YEAR: 2012

SEASON: Summer

MONTH: August

DATE: 31

STATE: Oregon

COUNTY: Linn County

LOCATION DETAILS: Location withheld.

NEAREST TOWN: Sweet Home

NEAREST ROAD: highway 20

OBSERVED: Camping out archery hunting with 19 year old son. Heard what sounded like non-descript mumbling outside tent. Thought I was hearing things, went to sleep. Woke to hear foot steps outside tent heading to truck, something rustled around in the truck, thought it was my son. I rolled over to see my son shaking inside his sleeping bag. Before I awoke to the footsteps, he heard at least two different vocalizing/mumbling sounds with walking around our tent. They stopped on my side and he heard a loud vocalization type talking and saw a large hand push in the side of the tent using three fingers, about 4-5 inches. I was snoring and my son thought this might have attracted them. We waited inside the tent for a couple hours and could hear movement outside. Nature called and we both went. I saw one standing behind the truck and he saw one duck behind a tree. We tried staying in the tent for another hour, but they wouldn't go away. I got up went to the truck started it; one was about 30 yards behind truck just watching. We grabbed the tent and everything in it and without breaking it down, threw it in the truck and left. This went on from 11:00pm until 4:00am when we left.

ALSO NOTICED: The one that touched and pushed in the tent a little did so when I was snoring. My son seemed to think it was curious, though my son was extremely scared.

OTHER WITNESSES: 2, My son and I.

OTHER STORIES: No

TIME AND CONDITIONS: 11:00pm-4:00am. night was clear with a full moon.

ENVIRONMENT: Pine woods, 1/2 mile or so from a high peak and meadows.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Geoff Robinson:

This report was filed by a witness who was bow hunting with his 19 yr old son. I visited with both men at the site where they offered to take me, some 40 miles (approx 1.5 hours) from the nearest town. They had camped without campfire on the moonlit night of August 31, 2012 in a remote site together in their tent in anticipation of an early morning hunt.

They continued to remind me that this was an extremely unusual event for them, as they had spent most of their lives being very comfortable in the woods, and were pretty horrified from their experience.

The father and son described the encounter occurring between 11:30 PM and approximately 4 AM. At about 11:30, the father said that he was awakened by what he thought was the sound of “footsteps” and attributed the sound to a “deer or elk, or bear” and went back to sleep. Later while the father slept, the son who had not fallen asleep so far that night, observed a large hand pressing on the tent, as well as hearing vocalizations from the subject closest to the tent that he described as “mumbling” with another subject farther from the tent in the trees. The son said at that point he hid inside his sleeping bag, afraid to look.

The father said he was awakened again by footsteps, only this time the sound was in the vicinity of his truck, and apparently “someone was rummaging around in the back of his truck.” It was at that time that he noticed his son’s distress, as his son was convulsively shivering from fear, head completely covered within his bag.

Both men had to go to the bathroom, so they both deliberated stepping out of the tent for some time, all the while hearing the presence of two bipedal subjects circling the campsite in the forested area outside of the perimeter. They noted that there would be quiet, but when they would begin to talk, they could hear footfalls in the woods, only to go silent when they stopped talking. The father described this experience as similar to his stalking technique where he would shadow elk.

Eventually the two men exited the tent to relieve themselves, and while doing so, both men observed large dark silhouetted figures in the tree line and on the road leading to the campsite. The father had brought his flashlight with him, and shined it on the figure in the road. He described an approximately 8-1/2 foot tall upright figure with its head turned away from the light beam. The subject had dark brown, almost black hair, and was holding a very large arm and hand up to shield its eyes from the intensity of the flashlight.

After this both men returned to the tent, still believing they were seeing things, and waited while two bipedal subjects continued stalking-type behavior around their campsite. As the witness described in his initial report, they gave up and left the area in a rush.

During the entire interview process, both men were shaking and appeared to still be in fear. At one point, the relating of the encounter by the son appeared to be unusually charged with emotion. I video-documented my discussion with them and after numerous repeat views determined that their account of the experience was thorough and factual to the best of their descriptive ability.

I examined the surrounding area of woods and the campsite and found no tracks or track way as the area was very dry, rocky, and/or ground covered with forest floor duff.

About BFRO Investigator Geoff Robinson:

Geoff Robinson is a software engineer and manufacturer's representative. As a teenager Geoff spent many nights in remote Georgia forests raccoon hunting. Mystified by seemingly inexplicable events during that time, Geoff has pursued explanations in the Pacific Northwest via study of an elusive bipedal primate that leaves tracks attributable to the taxon Anthropoidipes ameriborealis

Since those early experiences, Geoff has had encounters at his home in Granite Falls, WA, at the 2008 and 2009 WA Cascades expeditions, the 2009 Olympics expedition, as well as a number of smaller outings in WA and OR. He currently resides in Portland, OR with his wife and two sons.

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