WATERLOO STATE RECREATION AREA EXPERIENCE - MICHIGAN

"I went from zero belief that night to one hundred per cent believing in Bigfoot. It's ridiculous to say, but, after that night, we don't know how else to explain it or what to say." : Wil Neill

In the early morning of September 16, 2016, the two Marine reservists entered the southwest corner of the Waterloo State Recreation Area in Michigan and set up camp for the night. What would happen in a few hours would change their lives.

Tyler Kroetsch, age 20, and Wil Neill, age 23, arrived at the location at around 11:30 p.m. and had the camp set up by 12:30. This was to be an overnight camping/hunting trip. It was around 2 a.m. when they were woken. At first they were conscious of how cold it was but fell silent as they heard footsteps approaching their camp. When the intruder got within 20 ft. of them, they heard two distinct 4 second long screams. And then something took off fast with heavy, bipedal steps, running through the trees. Both knew it was not a four footed run. And by the sound of the crashing through the woods they knew it was something big.

Said Neill : "You could hear each step. It stopped almost directly in front of me, about 20 feet away, off to my right, and then it screamed two times. After that, we freaked out."

Kroetsch described the screams as the most "loud, freakiest, inhuman yell/scream/ roar" that he had ever heard coming from something that walked on two feet. "The only remotely close animal I've heard make this sound are mountain lions and cougars." He added, "There's a lot of animals that scream -- foxes, deer, coyotes -- but nothing that runs the way that we heard it run through these woods. I really have no idea. I'm not going to say outright that this was Bigfoot; I still don't want to jump to conclusions."

He also said the sound of the footsteps resembled a "fully grown man running through the woods". Only this was  in knee-high foliage, with large trees and branches everywhere which would be incredibly difficult for a person to navigate in early morning darkness." It'd be hard for a normal person to run through it without falling pretty much. But to this day, we both don't know exactly what it was."

One thing was clear. When the creature crashed off into the woods, the two took no chances. They spent the remainder of the night sleeping in their car. When the sun came up they investigated around their camp but were unable to find any tracks.  Neither of the men were strangers to the woods and to wildlife.

They did not see what their visitor was, but they did not stop searching for answers. In their quest, they found videos on the internet of Bigfoot calls and sounds. Said Neill : "The more and more we looked into it, it just really confirmed our belief that we were within 20 to 25 feet of this thing When we heard that same sound later . . .  the hair on the back of my neck stood up and I freaked."

Although the two never made an official report with the park, Russ Mason , chief of the Wildlife division of Michigan's Department of Natural Resources had the following statement to make :

"It could've been a raccoon, a house cat, any number of things. It's that time of year when animals are out and about bothering each other. The world is wondrous place; some people think it's more than others, I guess."

Uh huh. Ok, then. Good one, Russ Mason. SMH. I don't know what invaded the camp of those two. But I do know it was probably not a raccoon or a house cat bothering each other. 

Nancy 
"I'll spark the thought; what you do with it is up to you."