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With all of your experiences in hiking this great land, I am curious as to what is the strangest thing you have encountered whether it be animal or whatever???

CJG, no just kidding.

Strange lights in the night sky while snake hunting in the McDowell Mountains in 1987, or the Boy Scout leader and his troop climbiing the Fossil Springs dam fence last summer - I used to have a picture of it up on my comments of the hike.

GTG

Mrs. Cakewalk wrote:With all of your experiences in hiking this great land, I am curious as to what is the strangest thing you have encountered whether it be animal or whatever???

Other than GTG and Olesma?
It was a skin and bones black pup, probably no more than nine or ten months old, that somebody had dumped in the White Tank Mountain Park. I found him hiding in a cave about 50 yards off the Ford Canyon trail last Thanksgiving Day. Happily, the following Sunday, two of the Park Service guys rescued him. Temps dropped down into the 20's the next few nights and I doubt he'd have made it.

GTG wrote: I used to have a picture of it up on my comments of the hike.

Sorry, that'd be me

It was necessary to strip out all the coding in the comments when they were converted to the triplog for security reasons. On the bright side, you now have the option to edit your entries.

I'll add your photos to the trail page!

Wow. This topic could be spread into several categories easily.

The freakiest thing that happend to me personally was getting lost on top of a mesa that is no more than 1/4 mile accross and 1/3 mile in length - only 3 trails over the top, one straight across, the other intersecting at a T. That happened more than once - I hiked the darned thing probably 12 times, been lost on top 4 of those times. Freakiest thing ever.

I know a couple of individuals who had even wilder things happen up there, and one of them vowed he would never go within 100yds of the top of the mesa. He generally stayed away from it if he at all could as a rule anyway.

Now, let me tell you about the freakiest critter I ever saw...almost bald it was, old as the hills, but still kind of spry looking, made this weird Hoo(lie) kind of call at night....

olesma wrote:The freakiest thing that happend to me personally was getting lost on top of a mesa that is no more than 1/4 mile accross and 1/3 mile in length - only 3 trails over the top, one straight across, the other intersecting at a T. That happened more than once - I hiked the darned thing probably 12 times, been lost on top 4 of those times.

What mesa? Where?...why wouldn't your buddy go back?

GTG wrote:I used to have a picture of it up on my comments of the hike.

GTG

It's Back

Linking off the triplog is identical to the forum now, the BBCode is

I was hiking through the white mountains cross-country about 5 years ago when I came upon what looked like a sacrifice alter. It was made of rock and had six other little rock platforms around it in a circle. The trees surrounding it had the bark cut away and there was weird carvings that were cut into the sides. I found it very freaky and strange. The this that really confused me is that I was in the middle of nowhere! 8O

ck1 wrote:What mesa? Where?...why wouldn't your buddy go back?

Yeah, what mesa, where and why wouldn't he go back??? I wanna go. Is it the Bermuda triangle of AZ or what?

This is a response to Jeremy's sacrifice alter:

That is REALLY creepy. I flashed on the Blair Witch Project as I read it. Could you find it again, or give us an idea where it is?

( 2018-06-22 removed dead link )

HEY! Where did this picture come from? It looks like Abdul the Terrorist!

Wiz wrote:
HEY! Where did this picture come from? It looks like Abdul the Terrorist!

When I can manage to get off the floor from rolling around hillariously I'll take it down....



(that's what google returns for "scruffy" search)

it was either that or this ( 2018-06-22 removed dead link )

Jeremy,

Sounds like a satanic worshiping site. I did a research paper in college on the topic. Facinating, yet erie subject. Back in Wisconsin there were rumors about satanic activity in the woods in one area. While I was researching this topic it said when you hear rumors like that, they are usually true. For the sake of the research paper I looked for it (in the middle of the day, in the middle of the week of course) and found it. It was much like you described.

I wouldn't go there at night.

Teva,

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you don't approve of guns. Tell me if I'm getting close!

not sure where you gathered that from?

"Scruffy Gun totin-kokkapelli" was your signature on the post, which has now been changed.

I was fishing in a pond in Kansas years ago. The I noticed a 6 inch long catfish had surfaced in the center of the pond and was flopping about strangely. Then it started to move sideways towards the shore. I walked over to see what was up and that's when I saw the snake. A water snake had grabbed the fish and was taking it to shore. When he got to shore he let go of it and then took it by the head and proceeded to swallow the fish. I felt pretty lucky to have been there to see it.

hey these stories are facinating i cant wait to read more..... please keep'em coming....

for me it was the time that i slipped and fell into a 30 foot ravine and got bit by a rattler. Then as me leg was swelling up, i got struck by lightning, which killed the poison and I was able to climb out and make it home.
I never told anyone cuz you probably wouldnt believe me.

Did I mention the space ships?

I was going to tell this at the Chili Shindig, but I think I said enough there.

This story took place when I was sixteen years old back in Alabama.

These two other guys and I were wading up this creek and flounderring around in the shallows trying to dry off from the thick Alabama humidity. I came up out of the water and Kid 1 says. "Dude whats all over you?!" We examine my shirtless torso to find I am covered in hundreds of quarter inch leeches. Kid 1 and Kid 2 freak out, I freak for a second and then find the leeches just rub off with your hand, but not before I freak Kid 1 and Kid 2 by pointing out that they are covered with leeches as well.

A few hundred yards further down the creek there is a cattle crossing. We begin to see cows getting out of the creek and going up the bank onto the pasture. Within fifty yards of the crossing we begin to hear a terrible bleating that is not like anything any of us has ever heard. Kid 1, Kid 2 and GTG get freaked again. We get to the crossing and just up from it is a huge oak tree growing next to the creek. It had at least forty percent of it's top twenty five feet of roots exposed over the creek bank. It was originally growing in the pasture and the creek had washed the dirt away from it's roots. Suspended in the roots about four feet from the top roots, feet and legs dangling is a newborn calf. Hanging and bleating and bleating and bleating. Kid 1 and Kid 2 have no idea what to do, I scrambled up the bank onto the roots and began to wrestle this calf out of the oak roots. The calf is only a few hours old. He is still wet from birth, his hooves are still spongy he's so new. I finally manage to free him from the roots and skitter down the bank with him.

He cannot walk and I figure he was calved at the edge of the pature, then stood to walk and toppled over the bank into the roots. There was no worried momma cow hanging out bleating back by the way.

I manage him down to the creek finally and try to wash the sticky calf juice off of my hands, chest, face, arms. Wherever he touched me during the root rescue was wet. Kid 1 and Kid 2 are more freaked than by the leeches. I get them to hold him up so he wont drown, but they don't want to touch him so I send them to look for momma cow or a farmer. They report no momma and a house up the hill. So I figure we'll take him up the hill to the farmer's house and all is well. Well this calf is almost as big as I am. I have a difficult time carrying him in this creek full of algae covered rocks. I slip and he and I splash a few times. I finally get him in a good hold to carry him out.

(James Herriot fans will love this)

I have this bleating calf raised as high as I can so his back legs wont dangle into mine and trip me. I have him in almost a Heimlich maneuver, with his torso high above me. It's at this point where I am making good progress with him, that he releases the contents of his bowels onto my bare chest.

Infant cow poop splashes my neck, runs down my chest, and down the front of my pants. Kid 1 and Kid 2 freak and then begin to howl with laughter. When he bombs me, I don't drop him. I hold him steady and all I say is "Man I'm trying to save your life and you s*** on me!" I finally managed to rinse the color of it off in the creek and get him up the bank to the pasture. Falling in the red creek bank clay six or seven times with him was nothing compared to my crap shower.

We left him in the grass for the scared momma to come get him and went on up the hill to tell the farmer. There were about half a dozen dogs that wouldn't even let us on the porch. We yelled and hollered for about five minutes for someone to come out, but I guess they weren't home. We took a couple of plums each off of a loaded tree and headed out. We checked the baby on the way out and still no momma. We were sixteen and figured that was the best we could do.

We walked out and hoped for the best.

GTG

Har!!!

O man that was a funny story!!!

I will never look at GTG the same way again...

O man......

umm ok that was gross.... but at least you saved the calf