➡ The speaker recounts a day of gold panning with friends. They prepared their equipment, including a handgun for safety, and hiked down to a creek. Despite a long day of hard work, they didn’t find any gold. The speaker felt like they were being watched at one point, but dismissed it and they all eventually packed up and left.

➡ A group of people were hauling equipment through a trail when the narrator spotted a creature resembling Bigfoot. The creature was squatting like a baseball catcher, with a shocked expression on its face. The narrator tried to alert his friend Matt, who was further down the trail, but Matt didn’t take him seriously. The creature would stand up whenever the narrator looked away, but quickly squat back down when he looked back, creating a tense and eerie encounter.

➡ The speaker describes a tense encounter where they couldn’t escape due to a steep embankment. They felt the need to stand their ground, as running could provoke an attack. This is compared to how people in India wear masks on the back of their heads to deter tigers. The speaker ends by noting that their companion, Matt, has disappeared.

In this video, I traveled to sutherland, Oregon, to sit down and interview a man who spent more time face to face with an actual bigfoot than any other person I’ve ever heard a story about. This interaction with the bigfoot while gold mining affected this man so much that he commissioned an artist to build a lifelike representation of exactly what he saw. This thing was nine feet tall, four feet wide, in a. Probably about 900 to a thousand pounds, if I had to guess. But you’re going to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. And the entire time I was interviewing him, there was a parade going on that lasted two hours.

So once in a while, you will hear a big block Chevrolet engine or a turbo diesel Ford revving its engine. It is what it is. Enjoy. All right. I am in an undisclosed location in Oregon right now, and I’m sitting here with whatchip Jay. Jay. Jay. I met up with a friend of mine who is a big time radio host, and she’s been around a long time, and she’s married to a guy that’s was a sheriff. He was also special forces, etc. And he told me about your story, and he explained to me that you had such a unexpected interaction, and from what I’ve gathered, you’ve had an interaction that lasted longer than anyone else has ever run into.

To be honest, no one’s ever had. How about this? You tell the story, you have at it. Okay. It was April 10, 2016. So in another interview, you inadvertently gave the wrong date. I did okay. I did okay. After the fact. I was thinking about it, and in an interview I’d done before, I said it was March 10, but I googled the calendar for March 10, 2016. That was wrong. It had to have been April 10, because the day that this happened was clearly on a Sunday. I have Sundays off, and so did my friends at the time.

Got you. So it was the only way it could have been. So, yeah, I. I do want to make that correction. It was April 10th, 2016. Okay. And. And it really comes down to my friends and I are interested in gold prospecting. You know, it’s a fun recreation and hobby. So for the city folks, when you say gold prospecting, you’re literally out there with sims and pans in the r gold flake, looking for the color. So that’s fair to say. That’s fair to say, yeah. All right. We’re out there with gold pans, picks, shovels, sluice boxes, tools to help get the gold out of the cracks and crevices of the rock and, and stuff like that.

And, and so anyway I. I like to read about the subject especially living in this state. The subject of prospecting of gold. Prospect. Got you ye. Back to the gold rush and you know, where all the big strikes were made and so on so forth. It’s sad how many people don’t even understand the value of gold anymore. I mean it’s crazy. And gold is what made America what it is. That’s right. People weren’t going west for no reason. West was all native angry Native Americans, wildlife and whatever else but gold. Send the army. We’re gonna get it.

You know, that’s. That’s how we settled the West. You bet. You bet. You have to have the money to build you and, and, and do all those things. You’re darn right. And, and, and it’s tangible, you know, it’s wealth that is tan. That’s right. It’s not one zeros. Right. Right. You can’t wake up and all of a sudden an unknown entity, some country just hacked the banks and everybody’s money’s gone. That’s right. Because that’s a coming. But at any rate. At any rate. Yeah. So I don’t know. I. I read about it and, and a lot of it is.

I read also about these lost gold mines. Yeah. Chalk up to have probably already been refound. But the. They didn’t know that they’d found them. And they probably, you know, been worked out. But nevertheless. That makes sense. That makes sense. I, you know, an adventurer, you know, by nature. And, and I like a good mystery. And. And I was reading about this supposed lost gold mine is pretty famous for our area actually. And, and it had a lot of good detail. What do you mean details? Like a words location could be. So are you saying like it’s like oh, oh, oh.

Because it’s lost. It’s lost. Okay. Okay. I gotta interrupt. There’s a. There’s a pretty high end hot rod parade going on outside. So if the audio is a little bad. It is what it is. We’re in America. So suck it up, buttercups. Go ahead. Yeah, I’m sorry about that. It’s got nothing to do with you, bro. It’s all good. I didn’t even think about it. It’s all good. Honest. You so, yeah, we’re. I’m reading about this story. It’s got a lot of clues in this story of where the location can be. So much so that I think I’ve got the area nailed down.

So you’re literally I, I didn’t catch this. I heard, I listened to two of your other interviews, or at least one. You’re searching for a place that you don’t know where it is. You’re looking for clues to find this. Oh, all right. Cool, cool, cool. It’s like a big ass scavenger hunt. That’s awes, that’s awesome. I love a mystery, you know. All right, cool. Occupies the mind. Yep. And so yeah, I. I’ve read about this story. I’ve read it several times over the years. I’ve read everything I possibly could and, and I had this aha. Moment and epiphany as you could call it.

Yeah. So I, I call it my buddy Alan. And he’s my friend prospecting partner for this kind of stuff. And another friend is also Robert. And I call up Alan and I, I tell him, I say, hey man, I says, what do you think of this story? And I relay the story, the lost gold mine, to him and, and I give him my best guess of where I think we should start looking for this thing. And of course he’s excited. You know, it’s something for us to go chase down for the weekend. That is awesome. Yeah, Good clean fun right there, sir.

Awesome. So, and I said, I asked if Robert was available and. And he said yeah. And. And then he had a neighbor, his name was Matt. And he was evidently into gold prospecting too. And I hadn’t ever met Matt yet before. And I said, fine, you know, it’s a party. You know, the more people love the recreation, the better. Let’s go have a good time. And so it was, it was on and pretty early in the morning, got on the road because it was going to take at least a couple hours to, to get there. It was quite the drive to get all the way there.

And so we’re going there. And like I said, it’s the first time I kind of met Matt. And I found out through conversation that well, Matt is a non believer when it comes to the subject of Bigfoot. How did the subject of Bigfoot come up? Was it just something you’re talking about when you’re heading to the woods? Yeah. In Oregon. I mean, of course we’re living in Oregon, man. It’s a reality, the Pacific Northwest here. So Right. Naturally, you know, amongst friends and stuff like that, you know, the subject comes up and we like to talk about it.

And to back that up, everybody that I’ve met in the Pacific Northwest, Washington state, Northern California, in Oregon, they talk about Bigfoot like it’s just in passing. Like it’s a large raccoon that shows up once in a while. Hopefully he doesn’t do any damage to the house or anything, but. Right. He might go through the trash once in a while. It’s just a thing. It’s not a big deal. Yeah, yeah. I think if it was truly a public threat, they’d have no choice but to disclose it and bring it outright. You know, I don’t want people getting hurt out there.

Right, right. The government makes a lot of money on. On recreation. You bet. You bet. But yeah. So we drive all the way there and I find out through the process at all, Matt, this friend of Alan and Robert’s that I just met, Is a non believer. And I don’t hold that against anybody. You title believe whatever you want. Right. But it ensues into a bit of a debate and argument. And anyway, I kind of drop it and just let it go because we’re all here to have a good time. And so we arrive at the destination that I picked out to.

To search for this lost gold mine. If anything, maybe we can find A little bit of color in the creek. And we get out, and Matt and I are still kind of arguing over the. The bigfoot thing, Whether it’s real or not. And I happen to say, well, does anybody know a good bigfoot call? Because we’ve all watched that TV show, Finding bigfoot and seen bobo make the calls. Right. You know, so, of course, you know, everybody says no. I said, well, I. Do you want to hear it? And they said, yeah, okay. Go for it.

You know? And so I stand there and I want it to be as authentic as I can. Right. I want to perform for my friends. Right. So I go ahead and I belter it out and I make it really good. And they agree. That was good, you know, plus, you’re a little pissed off still with their back and forth with Matt. Yeah, I’m guessing. Yeah. I’m still kind of human over it, But I’m trying to keep my. My stuff together on it. And. And so I. I’m scoping the hillside there, the bank. You know, we got to get down into the creek.

And get our sluice boxes and gold pans and all of our tools down in through there. And Time to get to work. Yeah, it’s time to get to work. It’s hard work, too, correct? Oh, yeah. You’re. You’re basically fly fishing with 15 extra steps. Fly fishing and weightlifting at the same time. Yeah. But it’s funny, you know, Think about involved. Right, right, right. You know, especially with the, especially with the potential reward, I would imagine. Oh yeah. It’s one hell of a. One hell of a drive right there. You know, if you can find some color, great.

You might be onto something. Right. It’s that little illusion of I’ve got a lottery ticket. Right, Right. Hell, heck yeah. At the end of the day, you know, you’re still just doing it for fun. And so I’m scanning for a location to get, get through the brush and start working down through the trees there. And I’m slipping on my backpack and, and I, I said, okay, it looks like we can kind of get through the brush here and we’ll get down to the creek. And everybody agrees. Let me ask you real quick, I don’t mean to interrupt you, but I’ll forget personally, you’re carrying a backpack.

Yeah. You got. So you got your backpack with essentials and such, I’m guessing, but you’re also carrying other. Oh yeah, like you’re carrying the sluice box and stand by one sec. My truck alarm just went on. So I’m. We’re standing there at the vehicles going to go down over the bank and work our way to the creek. And I’m standing there putting on my backpack and what I had is I had a 40 caliber handgun and a holster. And I put that at the bottom of the backpack. And then I had these neoprene chest waiters that fly fishermen use when they’re standing in the water fishing.

Right. And I had those rolled up very tightly like a cinnamon roll or like a sleeping bag. Because I mean, chest waders in a backpack, it takes up a lot of space. It sure does. It’s worse than an insulated jacket, right? It is, right. Okay. Yeah. Because they’re, I don’t know how a quarter inch thick or whatever they are, so. And it took a lot of working for me to get those darn hip waiters shove into that backpack. And then I had to get that zipper closed on the backpack and not bust the zipper at the seams.

Right. So I throw the backpack on and grab a five gallon bucket. I might have grabbed this loose box in the other hand. I don’t remember now, but it’s probably unimportant. And I said, okay. And everybody had grabbed sluice boxes and tools and things too. And I said, okay, I guess you follow me. I guess we. This was your plan? This is my thing. Yeah. You had the inkling of where this lost gold mine would be. Yeah, I’ve done all the reading and homework and logistics on the thing. And where now you start finally here. So you’re carrying a.40 cal just for bear? Well, yeah, basically right.

Or bear or cougar or, you know, or people for that. I got you. You know. And so we start heading down over the bank and I. I discover a. A game trail. It looks to be like a deer trail. So we start following that. Because to get to the creek is maybe. Maybe about a football field in length. To get down through there. Game trail is the easiest path. Basically right path of least resistance. Thorns and stickers and such. And prior to that I was looking at topographical maps. So I was trying to find the terrain.

The easiest terrain that we could do anyway because. Makes real good sense. I’m a big, big planner. I want to plan for everything I can think of if possible. And so we make it down the cre no problem. And we set up all of our equipment, sluice boxes and such. And we get to work, you know, looking for the gold, man. Right. We’re having a good old time. BS Dude. That is just on a side note. That is the most badass American thing there is to do. I know a few guys like you, A buddy of mine up in Wyoming still looks for it.

And some of the worst, I mean, you’re out in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. You know, he just gets a. He gets a. He gets an idea. He gets a. He gets a. He gets any type of a lead. And it makes sense he’ll follow it. Because if. If it pays off. It pays off. That’s right. So go ahead. I didn’t mean to interrupt. Oh, it’s. That’s perfectly fine. Yeah. So we. We get to. To BS and stuff and. And working and. And I get focused in what I’m doing. And you know, it’s probably. I think we finally.

We get down in there anywhere between 11 o’ clock and noon. And I remember the point when I’m working on the bedrock, Scraping a crack and crevice out of a piece of bedrock that I’d found. I just got this feeling I was being watched. It’s just like you’re being watched. And I turned and looked up the bank from which we come. And of course there’s just a line of brush 20ft in front of you because you’re right down there next to the water. So the vegetation’s thicker big time. And I just kind of paused there for a moment looking.

And I don’t know, maybe five, ten seconds of that. I Kind of shrug it off and go back to. To working on what I was working on. And. And then I didn’t think much of it after that point. Yeah, I don’t know. We’re probably down there about two, three hours. So it’s getting about three, 3:30 in the afternoon. And I kind of make the call because, you know, I guess I’m the leader in this operation. And I said, okay. I mean, you know, it all. We’re still in springtime. You know, it’s April, so it still gets relatively dark earlier.

Right, right. And. And especially in the woods. And we were in a section with a lot of old growth trees, secondary trees, and first growth trees. So, you know, it can really get dark quick. And I said, I guess you need to probably do a cleanup and pack it up and get our butts up through the bank and back up to the vehicles and get out of here for the day. Day. And of course, everybody was, you know, good for that. So we did. We did a cleanup. And darn it, we didn’t find any gold at all.

Not even a freaking spec. I was just gonna ask you. Good cleanup right there. I was so upset, but, you know, it seems to be a freaking running tail sometimes. Right. You’re gonna strike out more than you ever win. Yep. But that’s why they call it a strike when you finally do it. Yeah. So anyway, I put my backpack on and. And I think I grabbed a couple five gallon buckets. They were full with hand tools and things. And I told everybody, I said, well, I’m gonna make a trip up to the vehicles and, you know, drop this off, come back, you know, we’re gonna take us, you know, two, three trips, Whatever it takes to get everything out of there.

And I said, oh, okay. So off I go. And took me a couple seconds to find the little, little deer trail we were using to get back up out of there. But I. I got back out of there, no problem. Made it all the way back up to the. To the vehicles because we took my vehicle and theirs and put the tools in the back of the truck and headed back down over the bank. Go get another load of equipment. Tool solution boxes. It’s a lot easier bringing the tools down as opposed to bringing them out, because now you just use them.

They’re all wet. There’s dirt and all that such. So, yeah, you’re probably really focused on that. Yeah, you’re just focused at the task at hand. You kind of get tunnel vision, which is not good. You should always be more aware of Your surroundings. But I head back over the bank there and start heading back towards the creek. And about halfway down through there, I meet up with alan and robert. They’ve got equipment in their hands, too, that they’re hauling out. And I tell him, I go, hey, you’re about halfway there. Right back behind me. Keep following the game trail.

You guys are on it. Be there no time. Back up to the vehicle. So I’m going back down to help matt bring up some more equipment. And they said, okay, fine. So up they went, and down I went to the creek. I get down to the creek. There’s matt. He’s trying to get his stuff in order. And so I grab up some more equipment and so does ma. And matt’s just behind me or to the side of me as we’re coming up through this deer trail. Because you can’t walk side by side on a deer trail.

Not, not a lot of times. If anybody doesn’t know what that means. The deer trails not even 12 inches wide usually. Right. I mean, if I’m wrong, say so. But no, you’re right. Yeah, absolutely. And so we come up the bank from the creek and we’re following this deer trail. And as soon as you get up onto the bank, the underbrush gets a lot thinner through there. And it’s kind of a flat portion for, I’m saying, maybe 50 to 70ft. There’s a flat portion that you. You kind of got to walk through the brush. And then the bank gets steep and goes up inclines for about 40 or 50ft anyway.

Okay. And we get to the base of this incline that we’re going to now have to go up. And Matt has set down some of his equipment that he’s been hauling. And I still have a five gallon bucket of tools in each hand. And my backpack’s on. And I decide I’m going to come up this incline because the inclines, like I said, maybe 40 to 50ft. And then there’s another kind of a terrace or a flat area. Right. And so I start coming up that incline as soon as I get to the top of it. Now I’ve got to take a breather, you know, because it’s tough going.

You bet. Two five. Two five gallon buckets in a backpack. That’s a little bit of weight. And so now I’m huffing and puffing and process. I’m trying to set down these five gallon buckets and get them balanced so they don’t roll back down, which would suck. So I don’t want to Pick them up and reload those buckets, you know. And so I. I no sooner get those darn buckets stabilized and I’m breathing hard and catching my breath when I look up ahead of me of where I believe we have to go. And that’s exactly when I locked eyes on it for the first time.

And Matt can’t see what I’m seeing because he’s 50ft below me on the decline. So he can’t see looking up and past me, But I can see directly in front of me right this. We’ll call it bigfoot. Okay. I. I don’t know what term we’re supposed to use for it nowadays. And it’s squatted down and like a. Looks like a frog. I said on my other interview, a baseball catcher is another good way. That was a great analogy. Waiting to receive the pitch, only its hands were between its knees. Its knees were flailed out to the side like a baseball catcher.

And its arms and hands were between his knees touching the ground. And it was looking straight at me with these black, beady eyes, but a very shocked facial expression. Like an, oh, crap, I’ve been caught. But he’s also in the position of a defensive football player that’s ready to launch itself. Yeah, it’s true. If need be. One leap, and I’m guessing he’s 30 at the most 40ft from me. He would have been on top of me with one leap. I’m guessing he looked very athletic, very agile. Now for. For people, again, honestly, correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re up on a.

On a flat landing. You just put the two buckets down, and Matt’s 50, 60ft behind you down an embankment. So he can’t even hear you. You. That’s right. You know what I mean? If he was above you and you yelled out, it’d be easier. But he’s below you, and the trees will suck that up. Oh, yeah. Does that make sense? And the sound of the water will drown out noises. I slept next to a river last night in Oregon, and that’s the exact thing. It sound like people were talking all night. There’s nobody out there. You can’t hear anything other than the water.

So go ahead. I just want to. Yeah, clarify that. Yeah. So I lock eyes with it, and that’s when it gets this shocked expression. And I’m sure I probably had the same expression on my face. And in that area, there was absolutely zero underbrush. Just two big old growth fir trees that are probably three to four feet round. Big Old growth trees and zero underbrush. So there was nothing for this thing to hide behind. Behind at all. And it squatted with one of these old growth trees Directly behind it, Inches behind its back. So it’s squatted in front of this thing, and its shoulders are as wide as this big old growth tree.

That’s how I got the size comparison to it. Dude. Dude. And. And real quick, because you didn’t get a chance. No one said this in your last interview. I’ve had an opportun Sit down and chat with you A couple of times now. And I’ve noticed that your attention to detail, plus what you do for a living, your attention to detail is really, really important. So I’ll leave it at that. Go ahead. Yeah. I’ve been that way my whole life, Since I was a little kid. So, yeah. And when we lock eyes and it gets that shocked expression, this thing start swaying side to side in that squatted position.

And I’m getting a little nervous When I see that behavior Because I’ve seen chimpanzees do stuff like that. And I don’t know how to get a read on that, because sometimes that means they’re angry, Sometimes they’re happy. Some you don’t know, right? And I don’t know. I’m not an expert. So I don’t know how to interpret. Interpret this. So I’m interpreting it automatically as this is probably not positive. And so I turn and I look back down at matt, and I tell Matt, hey, I says, get your butt up here next to me. I’m looking at a bigfoot.

I’m looking at one right now. And I’m gonna guess he left. And of course, he’s kind of. Of still, you know, Ready to mock me for it because he gets this condescending tone to his voice. Oh, that’s cool, man. That’s cool. Just be chill with it, man. Just be chill. You know, it’s not going to do anything. And then he tells me I’ve got to get back to the creek and grab more stuff and equipment and tools and stuff and piggyback it to the base of this hill, is what he’s trying to do do. And I’m.

I’m telling them. Did you not just hear what I said? Because, I mean, if anybody needs to see, it’s the unbeliever. Well, when you. When you’re saying this, do you remember if you broke eye contact with the sasquatch? Well, no, because that was the trick. I didn’t want to take my eye off this thing, but I’m trying to look at Matt. So I’m keeping out of the corner of my eye, my peripheral vision, an eye on this thing while I’m trying to look down at Matt and scream and kind of yell at him. And as I turn to look at Matt, I notice out of the corner of my eye that this thing is going from this squad position slowly standing up to an upright position.

And when I see that movement of that Adam, the corner of my eye, I. I quickly turn my shoulders and head back to it. And when I do that, that thing squats back down into that position. I mean, quick. I sit on. The last time I was interviewed, like, free fall. I mean, it. I never. I don’t even think I could go from standing to a squat as fast as that thing did. And when it went back to a squat, I then turned back to Matt that. To try to coax him to get up next to me.

And he’s already on his way, heading back down towards creek to get more stuff. And the closer he goes to the creek, plus, he’s already got, like a little bit of an arrogance thing. Sure he does. You know, like, he thinks you’re just messing with him. You gotta. He’s gonna climb up there and you’re gonna hit him with a tree branch or something, something like that. And so. And. And as I’m yelling at him a second time, again, I notice out of the corner of my eye, this thing is starting to stand up real slow again.

So I turn back to it, and it squats back down just like a wild animal would do this. Turn your back on a bear or mountain lion. And I’m. I’m kind of thinking to myself, you’re hiding behind what? There’s nothing to hide behind. You know, he’s squatting back down for I see you. And I think it got that impression because after I lost sight of Matt because he’s now the creek, I then fully turn towards this thing, keep. Keep my position on it, right? And it realizes, I think at that point that, well, the gig’s up.

I mean, yeah, there’s nothing to hide behind. Here I am. And here you are. Right? Is it. You think it’s dropping down just out of instinct, like it’s trying to hide, but there just ain’t nothing to hide behind. That’s right. It was the instinct of hiding, I think. And you couldn’t have ran. You couldn’t have turned and run because you’d have been dead. I don’t mean I shouldn’t say Dead. Dead. Right. But you ain’t running down a 50 foot embankment that doesn’t. Humans don’t work like that. No. You would have just ended up tumbling and I want to get out of there at this point, where am I supposed to go when it’s between me and where I have to go to get back to the vehicles now, ladies and gentlemen, I’m sitting here with him.

You. I can tell you right now that he’s. He’s not the type of dude to tuck tail and run. You know what I mean? Like, so I’m gonna preface what you’re gonna say next with that, so I understand that. Yeah. So the way I was born and raised, when it comes to cougars being a predator, you. You hold your ground. Right. And if you run, you’re gonna stir up that, that prey. Well, that’s what I was, that’s what I was trying to say. I’ve seen, I’ve seen people that have run into them and I’ve actually seen it on footage.

They’ll turn their back on a cat that seems like it’s not going to do anything. The minute you turn their back, they start coming. Especially tigers, you know? Yeah. That’s why, that’s why in India they wear the mask on the back of their. Their heads. That’s right. For that exact reason. So go ahead. Yeah. So Matt’s gone.
[tr:tra].

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