The woods can be a beautiful and peaceful place, but they can also be scary as fuck. As we all know from The Blair Witch Project, being stuck in the woods during a freaky situation is...not ideal. It's easy to get lost in there and it's likely that if you are trouble, no one will hear your screams. I'm getting the chills just thinking about it.
With this in mind, people who spend a lot of time in the woods are likely to run in to some scary stuff at some point. And you know who spends a lot of time in the forest? Hunters.
A reddit thread asked hunters what things they had seen in the woods that made them never want to go back in, and they delivered. Check out these seven and see if you ever dare to make a trek through the forest afterwards.
1. ms461 encountered some True Detective style shit.
I work in the woods for a living and I’ve seen a fair amount of odd things... Carvings in trees, old beat up cars, random weird trash scattered through the woods, and a fair amount of animal carcasses. I’ve had instances where I’ve gotten spooked, stuff like jumping big critters is always quite jolting, but I can recall one rather butt puckering experience. I was working with a few other people at the time, spaced out of sight but not out of ear shot. I crossed over a little ridge atleast 2 miles from the closest road, in the middle of the woods, and I saw what looked like a full skeleton of a cow tied together with twigs and a little bit of twine. Who ever made it had fashioned it to be sitting on a log. They left a very neat pile of bones in front of the thing, and nothing anywhere else. I saw it and about fainted. Definitely really fucking odd considering how far we were off the road, and how thick and steep it was. I ended up getting the folks I was with to come check it out, really just for shits and giggles. I took note of it and we moved on to the next plots
2. Mr_Drewski found himself in a Breaking Bad plotine.
I walked up on a meth lab (not sure if that is the right term) while scouting for a hunting spot. I noped the hell out of there immediately. I had never encountered such a thing before, and in hindsight the smell should have been a dead giveaway. It wasn't until I was standing there looking at what looked like a bunch of garbage under camo tarps and such that I realized what I was looking at.
3. DeadFIL was part of an unsolved mystery.
I think the creepiest thing I've experienced was one time while walking home from school through the woods. I heard people talking in the distance, and I couldn't hear what they were saying but they seemed to be arguing. They were quiet for a minute, and then I heard them again, really close now. The forest was really dense here so although they sounded maybe 15-20 feet away I couldn't see them or pinpoint exactly where they were. This time I could hear what they said:
Guy 1: "it's fucked up you guys always make me-"
Guy 2 (in a hushed voice): "shh! Someone's coming!"
Guy 1 (now also hushed): "shit"
Guy 3 (from a bit further to my left than the other guys, who sounded to be mostly right in front of me): "hurry"
Rustling noise
Guy 1: Fuck!
Guy 2: SHH!
I came around a corner and expected to see them, but I couldn't see anyone. I kept walking, cautious and trying to be aware of my surroundings. About ten feet past the corner I saw something to the left of the trail (close to where the voices we're coming from) that caught my eye. It was a bunch of stuff wrapped up in a big tarp. It wasn't completely wrapped up and you could kind of see into it. All I could see was something glass and I wanted to see what it was. I scanned the forest behind the tarp to make sure nobody was watching, and then stepped towards it. Suddenly, one of them says "keep walking" very calmly.
I looked back into the forest but still couldn't see anyone. They said "go," still calm. I looked for another second, still unable to see a soul, and then turned and kept walking like nothing happened. I don't know what was going on but the whole thing gave me the creepiest vibe I've ever gotten.
4. GadgetHawksaw had a really close call.
I adopted a 7 y/o lab who was very dog aggressive. With people she was great but she would lunge if she got within sight of another dog. Any dog. Male. Female. Big. Small. Quiet. Barky. So I would take her into the nearby woods to run where no one else goes for exercise. On one trip, we were about 3/4 mile from the main road and I get this weird feeling like I'm being watched. Like literally, a voice in my head says "You're being watched." But I don't see anything, don't hear anything, and my dog isn't acting like there's something around. I figured if anything is near us, she'd run at it, right? But the feeling is just so strong, too strong to ignore so I call the dog and start walking fast towards the main road. About 1/2 way there, I see a coyote off to the left just standing there, maybe 50 yds away. It's clearly making itself noticeable, trying to lure my dog into the bushes where other coyotes probably await it. I resign myself to losing her cuz I know I can't stop her or save her. But she ignores the coyote, turns tail and makes for the main road fast. I don't know how she knew but she knew this was one dog not to tangle with. I felt lucky that we both made it home ok.
5. cozyvvwitch thought they were gonna be killed.
I spend a lot of time in the backcountry in the winter time. Usually it’s just me and a friend, most trails we do are popular in the summer, and totally dead once it starts to snow.
Winter in *2014, we’ve hiked about two miles in and see this small black backpack in the middle of the trail. We hadn’t seen any other cars at the trailhead or any people around, but this backpack hadn’t been there long because there wasn’t any snow on it (it had snowed the night before). It was a very odd sight, we figured if it was still on the trail when we looped around we’d pick it up.
About 4 miles in and my friend and I are chatting away when I notice a large figure flailing in some trees up ahead. We go quiet and can hear this man rambling while he’s pacing. At this point we’re pretty freaked out and decide to turn around when we hear “Oh, HI THERE” and this guy starts walking towards us... and then out pops another guy with a very pricey looking video camera.
It turned out this flailing guy was actually a rapper and they were filming a music video for one of his new songs out in the forest. They had parked before the trailhead so we didn’t notice their car. They ended up being super friendly and gave us a card, and we figured out it was their backpack we had seen on the trail the few miles before. We said our goodbyes and walked out. But hot damn I was sure we were about to be killed in the woods.
6. meteoryears knows a seriously creepy story.
There is an illegal trail on Oahu. Of many actually. But there is one story about a kid who was visiting family or something and hiked this ridge. He was posting to social media while he hiked and he went missing. During the search someone found out you could see a man following him in the background of his selfies while he was hiking.
7. TranscontinentalDad has convinced me not to homeschool my kids.
Not a hunter, but a herper. I was looking for amphibians and reptiles with a few classmates at a local park during a herpetology class last summer, when we came across 2 little wooden 'teepees' and a card table covered in animal bones. It looked like we walked right into the blare witch project. Each of the structures had little alters that contained more bones in jars, plants, and other weird little trinkets. We got out of there fast and told the volunteer coordinator we were working with. We found out a while later that apparently, some homeschooled kids nearby liked to 'play' in the woods and they had most likely collected the things we saw. I understand making forts in the woods but the structures these kids made were freaky af.