Standing With Bigfoot

I saw the blurb while surfing my usual list of Bigfoot sites. 

‘Todd Standing to reveal new footage in Seattle on Tuesday.’

Then while digging online I found that he would also be appearing at this year’s 

Sasquatch Summit in Ocean Shores, Wa. and is going to ‘Release it all’ as the tagline said.

Cool…I was there last year and it was a nice venue and I got to meet Dr. Meldrum and Derek Randles who invited me up to his Olympic Project for an expedition. I wrote about that here on this blog last March.

I knew I had to go, but I really prefer to travel with someone if possible, both for the companionship and as a witness to anything unusual that might occur who will back me up as a source.  I called my friend Jack.

                                               I'm on the left, Black Jack on the right

We zip down to the conference in less than 90 minutes and I show Jack the side entrance where we waltz in and immediately encounter the ticket table. $25 bucks each (last year was only $5, so it was clear that the addition of Standing and a ‘special guest’ were the reason) and we were in with our neck lanyards and bigfoot key fobs. I spied Bob Gimlin right away. He’s unmistakable in his pressed western shirt, new riding jeans and $300 Stetson. Plus he is only about 5’5 (with that hat ) and usually surrounded by ladies, the Elf Prince of Bigfooting.

                                                    Bob getting busy with the ladies 
                                                      (click on the pics to enlarge)

I tell Jack, pointing out the diminutive Cowboy and he stomps over and waits for a minute as Bob finishes hugging girls. He jabs his hand out and Gimlin is all smiles and super-friendly.
I whip my camera phone up and snap a shot of them and then move in to meet him myself.
I saw Bob last year here but didn’t feel the need to meet him, partly because I am interested in new developments in the field and Bob is mostly a trophy attendee but also because I was intimidated by the crowds around him. I handed my camera to Jack, showed him how to work it and moved in to greet Mr. Gimlin. He shook my hand as Jack fumbled typically with the phone, but the flash went off and I got my face to face with the Man, who really is a warm, happy guy. I’m glad I met him.

I took the phone from Jack and we moved for the entrance to the main room. I see my new friend Ben Freed standing just inside the door to the room and I tap him on the shoulder. (Ben runs a website called Bigfoot Ops and was the second guy I met at the Olympic Project in March. I had spent the previous Saturday night with him at his habituation site up in Ashford, Wa., sitting by the orange glow of a propane heater late into the night waiting for a bigfoot to…do something. Nothing major happened (a trip wire sensor went missing) but I got to hang out in perhaps the hottest hotspot in the state with a nice guy and his wife who fed me and showed me the ropes of bigfoot stump baiting et. al. They also sold me a expedition leg pack.

Ben steps out and shakes my hand and says, “HEY…I’ve got your Expedition pack….hang on a minute.”

Ben disappears and just as I turn back to the door, Jack in front of me, here comes Les Stroud. He brushed up against Jack and Jack took the opportunity to shake Stroud’s hand, but Stroud was too quick for me to corner and was gone faster than Bigfoot over a ledge. For some quick background on both these guys; Bob Gimlin is the smaller, more alive half of Patterson/Gimlin, the duo who first rode into the hills of Orleans, California and Bluff Creek to record the famous 2 minutes of ‘Patty’, a very large female Bigfoot who has become the foundation of video evidence for the entire phenomenon.

Les Stroud is the creator and star of the Survivorman TV series, a highly popular collection of his excursions into the wild places of the world where Stroud is dropped off by his support team with only a few basic items and a portable video camera. He’s a neat guy to watch on film because he’s very accomplished and likeable as he starts a fire from the sparks of downed airplane battery onto some bark duff soaked in AV gas, then sits back in the below zero cold and plays his harmonica.

Inside the venue proper, we have arrived in time to catch Derek Randles in the middle of his presentation. Derek is the stout founder of the Olympic Project, (in his ever-present hiking shorts) with an HQ in the hills west of Port Angeles, Wa. He and his wife Pretoria hold court with attendees who pay $300 or $400 dollars to meet Meldrum and to trek into the surrounding woods for beginner courses in Bigfoot tracking. It’s a great way to get acquainted with the subject and it’s more fervent practitioners, and Dr. Meldrum is very patient and accommodating with answering the same questions over and over. I attended last March and enjoyed the two days and got to network with other like-minded BF’ers around the big woodstove there.

Here at the Summit, Derek introduced his friend, David Ellis, his audio expert and track cast guy and Ellis did the same spiel he’s did at the last conference, playing audio of bigfoot sounds, that, most of which could easily be made by owls or coyotes, but a few of the clips he played near the end sound as though they were made by something with a great deal of lung power. Plus, they were creepy. After a few minutes of hearing the intricacies of how to record BF in the wild, I leaned over the Jack, ‘You ready for a beer?’

I know the answer to this is always the same, so we both get up and head to the casino bar.
If Derek or his crew had anything new to add, we missed it, but I sort of doubt it.

The next speaker on the roster was Thom Powell, the author, and because he authored a book loaned to me by Jack right when it came out, we knew we had to hear Thom and to meet him. I had my copy of ‘The Locals’ with me and BINGO, there’s Thom sitting right against the back wall. I went right up to him and stuck out my hand and said, ‘Thom, your book is one of the only ones that allows for paranormal explanations for Bigfoot.’  He shook my hand and took my book, “Yep,” he says, “and tonight I will have plenty of stuff for all the ‘woo, woo’ people here.” He signed my book, saying it was a good, first edition and we thanked him and headed to the bar.

It's a typical casino, with cigarette smoke replacing normal air and the giant room full of money sucking machines are manned by the typical booze and tobacco-fueled automatons, pumping coins in a slot and punching big plastic buttons repeatedly with apparently, almost no recompense.

Jack orders two Big Wave beers and they are excellent, light ales, infused with a hint of pineapple. We are both a little giddy about meeting all the luminaries in such a short time and I get my phone out to look at the photos.

I click on and find the right tab and ‘poof’ nothing but black. What? I tap the screen, fiddle with the images and NOTHING. In the place where the two shots of Bob Gimlin and Jack and myself should be are two blotches of black, empty screen. I’m blown away. I tap it over and over, looking in other folders and they’re just not there.

The phone is overcomplicated and has failed me before, but never in this fashion. I hold it up and take a photo of Jack at the bar to test it. I say, “Maybe you held your finger over the lens?” But he says no, he saw the image of Bob and I on the screen, and sure enough, the photo I take of Jack turns out fine. I hand him the phone and he snaps one of me and it turns out ok too. I am flummoxed.

                                                               The Flummoxed Me

There is no explanation for this outside of some sort of spectral reason why Gimlin, the father of Bigfoot film evidence, cannot be photographed. Bob really is a magical Elf.

At this point, I'm in a somewhat sour mood, so I work at rationalizing the event until my mood improves. The beer helps and by the time it’s gone I have written off the lack of a good, clear photo of Bob Gimlin as never being obtainable.

It’s time to head back to the room to hear Thom Powell now so Jack pays the tab.
We walk in just as Thom takes the stage. He puts images onto the slide projector screen and begins his lecture about the stranger aspects of bigfoot witness encounters.
He says, “If you’re out in the field sitting in the dark waiting for bigfoot to come up to you or to walk by, you’re not a scientist, you’re a spy!’ Heads nod around us and people chuckle and murmur in agreement. He complains about the capitalization of the word ‘bigfoot’ saying that ‘Squatch’ is not a truly defined thing yet and does not deserve special treatment. He talks about ESP where Bigfoot uses what he calls a ‘coconut telegraph’ for lack of a better term, to communicate, in the kings English, with humans, saying, “They are definitely telepathic.” Here’s a link to the entire story that Thom relegated to us there at the Con. http://www.thomsquatch.com/2011/01/coconut-telegraph.html


The bulk of Thom's lecture felt sort of like a high school science class, where he punctuated his patter with a few bad puns and 9th grade quips and ‘dude’ references and this is understandable since he is a 9th grade science teacher AND as another dude in his late fiftie, I totally got it, dude. Thom also repeated a mantra that he has adopted to explain his attitude regarding what people think of his paranormal explanations for bigfoot;   ‘Nobody cares.’ I didn’t really understand what he meant, though.
I guess he’s saying HE doesn’t care what people think.

Thom then talked about the use of special pendants, swinging over special cloths, how cameras and batteries always seem to go dead when bf are around (a phenomenon not lost on me at that moment) and how he believes BF is an inter-dimensional traveler. He then posted a bullet-point list that I paraphrase here, including:

‘They are observers of humans and sentinels’, though he never explains what they’re looking for.
‘They live underground, along with ETs’, but he doesn’t suggest where that might be.
‘Some go rogue’, explaining negative witness reports of menacing bfs.
‘We are being led into a greater awareness’ which is appropriately ‘woo, woo’.
‘bigfoot picks the habituation sites and the people THEY want to interact with, not the other way around.’ This makes some sense I guess.  And finally,
 ‘They prefer to interact with humble people’ at which point I lean over to Jack and whisper, ‘You’re OUT, dude!’

Thom suggested that if we want to have an encounter with a bigfoot in the woods, we have to have good thoughts and humble intentions. We should pick up litter. At this, I nudged Jack again and winked and he smirked back in agreement, this may be a good idea, but it’s still funny.
Then he posted an image of a wormhole, calling them Einstein-Rosen Bridges and images of books supporting wack-theories including Michael Talbot’s ‘The Holographic Universe’ which I have read and enjoyed, but don’t fully support myself.

Despite all the woo woo, nobody had left the room and that told me that even with the solid, flesh and blood opinions of so many people on the panel, they were willing to entertain the possibility that bf creatures may indeed possess capabilities beyond that of us much less hairy, puny humans.
By this time, Thom had run over his scheduled allotment by about fifteen minutes and the Con host, local radio deejay, Johnny Manson was hanging on the stage stair rail looking simultaneously bored and annoyed. He never intervened however and Thom left the stage to applause nearly thirty minutes over.


I told Jack that we had ten minutes before Meldrum was scheduled so we headed back to the bar.
On the way there I explained that Meldrum would likely do his college-level Anthro 101 course like he did last year, to fill up his 90 minutes and that if we got back about thirty minutes before he was done we might catch any new stuff.

Jack made for the restroom and I got to the bar first. To make sure that we wouldn’t be bored, I ordered two whisky/cokes and when Jack sat down he concurred, “THOM WAS GOOD MAN…HE’S OUT THERE BUT HE’S GOOD.” Jack was using his big boy voice as usual and I could see other people in the bar turning to see what the problem was.  No problem, just Jack.

I looked around and noticed a lot of others from the room had joined us, all of us wearing the neon yellow lanyards with Sasquatch Summit cards. It was the expected cross-section of bigfooters.
Plenty of over-fed dudes and dudettes wearing Cabela gear like camo hats, vests and parkas that have never seen temps lower than the inside of their diesel truck cab with the windows down when they peer into the woods and say, ‘Was that a SQUATCH!?’

There were a few other attendees that looked like dedicated hunters. Flannel shirts and Carhartt logger pants, with burly arms and epic beards. Todd Standing looked this way, and surprise (except for the burly arms and epic beard, so did I ).

Seated behind our seats at the bar were two dudes sipping drinks. The whisky pushed me over to their table, “So you guys are here to skip Meldrum’s segment too, huh?” The burlier dude in a sweater laughed and agreed, the handsome kid across from him looked intently at his Vape stick and exhaled a cloud of mist. I continued, ‘So…you guys ready to hear Standing deliver the goods?” Handsome kid piped up, said, “Yeah…he’s fulla shit….just more puppet stuff.” And Burly sweater guy nodded and grinned. “That one on the right is so fake you could see the edges of the mask.”

Handsome kid said, “Phil took that image and super-imposed Standings face over it and it was a perfect match!’, nodding toward sweater guy. “Phils the guy who does the ‘breakdown’s’ online.
Then I knew this was Phil Poling, a video and audio expert who uses AV equipment to ferret out fine details in crappy video footage to ascertain whether it’s real bf stuff or a hoaxed clip.
I mention how I had listened to a bunch of audio clips at the Olympic Project event that Sara Brown had brought and Phil said, ‘Sara’s his wife..’ so, Handsome kid was Jon Brown, a Chickasaw tribe member and the owner along with Sara of the ‘Grays Harbor Thermal Footage.’  This is new (2013) night time footage taken with a FLIR BTS camera of a large white mass apparently hunched down below a large log. Size estimates, taken after the sun had come up indicated a creature much larger than a human both in height and breadth, aprox. 5 feet at the apparent shoulders.

At about two minutes into the eight minute clip, a cow comes into the frame and moseys off, apparently not alarmed by the huge blob behind the log.

Here’s a link to the clip:
https://www.facebook.com/thebigfootshow/posts/758352427514268

After I told Jon that I thought his wife did a neat thing when she went outside during Meldrum’s presentation in March and beat on a drum, I asked both guys if they though bigfoot was just a flesh and blood creature or if he had some extra-human abilities. The both demurred, saying this was just an animal and that it’s silly to think otherwise, but I maintain that the shamanistic aspect of drumming to summon a bigfoot is a dead-on part of tribal cultures around the country.

Jack had left our discussion early on, having drained two whiskys and the three of us decided to go back then too.

In the room, Meldrum had not yet taken the stage so I found Jack and we headed over to Dr. M’s table where he was sitting with a few bigfoot print casts. Jack ham-handed Meldrum and burbled enthusiasm at meeting the TV star and I shook his hand and greeted him too, “Nice to see you again.”

Meldrum is a friendly guy and the epitome of Professorial demeanor. He uses words typical of his profession and while there is a tendency to drone the way lecturers can when explaining textbook passages, he is clearly smart enough to grok the information into useful advances in the field of cryptid research.

Jack Obfuscating Meldrum

After a few minutes of Jack obfuscating any others from reaching Meldrum to chat I pull him over to Todd Standing, who is standing alone nearby.

Todd is a tall, hippie-ish man with long blonde mane tied in a loose pony-tail and with the requisite epic beard. Really epic. He speaks quickly and directly. I ask him if he will be showing anything from his documentary tonight and he says there will be some images and that the real show will be in Seattle on Tuesday. I ask him if it’s ok if I snap a photo (thank you whisky) and I fumble the shitty camera up and try to get the three of us into a selfie. I have decided that a blurry photo is the best way to present bigfoot con attendees now, as an appropriate depiction of both types of animals.

At this point I spot Standings Protection petition and I go over and sign it. It’s just a good idea to support any legislation that might bring awareness to idea of giving this (ostensibly) undiscovered primate room to breathe without so much fear of fuckheads with big rifles intent on cashing in on a corpse.

I also think that bigfoot are possibly a people who should be left alone entirely, as history has proved out time and time again that contact between moderns and primitives ALWAYS ends up destroying the latter. The indigenous natives of this country are the most glaring example, but in modern times we have the tribes of the deep jungles of Brazil and Peru, Indians like the Yuri and the Carabayo people, who we know exist because of recent aircraft flights over those areas, showing the ‘malokas’ or houses they live in, and how they were nearly made extinct when the juggernaut of the rubber tree tappers and slavers had bloody conflicts with these previously uncontacted people over 100 years ago. The new generation of existing peoples there have not seen white people face to face and the risk of diseases being passed to them is a real enough threat to hopefully thwart any new contact.  I suggest the idea of leaving bigfoot alone to Todd and he winces.
“We need to research them so we can protect them,” he says directly. I turn to Jack and say, “Sign it Jay,” and Jack gets a wide-eyed look of disdain on his face and backs up two steps. I can’t hear his answer as the microphone blares from the stage but it’s clear that he is not going to sign anything and so I grab a blank petition sheet from the pile and suggest we can do it later. Standing seems to like this and we thank him and go to our seats.

Blurry action shot of Me, Standing, Jack and a huge orb

His reticence to sign a protection document is a little puzzling to me, but I know him to be the type to usually avoid signing anything for any reason.

Meldrum does his thing and by the time he’s into deep explanations of the Denisovan pre-history peoples and the intricate nature of the mid-tarsal break and the inferred functional morphology of giant bipedal apes, I can see that it’s time for more booze. Jack agrees again and off we head for the bar, but this time I tell him I want to drop off my copy of The Locals at the car so I don’t risk losing it on the floor of the casino somewhere. He’s cool with that so we head to car. I toss the book in the trunk and we weave our way back to the room and stand outside watching Meldrum wrap up his lecture. Ben walks up and his wife is right behind him. She hands me the Expedition leg pack and it’s neat. Karen had asked me what name I wanted emblazoned on the pack as she personalizes them and so I chose the name of my blogpage, Bizarre Bigfoot.

Ben says, “I upgraded it with a space blanket instead of a poncho and you get the good knife too.”
I needed a new knife so this was the zenith of my night so far. I thanked them both and just as I was turning away, Ben caught my arm and said, “That guy from the Ocean Park habituation is here…I’ll introduce you.” Outstanding!

Standing lying about something (just kidding).

Back in the big room, right on schedule at 6:10 pm, Standing took to the stage. He began with a denial that his sister is a makeup artist, as apparently this is one of the accusations leveled at his 'muppet' image, the mask creature that Poling super-imposed Standings face over.

But listening to Standing was not difficult as he is a good speaker, funny and fast with compelling delivery. He said "I filmed them, I interacted with them, I'm trying to build credibility." But he recoils at the idea that bigfoot creatures could be something more that a giant forest ape.
"It offends me, it bothers me that people want to put them in the realm of paranormal."
He didn't explain why.

Standing as the model for this critter on the left?   I think Treat Williams is a closer match.


But while he was speaking I was thinking, 'Why would anyone expend this much energy and apparent conviction for so long if he was hoaxing?'  Now, here at home where the internet at large is easily reached, I found a bunch of information suggesting that Standing stole the habituation site from other, previous individuals with hopes of habituating and/or protecting the bfs that frequent it.  It's possible I suppose, and other info online suggests that Standing is actually much more cunning that he would have the public think, with a full-on video production company.

At the summit, he denied this: " I have an old laptop and I plan to do the final editing at my home," and "my dream is to put a drone in the air with a thermal camera on it and finish the project."
What he means is, a drone specially designed to stay aloft for 12 hours at a time, to be replaced with an identical drone in two alternating shifts. Full time, real time bf thermal surveillance.
That shouldn't cost a tremendous amount of dough, but I'm just a carpenter, so...

Standing showed a short video clip of him explaining a trackway to Dr. Meldrum, with Dr. Bindernagle re-tracing the foot tracks diagonally up a small hillside. You could see Meldrum's reaction as he changed from intense focus to surprised delight (for lack of a better descriptive, Meldrum was quite giddy), saying "That's exactly it," to conclude what Standing did in fact have a real bf trackway.


While Standing spent the majority of his time defending himself from the hoaxer accusations, he did say that he thinks that Sasquatch are 'a brilliant people' citing their ability to outwit humans consistently, that it is humans trespassing on their turf, and that "it's amazing what they can do they are the X-men of the woods!"  There's a soundbite if I've ever heard one.
At the end of his segment (less than forty minutes I think) Standing made a pitch for money.

"Go to my kickstarter site, please consider donating. It costs money to do research." and he finished by asking people to sign his Species Protection petition, and by asking Dr. Bindernagle up on stage.

Bindernagle is 73 and looks to be reasonably spry as he popped up on stage. His voice was a bit hard to hear, but he seemed animated and lively and to my understanding he concurs with Standing having filmed Bigfoot, but he said, when it comes to be absolute proof, 'not so fast'.
Perhaps I misheard him.

Standing to 'Release it All'

This concluded Standings presentation and Johnny Manson came back on stage as Jack and I peeled off and out the door to the lobby.   As I reached the door of the main room, Ben caught up with me and brought me over to meet his new friend, the guy with the habituation site near my place at the ocean.

This is what I was hoping for, ever since I had read the report on the BFRO's database.

Here's a link to that report:
http://www.bfro.net/gdb/show_report.asp?id=29609

In brief, the witness tells the investigator that he has had a family of bfs come to visit his property for the past two years, where he has been feeding them peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and has seen them and interacted with them so much that they consider each other to be family.

The guy is unassuming, had no issues with talking directly to me and was very generous with his time. He told me some amazing and unbelievable details. Here are a few that I am paraphrasing:
'We've discovered trails all around our property that were made in the thick brush without any tools.'
'I make them peanut butter sandwiches on wheat bread...they don't like white bread...just threw it on the ground.'
and
'I had some meth heads come onto the property and the big one was approaching them. I got there first..I had my pistol and I waved him back. All of the sudden, I heard a dog bark (my dog was back in the house) and then I heard two other dogs barking...a small dog, but with a deep bark...they were protecting me.'

Ocean Park Bf is watching 

There are a few other details that I am withholding as I think it's best to not divulge all that I know. The feeling I got while talking to this guy is that he is being very sincere, that he would not risk the safety of himself and his family for any sort of money or publicity. I asked him, "Are you worried about your place being overrun by people hoping to see bigfoot?" He said no, that the location is private enough and that he guards it himself, including that he rarely goes out and he feels like he is part of a process of some sort. That's a strange comment. This man is clearly intelligent and well spoken. I asked him I could come visit sometime. He said, "Summertime...that's the best time...but go out on your own property, late at night and call them. You'll be surprised."

Just about this time Les Stroud comes out of the main room and passes us. I stick my hand out and say, 'LES..how ya doin?' and he slaps my hand and says 'Hey' and continues walking, not too much unlike a bigfoot sighting.

I'm tired now....this was a lot of information to assimilate so...I will update this site as I learn more. Suffice to say that, what this Ocean Park guy had to say was far more interesting to me than what the panel of experts on the stage had to offer.  In all fairness, who has more evidence? A guy with a thermal camera and a footprint cast or a guy who is willing to call an investigative body (more than once ) to come check out his place for bigfoot activity.  Read the report at the link above and make up your own mind.

GUAG the Talking Bigfoot

From a new posting at the BFRO http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=29609
'One evening, the witness was on his front porch, and the younger male was standing in the brush about 30 feet away. The witness patted his chest and said, “Dad” three times. Then the Sasquatch patted his chest and said, “Guag”. Possibly this could be the name of this Sasquatch. If so, this is a remarkable break-through.  Another time, the witness and his son were demonstrating what hand shaking was. They repeatedly shook hands with each other. Then, one of the Sasquatches which was standing about 20 feet away on the far side of an old vehicle reached across the top and put its hand out in an offer to shake hands. The witness stated that he was too scared to bring himself to actually walk over and shake its hand. What an opportunity lost! The witness stated that if there is ever another opportunity, then he will take it.'   Click for more


Remarkable break-through is right!  Scott Taylor wrote this report as well as a previous report
http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=42448  where a motorist describes the following:
'After about a minute of looking at it, wondering what to do next, and being in an open 1951 MG sports car, he made a little hand wave and said, “Hi”. This is when the creature pulled it lips back in a bare-teeth threat expression and yelled what sounded like the words, “Sheea-hooah-Huh!” The witness said that the creature was very loud, and he could feel a vibration as it yelled at him.'

Click the pics, make 'em bigger!

So here we have TWO instances of verbal communication between humans and Bigfoot.
Yes, these are anecdotal, and anybody can post anything on the interwebs, but I'm choosing to believe they are true experiences because of the power of ridicule. What I mean here is, if you decided to announce to the world that you heard a Bigfoot tell you his name and offer to shake hands with you, what do you think your friends would say?

There is some anonymity in the BFRO, but I think this sort of information would leak pretty easily, especially if you describe where you live in detail in the post (as the Ocean Park men did) or if you drive a vintage convertible sports car and live in a retirement community.

Eventually you will get hammered for being crazy. Why would anybody want this sort of attention?

Now is when we have to discuss people like Rick Dyer and that asshat on youtube who calls himself 'ButchyKid'.

These guys are anomalies, insofar as they are aberrations in the overall witness accounting archives. Dyer is probably insane. He could not have made enough money to make it worth the abuse he brought on himself and his family. Not in my estimation. And the other idiot is just a mook with a video camera, ostensibly trying to get laid. Good luck, Kid.

It doesn't take very long to ferret those types out, as the ring of truth echoes pretty loudly once you have done some research and know what to look for, agreed?
But getting back to the best thing about these new reports is that they truly represent a real breakthrough. This statement is a qualified conundrum, I am aware. When I say represent, it is because we still don't have a Sasquatch walking up to a microphone and a camera crew to explain himself.

We have to accept that it is possible that these witnesses are telling the truth and if so, what it means for Cryptid research.
I have a theory.  I think we all agree that Sasquatch/Bigfoot/Skunkape creatures vary in physiology a bit from region to region. But I believe that they vary in other ways as well, including temperment and probably in I.Q.

                                        This dude reminds me of Willy Nelson, Am I right?!

 I believe The Coastal Sasquatch is more intelligent and less afraid of humans. Maybe it's because we don't have the same good old boy 'shoot it, grill it' attitude that pervades places like Texas and Georgia, and moreover, we may be coming to a point in our coexistance where we will make contact, mano y bigfoot and we will come to a much deeper understanding of these amazing, highly secretive animals.

 Time will tell, as Scott Taylor will undoubted stay in touch with both reporting parties.
When I met Taylor at the Sasquatch Summit in Ocean Shores in 2013, he told me that there are 'many more reports' that have not been added to the BFRO database, due to the time it takes to investigate them properly. This is exciting too and though he has not been added to the list of speakers at the 2014 Summit, I hope he goes and gives us more information on this new development.

Bigfoot on The Fringe

In a manner, all science could be said to start off as 'fringe' insofar as one individual suggests a theory or idea and until it is tested, scrutinized and adopted by others into consensus, that theory is outside of science and on the fringe.

Quantum physics was not instantly accepted as a sensible avenue of research. Today is a major field of study and is standard coursework for graduate and undergraduate physics students.
Today it is commonly agreed in scientific communities that there are three basic components to science; Center, frontier, and fringe.

Yesterday, walking through a local forested trail where other hikers have seen and reported encountering a large, hairy, bipedal figure, I contemplated how an 8 foot tall, 500 lb. creature could occupy that place, ostensibly for many years without making its presence known.  I see evidence of all sorts of animals on my years of hiking here in the Pacific Northwest.  Everything from voles to marmots, foxes to bears, all currently known animals in the woods are detectable if you are patient enough.

I have seen no evidence of a huge bipedal, non-human animal, but I know from my research that many people have had an inexplicable encounter with something huge and hairy. The common thread in all of these sightings is that the subject basically disappears.


From BFRO Class A report #1724
"I was driving home from work about 11:15 when I saw 2 reddish looking eyes in the middle of the road, about 7 or 8 feet off the ground. As I approached the spot where I saw what looked like eyes... seemed to vanish in thin air or into the woods near by. But by the time I got close to what ever I saw, all I did see was like a shadow going in front of my headlights."

She stated that it took off into the woods opposite their house. Mrs. Tallik told me that "She came down the road honking her horn, pulled into the driveway and jumped out of her car and ran to the front door yelling 'Mom!' in a very frightened voice. 'There was something standing along side of the road with red flaming eyes.' I told her it was probably a deer or some sort of animal. She replied, 'No, it was taller than a person.'
http://www.bfro.net/gdb/show_report.asp?id=1724

Outside of a few riveting but unsubstantiated stories of governmental involvement in the cover-up of a cryptid discovery (google 'Battle Mountain Bigfoot' or 'Mt.St. Helen's Bigfoot, eruption') we are left with a witness account where our quarry is observable one second and within a few more is simply not observable.

 In the book 'Hunt for The Skinwalker' by George Knapp and Colm Kelleher is this excerpt:

'On the evening of August 25, 1997, whilst surveying the ranch, two scientists witnessed a glowing opening in the distance. This egress grew in the lenses of their night vision binoculars. From within the portal, a black, faceless, 400-pound humanoid emerged, stepping onto the ground and walking into our current dimension. Moments later, the opening vanished. Following suit, the entity disappeared, as well, but only from view, as the men realized they were now alone, in the dark, with a being from another reality.'

Some BF aficionados will suggest that the heavy cover of forested areas provide enough occlusion to allow a Bf to escape or hide nearly instantly, and this is arguable because the ability of other animals in the forest to escape attention by simply standing perfectly still is known to us as a common occurrence, but there are far too many accounts that refute this an a catch-all explanation.

It would seem prudent for the researcher to widen the scope of possibility to include a quantum explanation.

From BF researcher Sharon Cornet;
'We must keep in mind that a mere couple hundred years ago things like holograms, mini-computers and worldwide electronic and/or wireless communications, exploration of space, weather-monitoring satellites, infrared vision night scopes, and other technological advances would have seemed like “magic”, so it may be that phenomena which seem to defy science or elude us today (since technology is really in its infancy) will all be rectified via science in our near (or far) future.  This goes for transparency of biological entities, teleportation (like “beaming up” in the TV series Star Trek), portals, time travel, and the like.'
 

Dr. Michio Kaku, Professor of Theoretical Physics (The City College of New York) said: “Some people slam the door on the question of other civilizations visiting the Earth because distances are so vast. I say, Not so fast! The fundamental mistake people make when thinking about extraterrestrial intelligence is to assume that they’re just like us but a few hundred years more advanced. I say, Open your mind. Open your consciousness to the possibility that they are a million years more advanced. Einstein said you cannot go faster than the speed of light. However, he left a loophole open. You know in school we learned that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points. But actually that’s not true. You see, if you fold a sheet of paper and punch a hole through it, you begin to realize that a wormhole is the shortest distance between two points. Only those civilizations millions of years ahead of ours, capable of harnessing the power of billions of star systems have the ability to open gateways to space and time, to travel perhaps through portholes, to go these enormous distances in a blink of the eye. You simply cannot dismiss the possibility that some of these UFO sightings are actually sightings from some object created by an advanced civilization, a civilization far out in space, a civilization perhaps millions of years ahead of us. You simply cannot count out the possibility. When you look at this handful, handful of cases that cannot be easily dismissed, this is worthy, this is worthy of scientific investigation. Maybe there is nothing there. However, on the off chance there is something there, that would literally change the course of human history. So I say, let this investigation begin.” ABC News, Peter Jennings Special: UFOs - Seeing is Believing (25 February 2005).

Telepathic Bigfoot

Last week during my search for Bigfoot news, I found a story in the Willamette Week News called 'Sasqautches are Aliens'  (link below)
http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-22531-sasquatches_are_aliens.html

The author, Martin Cizmar did a fairly straight ahead interview with Sasquatch authority Kewaunee Lapseritis and included a very good, tongue in cheek send up cartoon of two Bigfoots with an Alien Gray in a hardhat by Brad Alston.
I have read both of Kewaunee's books (The Psychic Sasquatch and The Sasquatch People (and their Interdimensional Connection), and I enjoyed the first and tolerated the second.
The reason for that disparity is that while the first book, while filled with some unusual conjecture, the second book went into metaphysical territory too deep for me to accept. Just a personal opinion.

I read the story at the WW News,  and commented in the comments section that I would like to see, for once, a bit of solid evidence of the claims. Evidence in the form of a televised, multiple witness (TV reporters in a news conference setting) situation where these interdimensional entities can speak directly to the world. This could really help bolster the work of people like Mr. Lapseritis.
Sadly, this does not seem likely and the posts that followed on that website concurred, including on anonymous 'guest' who decided that I am an 'asshole' who never bothered to read Kewaunee's books.   I commented back 'Why are you so angry', and that was the end of that guy as he never posted again.  But another person posted, saying (paraphrase) 'This is nothing new, other people have been channeling bigfoot.'
The poster named names. 'Brad Johnson' and 'Darryl Anka'. Now he's got my attention.
I googled Brad Johnson and Darryl Anka and learned that Anka, at least, is a high profile 'channeler' who downloads a extra-dimensional entity he calls 'Bashar'.  Try not to spit fluid and hear me out.

For regular readers of this blog, you may know that while I wish for hard evidence of the existence of a population of huge hairy people in the forests of the world, I tend to favor a paranormal explanation. In this vein, I have cited a collection of 'channelings' called 'The Ra Material' as a good source for this explanation. The Ra Material, in brief, explains that Bigfoot creatures are not simple flesh and blood animals that have existed for millenia but for some reason did not evolve along with humans, but are a (hold on to your hat) from another planet.
I'll wait while you clean up the coffee you just spit out.
Ok, ready?  Google 'The Ra Material, bigfoot' if you want the whole story, which doesn't take long. Here's an excerpt about how Bigfoot will ultimately be discovered:
From 'The Law of One/Bigfoot'
64.17 Questioner: Dr. Monroe, I understand, brought a four-toed Bigfoot cast by here the other day. Could you tell me which form of Bigfoot that cast was?
Ra: I am Ra. We can.
64.18 Questioner: I know it is totally unimportant, but as a service to Dr. Monroe I thought that I should ask that.
Ra: I am Ra. This entity was one of a small group of thought-forms.

64.19 Questioner: He also asked— and I know this is unimportant— why there were no Bigfoot remains found, that is after the Bigfoot entities had died on our surface. He had asked why there had never been any remains of these entities found. Could you answer this for him? It’s just of no importance but just as a service to him I ask it.
Ra: I am Ra. You may suggest that exploration of the caves which underlie some of the western coastal mountain regions of your continent will one day offer such remains. They will not be generally understood if this culture survives in its present form long enough in your time measurement for this probability/possibility vortex to occur.
=====================================================

To continue my earlier reference to the story printed in the WW News, I found one response to a post I made from the gentlemen below:
Brian C  Stefan Dozier • 2 days ago
Great discussion you two! I met Kewaunee at a workshop he gave in 2012 and bought his Sasquatch people book and will get his first book after reading your comments. He is a good hearted intelligent man and went to hear him talk at last Saturday at the McMinnville UFO festival. I enjoyed him very much and everyone there! I've had a sighting of a group of them up at Mt. Baker on a very remote FS road after stopping for a black bear & her cubs right in front of me. I thought they were bears also as they were black in tree shade 100 ft in past the bears. They all froze for like 10 seconds, then moved across the gravel road were I could see they were walking and disappeared behind the trees so I thought they were hikers, but I drove several hundred feet to find a vacant dead end open field trail head. They couldn't have gone that far & didn't see any backpacks on them! I hung out for awhile and saw nothing. It wasn't until I drove back & at the spot where I saw them cross the road it became like a vortex as my vision became very vivid & colorful (I'm partially color blind) that I realized I really was missing something special here and figured it out hours later driving home!
This is the first time I’ve posted my story and since you are reposting & free to do so. I wasn’t expecting that so I added more details that I thought might help explain why sightings are few or not reported like mine.
It makes me sad today thinking back as my camera was in the passenger seat as I just used it! I had just stopped my SUV next the only view point along the miles of that road I’ve never taken before, and got out to take some pictures of the valley and Baker Lake down below. I was 20-30 ft. from my car for 10-15 minutes before I received a notion to get going. I had just barely started my car & moved before I saw the bears 8 feet in front of me! Two happily trotting cubs & mamma bear watching them keeping up with a quick glance towards me before I completely stopped & my engine hood blocked my view. I was overwhelmed with the idea that I was nearly stuck on a rocky point with bears between me and my car as they approached from the other side of it so I had no idea of their presence.
And then I quickly became absorbed wondering what I was seeing beyond them. I was all alone and absolutely no one had any idea where I was & starting to feel foolish with the need for caution didn't include the idea of pictures then. This was supposed to be a spontaneous side trip to some hot springs nearby since I had the extra time & I haven’t visited in a decade so my intuition was guiding me even if my left brain disagreed. :)
The other time was at my cabin near Mt. Index last year. I was painting it and from around the corner a large one I could see through came walking by and within 15 ft disappeared. I didn't say anything to anyone for the longest time as I still didn't believe it and wasn't sure I want to be associated with it. It's all good now! :)
====================================================

I asked Brian if I could post his experience and his photo of Kewaunee and he agreed.
Here's Kewaunee speaking at the conference:

Bigfoot Bullshit

Guy Edward's Bigfoot Lunch Club has a recent post about Rick Dyer's admission of the 'Hank' Bigfoot body as a full-on hoax.

For most semi-serious BF followers, this was a foregone conclusion and the admission part is just more time-wasting, but it is important to note the effect that a hoax has on any effort to uncover truth, regardless of the field of research.

For the record, Jeff Meldrum did not buy into the 'Hank' story for a millisecond. Even after Dyer blatently baited him with a Youtube come-on to travel (either direction) to see the body, Meldrum posted his own rebuttal and then never commented publicly again. Smart move, as it turned out.

His partner, Derek Randles, was less cautious and had a dialogue with Dyer that included intimations that he would be willing to come see the body and that Randles believed that Dyer might actually have a real bigfoot body.  (Click on images to make them larger!)

   

I don't blame Derek for his actions, since this is the sad requirement of any serious Bigfoot researcher. When a new, fantastic claim like this pops up, you really have to dig into it the best you can to find out if there is any substance. This includes traveling to wherever the 'evidence' is,  which Randles offered to do (but luckily did not have to follow up on) and which Meldrum DID do, when he went to Russia and China to look for Yerens and that B.S. filled story that Igor Burtsev foisted on him.


All of this leaves me depressed.

After all the years since Bob Gimlin nearly fell off his horse in Bluff Creek, since all the years since Thom Slick threw his checkbook on the table and said, 'Let's do this thing,' the sharpest, most
dedicated people in the field still have nothing more than room full of  plaster track casts, some specious DNA papers, some blurry, distant photos and video and a bunch of stories of fleeting glimpses of big hairy things in the woods.

It's no wonder that skeptics get good mileage out of the suggestion that Bigfoot isn't real.

The P/G film, the Freeman footage, and Todd Standings puppets are the best film evidence available to date. Les Stroud is getting some new viewership hits on his recent show that includes the short, annoying images of a thing that looks like B-movie actor Treat Williams in heavy makeup. The Grays Harbor Thermal footage is basically just a ghost, and that dude on Youtube  with the 'Ontario Sasquatch' audio is so bizarre that it's either real or it's evidence of a man going mad on tape.  (I suggest that anyone who is unfamiliar with any of the names in the last paragraph simply google the terms to find the latest B.S. the bigfoot world has to offer. )

There is the nagging aspect of thousands of witness accounts, though.  Could thousands of people be lying? Sure. Could thousands of encounter reports be hoaxes? That's less likely, but still possible.

Could the hundreds of very good, trained observer-type reports of very large, hairy humanoids seen by cops, soldiers, forest rangers, Doctors and biology majors be figments of imagination?
Not likely at all.

So if we distill the stories down to the very best, most vetted and triple-checked anecdotes, what do we have?

A story.

If we stick to the tenets of good science, then, we basically have nothing more that stories and conjecture. So we're left with the choice, 'Is Bigfoot an imaginary, mass hallucination?' or 'Is Bigfoot a real entity, but proof of it's existence is not possible within the boundaries of known scientific practice? '

You can see where I'm going with this, and since I just re-read Grover Krantz' 'Bigfoot Sasquatch Evidence', I will now include this quote: 'Many sasquatch enthusiasts seem to think that by finding more widespread [anecdotal and trace] evidence of the species, they are in effect strengthening the argument that the species is real. Up to a certain point this reasoning is valid … But when it is suggested that a wild primate is found native to all continents, including Australia, then credibility drops sharply. … Beyond a certain point, it can be argued that the more widespread a cryptozoological species is reported to be, the less likely it is that the creature exists at all.'

It could be, too, that we ARE hallucinating Bigfoot into existence, the way Tibetan's suggest with thier 'tulpas'.

Dr. Robert M. Pyle says most cultures have human-like giants in their folk history. "We have this need for some larger-than-life creature," says Pyle, author of "Where Bigfoot Walks." Pyle is skeptical that Bigfoot exists but hasn't ruled it out. "This could be a case where biology and mythology correspond."

Bigfoot Expedition - Ridgewalkers - 2014

                                                        Ink drawing on Bigfoot Bar - Ridgewalkers HQ

Back home from my first BF expedition, courtesy of Ridgewalkers Unlimited and it's owners
Derek Randles and James Million. The fast version for those who are in a hurry is that it was
about 10% new knowledge, 70% fun and good networking and about 20% fluff.  The thing that I'm left with after thinking about it for a few days is that I had a good time, met neat people and I didn't learn a whole lot.  Pretty much like any good vacation.
And in that vein, I learned that this is what Bigfoot Tourism really is in a nutshell.
For the neophyte who is interested in getting close to the flame of their own particular obsession, they must choose the people who are the best at it.  Click for more.

For Bigfooters, in my humble opinion, there are no better individuals to cozy up to than Derek Randles and Jeff Meldrum.  As the best known, serious students of Giant Hairy Forest People these two are unsurpassed.

 

       

Mystery Machine - loaded for BF

Beautiful Olympic Mountains from Hood Canal bridge

I paid my money and made the three hour drive. The route is quite scenic from Seattle to Port Angeles, or  P.A. as we call it and you must cross Hood Canal at about the 2/3'rds point.

Mt. Muller, summit

The location of Ridgewalkers Unlimited is just beyond Lake Crescent.

 Don't go too fast down the hill past the Sol Duc Hot Springs sign or you'll miss the driveway.

Ridgewalkers HQ and the Squatch Cave

I pulled in and I was soon into the fold of Ridgewalkers Unlimited. Randles came up to greet me and gave me an envelope containing the itinerary, including in-the-field inspection of game cameras, backpacking and wilderness preparedness, evidence gathering and handling and track casting, all in the course of basically two days.
Derek himself is the kingpin. He's a compact and energetic guy, has a loud voice when needed (and it's needed a lot) but has an amazing ability to zero in on individuals who are on the fence about anything and is there to fix them up. Hazy on hike departure time? Need batteries for your audio device? Forgot your dinner? (that's me) Derek handles it and you can focus on why you came in the first place. He's good at delegating too, and for our hikes into the forest trails around Mt. Muller, he appointed his partner Million and another confederate, Tom Baker and everyone with various desires and hiking ability was covered.
I chose the low impact hikes because I'm 57 and fat, but also because those are the hikes Dr. Meldrum chose and I had a lot of questions for Meldrum.

Me and Meldrum - I'm taller, but he's got bigger feet

Dr. Meldrum is THE go-to guy for credibility in the Bigfoot world as the only credentialed Dr. who has gone all over the world for over 17 years lecturing and ruling in or out all manner of BF 'evidence'.  It's an onerous task and Doc M does it without complaint and never seems to tire of the same dumb questions over and over.

Other members of the staff included James Million, Derek's partner and an outdoorsman with years of hunting and tracking experience, David Ellis, a researcher specializing in print casts and audio recording, and Derek's wife Torrie who is a horseperson and who supports the team as needed. She's friendly and had a great smile too.

Now I will post the remaining pictures I took, along with comments, in a photo essay style.
                      As always, click on the photos to enlarge them.

The camping grounds - That's the meeting hall on the right, plenty of room for tents or RVs.

Inside the meeting shop- Cozy, there is a woodstove, Coleman cookstove, couches and most importantly, a bar. 

Inside the main building (not really called the Squatch Cave) 

This guy is pretty cool. Knows his stuff, is an intrepid outdoorsman and is actually taller than he looks because I'm standing on the porch. Sorry Derek.

Out in the field, our second hike was led by Tom Baker and his wife Carol.

We saw a couple of bent over trees, but all agreed that this stuff is inconclusive. 

Still....it's possible, right?

This is Jason Burke. He's a good guy, thoughtful and funny, plus, he brought a nice game camera.

Jason sets up his camera near a water course.

He set out some bait.

But when we went back to retrieve the camera, he'd forgotten his key.

I teased him as he did a 'yard sale' on his backpack.

Here's Meldrum ducking past Bog Creek.

At Fouts Rock...that's Doc M, Ben Freed next to Bear the Dog

That's Mike from Pemberton, Canada

Back at HQ, Cliff Barackman held a track casting class.

That's Derek, Cliff, Cliff's squeeze, a neat guy named Keith from Dallas/Fort Worth and James Million.

Not cocaine, Barackman shows his precise method of measuring out the Hydrocal, which he admits is not precise at all. 

Barackman measuring his own bare footprint. Note: Size 8 narrow.

This dude's dog was not invited. He drank the casting water, was still cute.

Barackman does the 'splatter' method. Why not wear gloves, Cliff?

Randles and Ellis, with Cindy Dosen in back. Prepping the print for hydrocal.

Meldrum explains something. To his left, a lady named Mallory from Kamloops, BC.

Photo by Tom Baker - Meldrum, Ben Freed, Me, J-dog Burke, Mallory, Kyle from Phoenix, Carol and I don't know who the last two are..

So this is the expedition in a single blogpost. I will update this post as I remember stuff and find mistakes. 

Additional Update:

Notes following the Expedition:

Tom Baker asked everyone in his group: 'What do you think Bigfoot is?'

The first couple of people responded in the 'a flesh and blood creature, a throwback of modern humans' vein. Then it was my turn. I said, "Ok..I think Bigfoot is a creature that exists and has capabilities that defy our understanding of physics." I expected a long pause, but Dr. Meldrum spoke next, "I think we're dealing with a bipedal, relic hominid..." etc..etc..

His usual Professor-speak, siding with the flesh and blooders, which is appropriate coming from a tenured teaching professional who wishes to keep his job. Then a guy next to him named Kyle from Phoenix spoke up, "I think it's a combination of all the things they said.." which pretty much covers the demographic of modern Bigfoot wonderers: We don't have any idea, but some think it's a forest ape that is very good at remaining scarce, some think it's a ghostly UFO-connected robot and some think it's a combination of those parameters.            In other words, square one. 

===================================

I sauntered up to the Bigfoot bar where David Ellis and John Pickering were listening to Bigfoot sounds on a laptop being run by a young lady named Sara Brown. She gave me the headphones and clicked on a .wav file. 

I heard white noise, typical of an outdoor recording (I'm a musician with hours of recording experience if that helps) and then some faint screeching noises and howls. The small group there was excited by the sounds, and I smiled and said, 'wow', but I must be truthful and admit that I was not overwhelmed. I asked them if the Sasquatch Ontario recordings on youtube were bunk or not and the young lady just said, "I don't know..", dismissively. This is understandable as these bits of 'evidence' belong to The Browns and thier habituation work, and as far as anyone in the world knows, it COULD be real audio of giant forest people. The Browns are also the people who created the Grays Harbor Thermal footage, which Derek Randles pitched as big news at the Sept. Sasquatch Summit in Ocean Shores.  If anyone reading this has heard the Sasquatch Ontario audio on Youtube, you will note that it is basically a man teaching a Bigfoot how to speak english. 

It's oddly compelling, with a sweetness about the way the site owner, Mike, treats his charge, calling him 'brother' and in maintaining a light attitude. Is it bullshit? Maybe...just like any of this is bullshit. We may NEVER know for sure, even if a Bigfoot body lands on a coroner's table at Johns Hopkins.  Still...the stories are great!

 BTW, Mike Paterson ( I think that's his last name) apparently has never seen a bigfoot either, but it's because he feels they are able to flit in and out of dimensions at will.

========================================================

My post-expedition observations on the more high caliber individuals present and whether or not they've actually SEEN a bigfoot:

Derek Randles - He's a cool guy, energetic and focused. He's a serious guy by my estimation as I never saw him laugh. His bigfoot cred is that he saw one, but further research (which is always necessary) reveals that he never actually got a good description, but only saw a 'sillouette' of a swaying bigfoot after he stopped during a chase down a mountain. Another encounter, where Derek was in a remote, off-trail location in the Olympics with an audio recording of one of his infant sons resulted in a 'huge' creature thrashing up the mountain nearly to his tent site, but which still remained unseen.  Do we believe him? Why not? Why would he lie? 

Dr. Meldrum - He's got lots of footprint casts. He's a world authority on primate locomotion. 

That's cool shit, man. And, he's totally mellow and willing to chat with anyone. This is impressive given the large amount of crazy, boring and repetitive stuff Doc Meldrum must have to deal with. 

I bugged him a lot, asking him about guard hairs and hollow hair shafts, possible skin thickness, 

BUT, there is a tendency toward 'baffling with bullshit' in his answers and lectures, and by this I mean not that he's wrong or lying, but that he will cite studies and deep facts that don't really add to the answers we seek. Here at the expedition and at my first meeting with him at the Sasquatch Summit, I felt my eyes glaze over a number of times while Doc M regurgitated stuff about the Denisovan period and the reconstructed length of australopithecine toe. 

I wanted him to break stride, come down to earth and say something like 'Fuck....I have no idea what this thing is..'

Has Doc Meldrum seen a bigfoot? Nope...but he says one brushed by his tent early in the ayem in the Sierra Nevadas. Also, he said, " I think....I MIGHT have seen one on another trip...but it was too far away." something like that.  Not good enough, dammit. 

=================================================================

Tom Baker - Another nice guy. A BIG guy too. Probably about 6'3. He had the look of a guy who was there at the request of someone he owed a favor to, but was pleasant and along with his wife he led us down a logging road and put up with a number of dumb questions from yours truly. 

The walk was short. He snapped the photo you see below and then it was back to the camp before noon. A little disappointing. Has he seen a Bigfoot? Nope...but he claims to have found a footprint right there in the Olympic Project's expedition area. He did not tell us this during our walk, but I found that info online. Would've liked to have known this, and maybe have been led to the area he found it. 

==================================================================

There were some less luminary individuals present too. 

Sara Brown ( I think that's her name, I should've asked) was pretty, had a neat Native American drum she beat outside the Expedition shop a few times, which is as good an idea as any if you want to get Bigfoot to know you're around.  She was pleasant if distant, excited about her audio clips. 

I lent her my cellphone as hers had no service there and she was anxious to let us hear her SoundCloud files online.  There were pretty much the same as the ones on her laptop. 

Sara also made some really neat 'Olympic Project Expedition' notebooks by hand out of colorerd, lined book stock. Gave 'em away free.

Has she seen a bigfoot? I didn't ask her, but it would seem that she feels she has heard plenty of them and has co-ownership of the Grays Harbor Thermal footage which actually is reasonably compelling. It's ostensibly the best footage we have of a large cryptid animal at close range since Paul Freeman's 'Oh gawd, there's TWO of 'em' footage back in 93 or so. 

==================================================================

David Ellis - Another nice enough guy. He was focused and willing. He poured the Bigfoot copy cast that Derek said I could have to take home. Seems to know his stuff with track casting. Word is that he does audio work too, but I did not get this from him. 

Has he seen a bigfoot? Not that I can ascertain. 

===================================================================

Guy Edwards -I never spoke to him, but only recognized him after online research. He sat near the woodstove chatting and I think he went out on a night op with Derek. 

His Bigfoot credibility is hard to find, except that he created the blogsite 'Bigfoot Lunch Club' and he appears to like beer. A man after my own heart. Has he seen a Bigfoot? Doesn't look like it.

==================================================================

Cindy Dosen - I chatted with Cindy a couple of times. She offered me some of her Tillamook cheese. She's a pretty blonde with a nice jeep. Drove down from Vancouver Island, Canada. She owns a Christmas tree farm. She told me about how sulfites are unpleasant things present in nearly all foods and how she has a big garden, how her husband harvests venison for the table but not much about Bigfoot.  She has schooling in Animal Sciences, has been on MANY expeditions for herself and for the BFRO. 

She gave me some bigfoot evidence collection envelopes with 'chain of custody' instructions.

Has she seen a Bigfoot? 'Yes' is her answer. In 2007 she saw a 'dark shadow' that was following a frightened group of deer. It screeched, howled and bellowed and scared her back to her car.

It's not the P/G film, but at least she claims to have seen something.

======================================================================

Ben Freed- Ben came to the Oly Project in a neat Motorhome that made me jealous.

He was quiet at first, dressed all in high quality black, swat-style clothing complete with a pistol and arm bands with 'Bigfoot Ops' on them.  Ben clearly has a military background and after talking with him I learned that he has a website called 'Bigfoot Ops' (imagine that!?) and that he operates around Mt. Rainier near the Ashford entrance to the park. The site claims to have a good number of print casts, photos and video of Bigfoot but efforts to view them on the site did not pan out. 

Has Ben seen a Bigfoot? He told me that he has HEARD many of them, at night on the outskirts of his camps. That's about all I got. 

=======================================================================

Overall, I enjoyed the experience, learned that Bigfoot has hollow hair shafts, but no guard hair, that they tend to follow elk herds when they begin to enter calving season and are a likely food source. I learned that Fix-it-All is less expensive alternative to hydrocal for casting tracks, and that in a pinch, spray foam insulation covered with cardboard and a rock will work as well, and I learned the importance of extensive note and picture-taking if you encounter tracks or hair or scat.

As to the fluff part of this trip. It's endemic to the situation. Not much different from a sea cruise to the Galapagos Islands, organized bigfooting is a new form of eco-tourism. There's just not as much emphasis on the concept of protecting the poor animals we seek to view, since they're so damned scarce. If it was Monitor Lizards, they're nearly a dime a dozen for photo-ops, but Bigfoot will need to make an appearance at some point if we wish to enact widespread legislation to prevent people from shooting them, and I am skeptical that this will happen anytime soon. 

Why do I say this? 

Read a few of my previous blog posts.