YEAR: 2019

SEASON: Summer

MONTH: August

DATE: 8/6/19

STATE: Vermont

COUNTY: Lamoille County

LOCATION DETAILS: [Removed from report]

NEAREST TOWN: Eden, VT

NEAREST ROAD: RT. 118

OBSERVED: The sighting was today (8/6/19) at 10:15 am at our VT summer cabin.

I am 67, retired RN & former private pilot with excellent vision- 20/15, so I was not mistaken. It was not a bear. We have had a bear here by the deck, so I know what bears look like standing up to the reach feeder.

It was sunny day. My small Chihuahua mix was out front in her cage. She was barking so I walked out to front deck and looked towards dirt road where she was looking. We sit back approx.125ft from the road.

I saw a very black humanoid shape walking on two legs go past our driveway. It was half bent over then straightened up. It had longs arms swinging. The head was turned away & appeared to have very short neck & roundish head from that angle.

I said to myself, "That looks like a chimp!". I watched for it for approx.12 seconds until it disappeared behind trees going east on road. There are spots that I can see thru the trees to the neighbors drive, so I was looking for it to either go up the drive or continue on road. When it did not, I walked out to end of drive, approx. 200 ft. ( w/ my air horn). There was nothing on the road for some distance.

Later in day I went out to that area with my small dog. She refused to even walk and was trembling. This is the same dog that almost went thru a screen door to attack the bear by our feeder a few weeks ago. I noticed an area of bent weeds that would have been where the creature had exited our woods, going into a small ditch then back up to get onto road before walking past our drive. On the roadside, in the direction I saw it going, there were 3 barefoot heel depressions w/ faint toe marks approx. 12 inches long. The area was dry with fine gravel so not a clear print.

The week before, I had heard twigs snapping & weeds moving behind my fenced garden. This approx. 40 ft from the front porch where I often sit. The dog barked. The noise stopped then started again, so I fired off my air horn which I always have near after an encouter with a large coy-wolf.

The cabin sits about 100ft above the N. Branch Lamoille River. There are many snowmobile & ATV trails plus the Long Trail is only 1/5 miles. It was very wooded and remote. A few homes and camps on our road.

ALSO NOTICED: See note regarding bent weeds & previous noises.

OTHER WITNESSES: 0

OTHER STORIES: Have clipping of sighting in 1990 in Eden Vt--5 miles away

TIME AND CONDITIONS: 10:15 am sunny dry

ENVIRONMENT: Heavy woods on @ side of dirt road but there are 3 driveways within 200 ft. to cabins.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Jeff Sheppard:

I did a site visit on 9/28/19 with the home owner in xxxx VT to discuss her day time encounter from 8/6/19. We discussed her experiences and she gave me a tour of her property and the surrounding area where she had her sighting and has experienced other unusual happenings.

The property owner was very cordial and felt the need to share her experiences. She gave background information on the geography of the local area as well as animals native to her surroundings, including the visit by a bull moose just hours before my arrival.

On the morning of the sighting she had her pet Chihuahua outside in a large metal cage/kennel (due to a previous run in with a large coy-wolf) when she heard it starting to growl. Upon hearing the growling, she went outside to make sure the coy-wolf had not returned. She noticed the direction her dog was looking and heard something walking in the woods between her property and the neighbors lot next door. She thought it was probably a deer as they have been seen cutting through that side the property in the past. Both she and her dog were following the sound of the footsteps as they headed towards the dirt road in front of her home.

To her surprise instead of seeing a deer walk past the end of her driveway she saw a slightly hunched over black figure step up out of the drainage ditch into her driveway. What caught her attention was how it was walking on two legs and the length of its arms in relation to its body. Unfortunately it never looked in her direction as it was looking across the road towards the forest on the other side so she did not see its face.

She then re-positioned herself on her porch to look through an opening in the trees towards a neighbors house diagonally across the road to try to catch another glimpse of the creature. After waiting a number of seconds and not seeing the creature pass she quickly got an air horn and went out to look up the road to see if she could see where it went. At that point she came to the realization that what she had seen was a Bigfoot.

Not seeing anything she went to her neighbors house to ask if he had anyone staying with him or had seen anyone walking down the road. He didn't have anyone staying at his home and did not see anyone/anything that morning. He did mention that a bear had been around recently and had gotten into his garbage. It appears the creature had entered the woods on the opposite side of the road between the homeowners house and her neighbors.

When asked if it could have been a bear she said she was positive that it wasn't a bear. She is very familiar with bears due to the number of bears that have been in her yard and on her property. She has seen bears standing up in her garden and their arms/legs were much shorter in relation to their bodies than the creature she saw cross her driveway.

While investigating, the homeowner and her husband found matted grass in the drainage ditch at the edge of the road where something had walked. They found 3 footprints in the hard dirt at the bottom of their driveway and on the road. Due to the surface composition they were barely visible other than a heavy heel strike and some toe impressions. She was able to approximate the being/creatures height as around 6' tall, give or take, by having her husband stand in the sighting location.

Not long after that (8/16/19) while out hiking along the road the homeowner came across a hollow tree and struck it three times with her hiking stick. To her surprise she got a response back from across the river that runs behind her property. Intrigued she did it again and got six responses to the ten knocks she did. This made her nervous and she decided against continuing.

On another occasion (9/19/19) while walking on the road (through a very dense section of pine trees) about a half a mile from her home she encountered something throwing rocks up into a tall pine tree knocking pine cones to the ground, Staying very quiet she stood watching as rock after rock kept knocking large pine cones to the ground. Whoever/whatever was throwing the rocks was on the other side of the tree in thick overgrowth across a small stream. A neighbor drove up the road and stopped to say hello. The woman was a little scared at this point and with her neighbor there it gave her the courage/opportunity to quickly make her way back home.

The following day she returned with her husband only to find the pine trees in this section of the forest had no pine cones on them and there were none on the ground. It appeared that whoever/whatever knocked the pine cones down had collected them and taken them from the area.

The homeowner is a retired nurse and private pilot. She and her husband split their time between living in VT (to be near family) and wintering in FL. They have owned and lived in this part of rural VT for approximately five years. In that time they have been welcomed/accepted into the community and others have shared their stories of their Bigfoot encounters or those of their friends. Two of those sightings have been on/near their road, one being a face to face encounter by a local hunter a few miles from their home. She also provided me with a newspaper clipping from a local newspaper of other Bigfoot encounters in VT as well as a sighting in a neighboring community.

The area where the homeowner and her husband live is in a beautiful rural setting approximately 30 minutes south of the Canadian border. The home sits on top of a ridge where the land gently slopes into a valley with a pristine river on the back side of their property. There is also a set of power lines that cuts through the wilderness not far from their home. Long Trail State Forest is in close proximity to their home. The area has a great diversity of animals, both large and small and there is also trout in the river that cuts through the property.

I found the homeowner to be very sincere and a credible witness.

Here's a photo of the area.

About BFRO Investigator Jeff Sheppard:

Jeff is a Middle School Technology/Engineering teacher from MA. He loves the outdoors and enjoys hiking and camping with his wife and dogs any chance he gets. He has had a fascination with all things that fall into the cryptozoology category since a young age.

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