over two waterfalls and kept on going according to a witness well above me topographically with a better view.  Faster than a Bigfoot cruiser!

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by bipedalist