Scariest Backcountry Experiences
- Thread starter Aldaron
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I've really enjoyed reading this thread.
I haven't had too many scary experiences in the backcountry, thankfully. None have ever been spooky/eerie (like the one @gnwatts described in Grand Gulch. Sent shivers down my spine). Most have just been weather-related. The worst was in Indiana. It was one of the strongest thunderstorms I've ever been in, and it lasted just about the entire night. Heavy rain leaked through my not-so-great Coleman tent, the wind was strong, and there was incredibly frequent lightning. I was certain that lightning would hit the tree next to my tent, charge the ground, and kill me. If not that, then the wind would knock it (or another one) over on me. Fortunately, neither happened.
I haven't had too many scary experiences in the backcountry, thankfully. None have ever been spooky/eerie (like the one @gnwatts described in Grand Gulch. Sent shivers down my spine). Most have just been weather-related. The worst was in Indiana. It was one of the strongest thunderstorms I've ever been in, and it lasted just about the entire night. Heavy rain leaked through my not-so-great Coleman tent, the wind was strong, and there was incredibly frequent lightning. I was certain that lightning would hit the tree next to my tent, charge the ground, and kill me. If not that, then the wind would knock it (or another one) over on me. Fortunately, neither happened.
Upgrayedd
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As a kid we would take a trip up into the Sierras every summer for a few days as a family. One of the places we camped had natural pools of water in the granite that were as deep as 20ft and filled with fish. If you timed your trip just right the water would be crystal clear and swimming with the fish was a really killer experience. If you went too early in the year the water would be rushing down the creek too strongly to swim and the weather wouldn't be warm enough to heat up the pools. If you went too late in the year the pools would be green with algae, too dried up and gross to swim in.
Because the water was all snow melt it was very cold but we'd never had a problem in all the years we'd swam there until one summer when I was around 16 years old. We headed down to the pools with our towels, and masks and snorkels and were excited to swim and relax in the pools. It was a nice warm day with temps in the 80's and no cloud cover overhead, perfect conditions. We started jumping in one by one and swimming around enjoying ourselves. The pool we'd chosen was the largest and was probably around 25ft across and easily 15ft deep. It had a large waterfall that emptied into it from the pool above and on this particular trip it was flowing pretty strongly but not rushing dangerously like in late spring.
After five or ten minutes my brother and I were cold enough that we took a break to sun ourselves on the rocks like lizards and warm back up. My mom is a terrible swimmer and in all our years of doing things like this I can't ever remember her swimming with us. She would usually just relax and enjoy watching us all have fun. My dad grew up surfing in southern California and always prided himself on being a strong, competent swimmer.
After around ten minutes of laying in the sun and warming up I heard an alarming noise. I shot up and looking into the pool to see my dad struggling to swim. At first I thought he must have been joking around since he had never had problems in the past but after a second or two it set in that he was actually in trouble. The pool that we were swimming in had an eddy to it that would slowly pull you under the waterfall if you weren't swimming against it. That eddy pulled my dad under the waterfall and he disappeared for a moment only to pop back up and keep struggling. I ran down to the water to put my hand out and try to grab my dad but missed him.
Time seemed to slow down and I frantically looked around for something buoyant to grab and use as a life preserver to help him. I was only about 135lbs and my dad was 230lbs so I wasn't super confident in saving him without something to help me. Before I could think of the next step to take I saw my mom fly into the water and start swimming to my dad. She struggled to catch up to him as he was pulled around by the eddy towards the waterfall again and as she got close I saw their eyes meet and a look of surprise on my dad's face. He knew that she couldn't swim well and the look in his eyes told me that the only person he was worried about in that instant was her. It must have been a surge of adrenaline or just a focused will to save her that kicked in but he grabbed her and pushed her to the shore, before they got to the waterfall again, he went under and past it and was able to climb back up on to the rocks with our help.
He was cold as as ice, had a blue skin tone and was well into hypothermia which had left him weak, disoriented, and unable to function. It probably didn't help that he was getting older and was in pretty poor shape. We were now split up with my mom on one side of the canyon and us on the other. I walked up the stream with her until we found a place where I could help her cross back safely and then we walked back to meet up with the rest of the family. By then my dad was feeling a lot better and we had a nice long lecture from my mom about safety and using our brains and not being reckless.
Because the water was all snow melt it was very cold but we'd never had a problem in all the years we'd swam there until one summer when I was around 16 years old. We headed down to the pools with our towels, and masks and snorkels and were excited to swim and relax in the pools. It was a nice warm day with temps in the 80's and no cloud cover overhead, perfect conditions. We started jumping in one by one and swimming around enjoying ourselves. The pool we'd chosen was the largest and was probably around 25ft across and easily 15ft deep. It had a large waterfall that emptied into it from the pool above and on this particular trip it was flowing pretty strongly but not rushing dangerously like in late spring.
After five or ten minutes my brother and I were cold enough that we took a break to sun ourselves on the rocks like lizards and warm back up. My mom is a terrible swimmer and in all our years of doing things like this I can't ever remember her swimming with us. She would usually just relax and enjoy watching us all have fun. My dad grew up surfing in southern California and always prided himself on being a strong, competent swimmer.
After around ten minutes of laying in the sun and warming up I heard an alarming noise. I shot up and looking into the pool to see my dad struggling to swim. At first I thought he must have been joking around since he had never had problems in the past but after a second or two it set in that he was actually in trouble. The pool that we were swimming in had an eddy to it that would slowly pull you under the waterfall if you weren't swimming against it. That eddy pulled my dad under the waterfall and he disappeared for a moment only to pop back up and keep struggling. I ran down to the water to put my hand out and try to grab my dad but missed him.
Time seemed to slow down and I frantically looked around for something buoyant to grab and use as a life preserver to help him. I was only about 135lbs and my dad was 230lbs so I wasn't super confident in saving him without something to help me. Before I could think of the next step to take I saw my mom fly into the water and start swimming to my dad. She struggled to catch up to him as he was pulled around by the eddy towards the waterfall again and as she got close I saw their eyes meet and a look of surprise on my dad's face. He knew that she couldn't swim well and the look in his eyes told me that the only person he was worried about in that instant was her. It must have been a surge of adrenaline or just a focused will to save her that kicked in but he grabbed her and pushed her to the shore, before they got to the waterfall again, he went under and past it and was able to climb back up on to the rocks with our help.
He was cold as as ice, had a blue skin tone and was well into hypothermia which had left him weak, disoriented, and unable to function. It probably didn't help that he was getting older and was in pretty poor shape. We were now split up with my mom on one side of the canyon and us on the other. I walked up the stream with her until we found a place where I could help her cross back safely and then we walked back to meet up with the rest of the family. By then my dad was feeling a lot better and we had a nice long lecture from my mom about safety and using our brains and not being reckless.
Upgrayedd
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I went backpacking two weeks ago with my brother, his fiancé and my best friend up in the high Uintas. We drove up to one of the most beautiful areas I've been to and started the 7 mile journey to our first night's destination around 11am. The trail was beautiful with tall fir and aspen trees along the trail and a creek flowing down from the alpine lakes 2000ft above the trailhead.
The trail was muddy and beat up by the horses that the forest rangers use to maintain and patrol the area.
We hiked fast and covered the first three miles in an hour before hitting the steep uphill section full of loose rocks and granite slabs. As we climbed we passed numerous groups of people leaving the trail for home.
As the trail leveled out we came to a large, open field of wildflowers with a quick flowing stream full of trout that meandered through the middle. We took pictures and all remarked at how stunning the sight was and debated on setting up camp in the field or pushing forward to our lake destination. We all decided to push forward since the trout in the stream were smaller than we wanted and we were hopeful that we would catch a few monster fish for dinner that night. As we hiked through the field we noticed a lone tent pitched in an area that would present great views of the surrounding terrain but was out of your direct field of vision if focused on the trail.
We continued to climb elevation and make our way up the canyon for another mile before taking a short break. At this time my brother decided to retie his boots and take his pack off for a few minutes to rest. He was carrying over 50lbs since he is a packrat and his fiancé is new to backpacking and taking it easy with a 20lbs pack. My brother was a little worn out since we were clipping along at a good pace and coming from living at sea level he wasn't used to physical exertion above 10k feet.
His fiancé and my friend decided to hike ahead while we rested up for a few minutes and chatted. After we felt rested we hit the trail again and almost immediately came across a man in his late 20's or early 30's walking down the trail with a near empty nalgene bottle in his hand.
The very second I saw the man I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, the hair on my arms and the back of my neck stood up and I instantly felt the desire to put distance between myself and this man that sent my spidey senses into overdrive. My adrinaline pumped, my heart raced and I ran through scenario after scenario in a split second on how to neutralize the threat before me if needed.
As we walked closer I forced a smile onto my face and asked him how he was doing and he responded with "great, just getting some water from the lake" and then I forced out a "enjoy the view, we're jealous of your campsite" as we passed him. He seemed surprised that I knew where his site was and said "I thought I'd be the only one up here" but in a way that didn't sound disappointed at all and quite frankly creeped me out.
My brother and I kept walking without saying a word for another minute but looked back in the man's direction several times until he was out of sight. I turned to my brother and said "did anything seem weird about that guy" to which he responded "yeah, I was majorly creeped out and for the life of me don't know why, what the hell is going on?"
We continued chatting about it for the next half mile until we met up with my friend and my brother's fiancé. The first thing out of their mouthes was "did you see that creepy guy?" It turns out that my buddy had climbed up a hill off the trail to see if he could see an off trail lake we were going to hit up the next day.
My brother's fiancé had kept hiking since she was a little slower than he was and had passed the man on the trail while my friend was on the hill. My brother's fiancé had the same experience as we had and was instantly creeped out and alarmed by he man passing her on the trail.
The man hadn't seen my friend since he was a good ways off the trail and passed her without saying a word but turned and stared at her as she walked away for a good 20 seconds. My friend said the look on his face sent chills down his spine and he made his way down the hill quickly to my brother's fiancé without the man seeing him.
After chatting about it for a solid half hour as we hiked towards the upper lake we came to the following conclusions:
1) Nothing about the man's body language, other than him turning around to watch the girl which was only observed by my friend, pointed to him being a threat. He smiled, walked, talked and carried himself normally.
2) He was dressed like a normal middle class white guy in the outdoors with no threatening characteristics whatsoever. Clean cut hair, no facial hair, no threatening distinctive marks, average height and slender build. The guy shouldn't have been intimidating or scary in the least bit.
3) Something about him having a near empty nalgene and telling us he went for water didn't seem right to my brother and I. This man wasn't carrying a backpack or filter that I could see and it made no sense to hike to the lake that was over a mile and a half away and up a steep hill for water when he was camped not 100 yards from a stream that the lake was feeding with crystal clear water.
4) Not only did this man put each one of us on guard and creep us out, but the experience put all three men into a mental state where upon seeing him we literally wanted to beat him senseless. I have only had a feeling that strong a few times in my life and each time I made sure I listened to that feeling that shot adrenaline through my veins and sent blood pumping so quickly I could hear and feel my heartbeat like a drum in my head.
It took over an hour for that feeling to leave my system. For the record I'm an extremely mellow and non-violent guy and so are both my brother and my friend but we each felt a violent urge upon seeing the man.
5) We all agreed that the man was a danger and decided to make camp in an area that is well off the trail and fairly defensible. We also made sure that we were ready to meet a threat as a group and didn't leave each other's sight that night.
That night was still peaceful and enjoyable but the "creepshow" as we came to call him really put a damper on what should have been an extremely relaxing evening. In the morning we decided to hike to another lake off trail and to make our way through a boulder field instead of the grassy area to cover any tracks we would leave.
We spent the rest of the day catching huge fish and delighting in the taste of fresh backcountry meals. The weather took at turn for the worse and started dumping on us so we retreated to our tents for the night.
We never did see creepshow again and on our way down out of the area we spent as much time off trail as possible to avoid running into him.
This experience and a hand full of others I can't explain or understand, both bad and good are experiences I'd love answers to but will have to wait for the next life to receive. Was this guy a murderer? A rapist? A pedophile? What evil inside him caused four people to all have the same exact feeling when coming across him on the trail? Was it all in our heads?
Just typing up this story has put goosebumps on my arms as I try to remember the details.
The trail was muddy and beat up by the horses that the forest rangers use to maintain and patrol the area.
We hiked fast and covered the first three miles in an hour before hitting the steep uphill section full of loose rocks and granite slabs. As we climbed we passed numerous groups of people leaving the trail for home.
As the trail leveled out we came to a large, open field of wildflowers with a quick flowing stream full of trout that meandered through the middle. We took pictures and all remarked at how stunning the sight was and debated on setting up camp in the field or pushing forward to our lake destination. We all decided to push forward since the trout in the stream were smaller than we wanted and we were hopeful that we would catch a few monster fish for dinner that night. As we hiked through the field we noticed a lone tent pitched in an area that would present great views of the surrounding terrain but was out of your direct field of vision if focused on the trail.
We continued to climb elevation and make our way up the canyon for another mile before taking a short break. At this time my brother decided to retie his boots and take his pack off for a few minutes to rest. He was carrying over 50lbs since he is a packrat and his fiancé is new to backpacking and taking it easy with a 20lbs pack. My brother was a little worn out since we were clipping along at a good pace and coming from living at sea level he wasn't used to physical exertion above 10k feet.
His fiancé and my friend decided to hike ahead while we rested up for a few minutes and chatted. After we felt rested we hit the trail again and almost immediately came across a man in his late 20's or early 30's walking down the trail with a near empty nalgene bottle in his hand.
The very second I saw the man I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, the hair on my arms and the back of my neck stood up and I instantly felt the desire to put distance between myself and this man that sent my spidey senses into overdrive. My adrinaline pumped, my heart raced and I ran through scenario after scenario in a split second on how to neutralize the threat before me if needed.
As we walked closer I forced a smile onto my face and asked him how he was doing and he responded with "great, just getting some water from the lake" and then I forced out a "enjoy the view, we're jealous of your campsite" as we passed him. He seemed surprised that I knew where his site was and said "I thought I'd be the only one up here" but in a way that didn't sound disappointed at all and quite frankly creeped me out.
My brother and I kept walking without saying a word for another minute but looked back in the man's direction several times until he was out of sight. I turned to my brother and said "did anything seem weird about that guy" to which he responded "yeah, I was majorly creeped out and for the life of me don't know why, what the hell is going on?"
We continued chatting about it for the next half mile until we met up with my friend and my brother's fiancé. The first thing out of their mouthes was "did you see that creepy guy?" It turns out that my buddy had climbed up a hill off the trail to see if he could see an off trail lake we were going to hit up the next day.
My brother's fiancé had kept hiking since she was a little slower than he was and had passed the man on the trail while my friend was on the hill. My brother's fiancé had the same experience as we had and was instantly creeped out and alarmed by he man passing her on the trail.
The man hadn't seen my friend since he was a good ways off the trail and passed her without saying a word but turned and stared at her as she walked away for a good 20 seconds. My friend said the look on his face sent chills down his spine and he made his way down the hill quickly to my brother's fiancé without the man seeing him.
After chatting about it for a solid half hour as we hiked towards the upper lake we came to the following conclusions:
1) Nothing about the man's body language, other than him turning around to watch the girl which was only observed by my friend, pointed to him being a threat. He smiled, walked, talked and carried himself normally.
2) He was dressed like a normal middle class white guy in the outdoors with no threatening characteristics whatsoever. Clean cut hair, no facial hair, no threatening distinctive marks, average height and slender build. The guy shouldn't have been intimidating or scary in the least bit.
3) Something about him having a near empty nalgene and telling us he went for water didn't seem right to my brother and I. This man wasn't carrying a backpack or filter that I could see and it made no sense to hike to the lake that was over a mile and a half away and up a steep hill for water when he was camped not 100 yards from a stream that the lake was feeding with crystal clear water.
4) Not only did this man put each one of us on guard and creep us out, but the experience put all three men into a mental state where upon seeing him we literally wanted to beat him senseless. I have only had a feeling that strong a few times in my life and each time I made sure I listened to that feeling that shot adrenaline through my veins and sent blood pumping so quickly I could hear and feel my heartbeat like a drum in my head.
It took over an hour for that feeling to leave my system. For the record I'm an extremely mellow and non-violent guy and so are both my brother and my friend but we each felt a violent urge upon seeing the man.
5) We all agreed that the man was a danger and decided to make camp in an area that is well off the trail and fairly defensible. We also made sure that we were ready to meet a threat as a group and didn't leave each other's sight that night.
That night was still peaceful and enjoyable but the "creepshow" as we came to call him really put a damper on what should have been an extremely relaxing evening. In the morning we decided to hike to another lake off trail and to make our way through a boulder field instead of the grassy area to cover any tracks we would leave.
We spent the rest of the day catching huge fish and delighting in the taste of fresh backcountry meals. The weather took at turn for the worse and started dumping on us so we retreated to our tents for the night.
We never did see creepshow again and on our way down out of the area we spent as much time off trail as possible to avoid running into him.
This experience and a hand full of others I can't explain or understand, both bad and good are experiences I'd love answers to but will have to wait for the next life to receive. Was this guy a murderer? A rapist? A pedophile? What evil inside him caused four people to all have the same exact feeling when coming across him on the trail? Was it all in our heads?
Just typing up this story has put goosebumps on my arms as I try to remember the details.
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Eric O, he was probably a politician.
Upgrayedd
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Ha! I literally laughed out loud at that! Who knows, maybe you're right! It was one of those experiences that just get seared into your memory.
genez
mostly lurking
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- May 25, 2013
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I've never had a really scary experience in the backcountry, only when car camping.
About 5 or 6 years ago we were on a yearly trip to Lake Tahoe and were camping in the campground at Camp Richardson. We were with my brother and sister-in-law and their 2 kids. We chose a really nice site that was all grass and surrounded by trees and was really secluded for a campground. There were some trails at the back of the site that you could take to follow out to access a beach. We set our tent up in the soft grass near the back of the site and those trails. It was the second night, we stayed up late drinking, snacking and building a puzzle on the picnic table and went to sleep around midnight. I was woken up in the middle of the night by my wife tapping me on the shoulder. "Gene -- wake up. There's something outside the tent" I think I mumbled and said its nothing - probably a mouse or something, go back to sleep. "No", she said "I think there's an animal walking outside the tent and it was scratching!" I was sleeping on my stomach. Then I heard it, right near my head.
SNIFF SNIFF WHOOSH SNIFF SNIFF SNIFF WHOOSH
I jumped up on all fours and turned to my right to see the tent side stretched a bit by the face of an animal and immediately realized it was a black bear. I could make out the nose poking into the tent wall.
"Holy shit! Its a bear" I whispered to my wife, she said my eyes were huge. I moved back to the middle of the tent and in front of her and we sat there for a minute as this bear was sniffing the sides and around the tent. "Should I yell at it?" I said while debating in my head what to do. I remember wondering if I should smack it in the nose. (I didn't) A minute past and we decided just to sit there.... quietly observing it in the darkness. It just seemed curious about our tent.
I remember she had her phone with her and texted her sister, they were in a large tent about 15-20 feet away - "bear is here! tried to get in our tent" she typed. As she hit the send button her battery died.
We didn't have any food or anything in the tent so I said "I think its just might lose interest and walk away in a minute".
And it did.
We fell back asleep after 30 minutes of listening and laying there quietly. In the morning I woke up early and inspected the outside of the tent to see dirty nose prints on the side of the tent. We ended up telling the story to the rest of our family and laughing about it in the morning!
About 5 or 6 years ago we were on a yearly trip to Lake Tahoe and were camping in the campground at Camp Richardson. We were with my brother and sister-in-law and their 2 kids. We chose a really nice site that was all grass and surrounded by trees and was really secluded for a campground. There were some trails at the back of the site that you could take to follow out to access a beach. We set our tent up in the soft grass near the back of the site and those trails. It was the second night, we stayed up late drinking, snacking and building a puzzle on the picnic table and went to sleep around midnight. I was woken up in the middle of the night by my wife tapping me on the shoulder. "Gene -- wake up. There's something outside the tent" I think I mumbled and said its nothing - probably a mouse or something, go back to sleep. "No", she said "I think there's an animal walking outside the tent and it was scratching!" I was sleeping on my stomach. Then I heard it, right near my head.
SNIFF SNIFF WHOOSH SNIFF SNIFF SNIFF WHOOSH
I jumped up on all fours and turned to my right to see the tent side stretched a bit by the face of an animal and immediately realized it was a black bear. I could make out the nose poking into the tent wall.
"Holy shit! Its a bear" I whispered to my wife, she said my eyes were huge. I moved back to the middle of the tent and in front of her and we sat there for a minute as this bear was sniffing the sides and around the tent. "Should I yell at it?" I said while debating in my head what to do. I remember wondering if I should smack it in the nose. (I didn't) A minute past and we decided just to sit there.... quietly observing it in the darkness. It just seemed curious about our tent.
I remember she had her phone with her and texted her sister, they were in a large tent about 15-20 feet away - "bear is here! tried to get in our tent" she typed. As she hit the send button her battery died.
We didn't have any food or anything in the tent so I said "I think its just might lose interest and walk away in a minute".
And it did.
We fell back asleep after 30 minutes of listening and laying there quietly. In the morning I woke up early and inspected the outside of the tent to see dirty nose prints on the side of the tent. We ended up telling the story to the rest of our family and laughing about it in the morning!
Scott Chandler
Wildness is a necessity- John Muir
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I know I've been on here before but seeing the thread again got me to reminiscing...
Waking up at an unknown hour to a herd of cattle mooing and gallivanting around the tent one night...
Waking up the next night to a herd of feral (calling them wild is bs) donkeys making their devil noises and seeming to fight around the tent...
Waking up at 4 in the morn to coyotes yipping, yowling, and every other otherworldly noise imaginable a couple hundred feet from camp (they had to have been in the meadow across the stream)....
Waking up at 5 in the morn to the shrieks of a woman being murdered nearby.... (after discussing it with others we have decided this was from a mountain lion)
Waking up with sleep paralysis and thinking a bear was right outside my tent ready to kill me....
Why do I enjoy camping again?!
Waking up at an unknown hour to a herd of cattle mooing and gallivanting around the tent one night...
Waking up the next night to a herd of feral (calling them wild is bs) donkeys making their devil noises and seeming to fight around the tent...
Waking up at 4 in the morn to coyotes yipping, yowling, and every other otherworldly noise imaginable a couple hundred feet from camp (they had to have been in the meadow across the stream)....
Waking up at 5 in the morn to the shrieks of a woman being murdered nearby.... (after discussing it with others we have decided this was from a mountain lion)
Waking up with sleep paralysis and thinking a bear was right outside my tent ready to kill me....
Why do I enjoy camping again?!
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Had to read this one twice to make sure you weren't saying you heard a woman being killed by a mountain lion.
Scott Chandler
Wildness is a necessity- John Muir
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When the mountain lion theory was initially stated I thought the exact same thing. I'm sure my face was pretty priceless. I didn't know that people associate mountain lion screams with those of woman being killed....
Jimmy
Member
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- Oct 7, 2014
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This is not backcountry, per se, but definitely the most freaked out I’ve been with a pack on…Back in my early 20s, I spent a lot of time backpacking overseas, including a 3-month stint in Central America going one-way from Panama City, Panama, eventually making our way to our buddy’s couch in San Diego (with stories too numerous to share in one post!). The Central American trip consisted of moving from one great trek to another, spending a few days to a week in each place either backpacking, hiking, fishing, etc. Toward the latter half of this adventure, my buddy and I head to northern Guatemala, where we did some trekking between mountain villages near Nebaj, which was a jumping off point to get to the Biosfera Visas Caba, a very remote, but beautiful mountainous region, where many of the indigenous people live much like they did hundreds of years ago.
Unfortunately, a couple weeks prior to our arrival, the largest prison break in Guatemalan history occurred, unleashing several dozen of the country’s most vicious criminals—murderers, rapists, drug traffickers, etc. The government even suspended habeas corpus, and Guatemala’s infamous police were given freedom to search and detain pretty much anyone. As a couple of gringos, we were safe from the police, but the whole country was on edge. We roll into Nebaj on a chicken bus to find a dusty little town, and the city square is busy with farmers selling their goods to the villagers. Not five minutes after our arrival, a huge fight breaks out right in front of us, including two men who are really going at it. One of them pulls out a knife, stabs the other guy in the chest, apparently killing him instantly. The police rush in from everywhere, start busting heads, and people start screaming and running in all directions. We would have run, but we had no clue where we were at, nor where to go, and it appeared that running meant a baton to the face. Apparently, based on the rumor mill in the town (and we didn’t stick around long enough to substantiate), one of the escapees from that region had made his way “home”, to be discovered by someone who wasn’t too happy to see his return. The escapee didn’t get to enjoy his freedom for very long…after things settled down, the police threw his body in the back of a pickup (knife still protruding), threw a dirty piece of cardboard from the ground over his face and sped away. Within an hour, the town seemed to have forgotten the episode, and the city square was filled with people again—except for the two horrified gringos who caught the first chicken bus the f*@% outta there. We had spent nearly three weeks in the mountains of Guatemala, and the great reef fishing in Belize would be a much deserved respite for our nerves.
I could not find a news story about the incident in Nebaj, though this article from 2001 mentions that 5 prisoners had been killed by “police”:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/GUATE...OUNTRY+IN+STATE+OF+EMERGENCY+AS...-a076664394
Unfortunately, a couple weeks prior to our arrival, the largest prison break in Guatemalan history occurred, unleashing several dozen of the country’s most vicious criminals—murderers, rapists, drug traffickers, etc. The government even suspended habeas corpus, and Guatemala’s infamous police were given freedom to search and detain pretty much anyone. As a couple of gringos, we were safe from the police, but the whole country was on edge. We roll into Nebaj on a chicken bus to find a dusty little town, and the city square is busy with farmers selling their goods to the villagers. Not five minutes after our arrival, a huge fight breaks out right in front of us, including two men who are really going at it. One of them pulls out a knife, stabs the other guy in the chest, apparently killing him instantly. The police rush in from everywhere, start busting heads, and people start screaming and running in all directions. We would have run, but we had no clue where we were at, nor where to go, and it appeared that running meant a baton to the face. Apparently, based on the rumor mill in the town (and we didn’t stick around long enough to substantiate), one of the escapees from that region had made his way “home”, to be discovered by someone who wasn’t too happy to see his return. The escapee didn’t get to enjoy his freedom for very long…after things settled down, the police threw his body in the back of a pickup (knife still protruding), threw a dirty piece of cardboard from the ground over his face and sped away. Within an hour, the town seemed to have forgotten the episode, and the city square was filled with people again—except for the two horrified gringos who caught the first chicken bus the f*@% outta there. We had spent nearly three weeks in the mountains of Guatemala, and the great reef fishing in Belize would be a much deserved respite for our nerves.
I could not find a news story about the incident in Nebaj, though this article from 2001 mentions that 5 prisoners had been killed by “police”:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/GUATE...OUNTRY+IN+STATE+OF+EMERGENCY+AS...-a076664394
ram
Member
- Joined
- Feb 15, 2013
- Messages
- 116
Just found this thread.....Looks like a lot of fun reading.....Ummmm, I wonder if I have anything to contribute? Looked through the story collection. Ahhhh yeah, guess so. Maybe toss one a month to fill out the rest of the year, if folks like um. This one from 25 years ago
The Beast
by Ram
I wasn’t always claustrophobic. For the first 35 years of my life, tight places, only occasionally, would create some mild anxiety—no longer—the beast is a regular companion in tight spaces. And this is how that came to be ...
Escalante is a vast world, with many a narrow place—many known, others obscure. My pals and I had been pushing this one canyon over a period of a couple of years. We entered it from the bottom and climbed up through it, for as long as our strength and nerve would hold. This particular canyon is a 100 feet deep, with the bottom 75 feet rarely more than a foot or two wide. The upper 25 feet of the slot, has high angle slabs and a lot of ledge type protrusions at the divide between these two sections. We had traversed much of the canyon at this level. The siren song, though, pulled us down into to the deep and unknown recesses. The canyon has a pretty low angle, maybe averages 5 degrees; the slope makes a huge difference, up versus down, in regard to the amount of effort involved, passing through its narrow confines.
On a day in the early 1990s, John Baise and I nervously drank as much water and ate as much food as we could hold. We abandoned all of our gear, with the exception of a thin layer of long sleeves (top and bottom), and entered the canyon with the aim to pass through the canyon as close to the ground as possible. A pleasant sideways set of narrows deepened, darkened and narrowed, and narrowed again, and again. The technique that we found ourselves using was to have our feet pointing in opposite directions and our heads looking down canyon. It was so narrow that we could not rotate our heads or our feet. Partner aid was purely psychological. Having somebody there with you cannot be underestimated. You get stuck. Me, usually a half of dozen times on this day. You have to calm yourself down and problem solve your way free.
As you look down canyon, the walls’ subtle turns always give you the appearance that the area immediately ahead is becoming impossible. This is terrifying. You route find on a micro level. You figure out quickly enough what part of your body is widest, and you shift your body up 6 inches, down 6 inches, to accommodate the biggest widening in the canyon. The method that I used the most was to tilt my upper body down canyon about 30 degrees or more and use that angle, combined with the slope of the canyon, to make progress, while the canyon pressed in on my chest and back. When you would get stuck, subtle rotations of your upper body would help you make progress and become unstuck. This method we named ‘the sternum swivel.’ The muscles around my sternum were sore for a couple of weeks after this day. In the lead, I once became panicked. I started to hyperventilate. The true horror came from the fact that the walls stopped my rapid breathing half way on the inhales and exhales.
OK! OK! CALM DOWN! RELAX! OK.
Further down canyon we reached a spot where the sun angle filtered down the hundred feet almost to the canyon floor, alleviating some of the darkness. One would think that this would be comforting. The sunlight, though, revealed hundreds of spider webs, bugs of every description, and a massive amount of dust particles floating in the air. Time for Ram to panic again. Rapid breath. Just imagining all those particles being sucked in. A bit of nausea and then upchucking my lunch. The sound of retching, couldn’t have helped John a whole lot, but the real treat in this narrow section, was that he had no choice but to slide through my partially digested lunch. After all, what are friends for? After a particularly narrow 100 feet, which we dubbed ‘the darkside,’ the narrowness eased, and out the bottom we went with the two emotions of elation and relief, vying for supremacy.
‹› ‹› ‹›
Now that the canyon had become known to us, we shared it with a variety of folks over the next few years. On one occasion, the infamous Pitney joined John and me. For the first time, I relinquished the lead and went last. Perhaps I had put on a few pounds. Perhaps I hadn’t steeled my mind for the necessary efforts. Whatever the reason, I was having more difficulty than normal. At a point in the narrowest section of the canyon, while leaning forward and swiveling, I lost my center of balance. In this unique environment it took almost a minute for me to fall to the ground. Battle I did, trying to keep upright, but like a doomed ship, slowly I sank to lie horizontally on the ground in a slot not much more 8-10 inches wide. My body position was laying on one side with one arm ahead of me down canyon and with my head facing up. My 2 friends, right ahead of me, could not even turn their heads to look at me, nor could I any longer see them.
After the requisite panic, and sense of doom, some calm returned, and I asked myself a question: ‘What the hell am I gonna do now?’ Time to invent a new mode of locomotion. I found that, if I threw my hip one direction—the couple of inches it would go—and my shoulder the opposite direction, with much effort and sweat I could make progress down canyon, an inch or so at a time. John and Pitney had arrived at one of those spots that was over 2 feet wide and could now turn and see me, but offer no help, as I came around the corner. They estimated that I had 12 feet before the widening. An hour passed, during which time, I worked about as hard as I ever had in the outdoors. Slowly and surely, the new form of locomotion, which we dubbed ‘the snake,’ paid dividends. The little opening, which my elbow and then my shoulder arrived in first, was round in shape, maybe 2 feet in diameter, and a full foot lower than the ground I was snaking my way along. Without any leverage, my arm and then my head and my neck dropped down into this hole. With the additional angle, now I was able to work my lower body up the wall until I was entirely upside down, feet pointing to the sky, full weight on the side of my head and my neck.
This would be bad enough, but there was one more indignity ... my pants were around my ankles.
OK time to try and right myself. I would bend my knees and squeeze with my feet, but try as I might, even in this luxurious opening, it was still too narrow to right myself. Finally, I scraped my knees, bloodying them, and managed to right myself. Like any good boy, raised in America, I did not let on that I was near tears from a plethora of various emotions. So on this day, I found the beast and the beast found me, and we walk through this world’s narrow spots together. Some days are better than others, but he is never far away. This was my last time down that canyon. John, on the other hand, returned several more times. On one occasion, a new log that had come wedged, combined with recent rain, created a long swimmer, with the walls muddy above denying leverage. Not being prepared for such conditions (who would be?) John and his partner, had their own life and death struggle, with drowning and hypothermia hanging over their heads like a huge hammer. But that’s John’s story to tell ...
It’s been a bad week at work, but I feel better now. Like I told my mommy about a bad dream, and that makes it all better.
Ram
The Beast
by Ram
I wasn’t always claustrophobic. For the first 35 years of my life, tight places, only occasionally, would create some mild anxiety—no longer—the beast is a regular companion in tight spaces. And this is how that came to be ...
Escalante is a vast world, with many a narrow place—many known, others obscure. My pals and I had been pushing this one canyon over a period of a couple of years. We entered it from the bottom and climbed up through it, for as long as our strength and nerve would hold. This particular canyon is a 100 feet deep, with the bottom 75 feet rarely more than a foot or two wide. The upper 25 feet of the slot, has high angle slabs and a lot of ledge type protrusions at the divide between these two sections. We had traversed much of the canyon at this level. The siren song, though, pulled us down into to the deep and unknown recesses. The canyon has a pretty low angle, maybe averages 5 degrees; the slope makes a huge difference, up versus down, in regard to the amount of effort involved, passing through its narrow confines.
On a day in the early 1990s, John Baise and I nervously drank as much water and ate as much food as we could hold. We abandoned all of our gear, with the exception of a thin layer of long sleeves (top and bottom), and entered the canyon with the aim to pass through the canyon as close to the ground as possible. A pleasant sideways set of narrows deepened, darkened and narrowed, and narrowed again, and again. The technique that we found ourselves using was to have our feet pointing in opposite directions and our heads looking down canyon. It was so narrow that we could not rotate our heads or our feet. Partner aid was purely psychological. Having somebody there with you cannot be underestimated. You get stuck. Me, usually a half of dozen times on this day. You have to calm yourself down and problem solve your way free.
As you look down canyon, the walls’ subtle turns always give you the appearance that the area immediately ahead is becoming impossible. This is terrifying. You route find on a micro level. You figure out quickly enough what part of your body is widest, and you shift your body up 6 inches, down 6 inches, to accommodate the biggest widening in the canyon. The method that I used the most was to tilt my upper body down canyon about 30 degrees or more and use that angle, combined with the slope of the canyon, to make progress, while the canyon pressed in on my chest and back. When you would get stuck, subtle rotations of your upper body would help you make progress and become unstuck. This method we named ‘the sternum swivel.’ The muscles around my sternum were sore for a couple of weeks after this day. In the lead, I once became panicked. I started to hyperventilate. The true horror came from the fact that the walls stopped my rapid breathing half way on the inhales and exhales.
OK! OK! CALM DOWN! RELAX! OK.
Further down canyon we reached a spot where the sun angle filtered down the hundred feet almost to the canyon floor, alleviating some of the darkness. One would think that this would be comforting. The sunlight, though, revealed hundreds of spider webs, bugs of every description, and a massive amount of dust particles floating in the air. Time for Ram to panic again. Rapid breath. Just imagining all those particles being sucked in. A bit of nausea and then upchucking my lunch. The sound of retching, couldn’t have helped John a whole lot, but the real treat in this narrow section, was that he had no choice but to slide through my partially digested lunch. After all, what are friends for? After a particularly narrow 100 feet, which we dubbed ‘the darkside,’ the narrowness eased, and out the bottom we went with the two emotions of elation and relief, vying for supremacy.
‹› ‹› ‹›
Now that the canyon had become known to us, we shared it with a variety of folks over the next few years. On one occasion, the infamous Pitney joined John and me. For the first time, I relinquished the lead and went last. Perhaps I had put on a few pounds. Perhaps I hadn’t steeled my mind for the necessary efforts. Whatever the reason, I was having more difficulty than normal. At a point in the narrowest section of the canyon, while leaning forward and swiveling, I lost my center of balance. In this unique environment it took almost a minute for me to fall to the ground. Battle I did, trying to keep upright, but like a doomed ship, slowly I sank to lie horizontally on the ground in a slot not much more 8-10 inches wide. My body position was laying on one side with one arm ahead of me down canyon and with my head facing up. My 2 friends, right ahead of me, could not even turn their heads to look at me, nor could I any longer see them.
After the requisite panic, and sense of doom, some calm returned, and I asked myself a question: ‘What the hell am I gonna do now?’ Time to invent a new mode of locomotion. I found that, if I threw my hip one direction—the couple of inches it would go—and my shoulder the opposite direction, with much effort and sweat I could make progress down canyon, an inch or so at a time. John and Pitney had arrived at one of those spots that was over 2 feet wide and could now turn and see me, but offer no help, as I came around the corner. They estimated that I had 12 feet before the widening. An hour passed, during which time, I worked about as hard as I ever had in the outdoors. Slowly and surely, the new form of locomotion, which we dubbed ‘the snake,’ paid dividends. The little opening, which my elbow and then my shoulder arrived in first, was round in shape, maybe 2 feet in diameter, and a full foot lower than the ground I was snaking my way along. Without any leverage, my arm and then my head and my neck dropped down into this hole. With the additional angle, now I was able to work my lower body up the wall until I was entirely upside down, feet pointing to the sky, full weight on the side of my head and my neck.
This would be bad enough, but there was one more indignity ... my pants were around my ankles.
OK time to try and right myself. I would bend my knees and squeeze with my feet, but try as I might, even in this luxurious opening, it was still too narrow to right myself. Finally, I scraped my knees, bloodying them, and managed to right myself. Like any good boy, raised in America, I did not let on that I was near tears from a plethora of various emotions. So on this day, I found the beast and the beast found me, and we walk through this world’s narrow spots together. Some days are better than others, but he is never far away. This was my last time down that canyon. John, on the other hand, returned several more times. On one occasion, a new log that had come wedged, combined with recent rain, created a long swimmer, with the walls muddy above denying leverage. Not being prepared for such conditions (who would be?) John and his partner, had their own life and death struggle, with drowning and hypothermia hanging over their heads like a huge hammer. But that’s John’s story to tell ...
It’s been a bad week at work, but I feel better now. Like I told my mommy about a bad dream, and that makes it all better.
Ram
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2015
- Messages
- 2,030
Suddenly my cubicle seems so spacious. Wow.
kimbur96
Member
- Joined
- Dec 30, 2015
- Messages
- 194
Ram that was a thrilling read. It reminded me of a time got stuck scuba diving in a wreck 200ft beneath the water. You just can't panic. To panic is to be dead. You learn to talk yourself down. But's it scary. Glad you kept your head and made it out.
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2015
- Messages
- 2,030
"It’s been a bad week at work, but I feel better now. Like I told my mommy about a bad dream, and that makes it all better."
I hope you never told your Mom that story, she may never sleep again.
I hope you never told your Mom that story, she may never sleep again.
HomerJ
Member
- Joined
- Jan 19, 2012
- Messages
- 1,199
Holy crap @ram! 
That made me claustrophobic just reading that! Seriously, it brought back that feeling when I've gotten a little stuck. Last time was in the bottom of Leprechaun as far as you can go from the bottom up. A friend squeezed up the tight section and I started to follow, had that claustrophobic feeling and noped the hell outta there!
I did get a good laugh at your friend having the slide through the puke stained walls after you threw up.
That made me claustrophobic just reading that! Seriously, it brought back that feeling when I've gotten a little stuck. Last time was in the bottom of Leprechaun as far as you can go from the bottom up. A friend squeezed up the tight section and I started to follow, had that claustrophobic feeling and noped the hell outta there!I did get a good laugh at your friend having the slide through the puke stained walls after you threw up.
Absarokanaut
Member
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2014
- Messages
- 699
I fell through in the Tetons as a kid. Near the head of Paintbrush Canyon. I had to chip snow to the side and then down for almost 3 hours before I built up enough to get my pic over the lip. That's the most scared I was for hours.
For seconds and ultimately the most scared I ever was was in July 2012. I'd carried bearspray for 13 years and only used it on problem black bears on ranch property. I'd had grizzlies mess with me a little, notably one real bluff charge and another time with my 13 year old niece and a sow put on a serious dominance display. Well, that summer morning I was solo hiking where I often do, just short of the Shoshone National Forest's Dunoir Special Management Area not far below the Contiental Divide boundary of the Bridger-Teton National Forest's Teton Wilderness. It was early, the sun was just begining to shine in my eastbound eyes. All of sudden I saw the golden silhouette of a large boar grizzly about 15 yards in front of me. It charged, I sprayed, in what seemed to be an eternity the big boy rolled up 6' in front of me and ran away.
Please carry bearspray.
For seconds and ultimately the most scared I ever was was in July 2012. I'd carried bearspray for 13 years and only used it on problem black bears on ranch property. I'd had grizzlies mess with me a little, notably one real bluff charge and another time with my 13 year old niece and a sow put on a serious dominance display. Well, that summer morning I was solo hiking where I often do, just short of the Shoshone National Forest's Dunoir Special Management Area not far below the Contiental Divide boundary of the Bridger-Teton National Forest's Teton Wilderness. It was early, the sun was just begining to shine in my eastbound eyes. All of sudden I saw the golden silhouette of a large boar grizzly about 15 yards in front of me. It charged, I sprayed, in what seemed to be an eternity the big boy rolled up 6' in front of me and ran away.
Please carry bearspray.
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