Believe It Tour on the Road to Bluff Creek, We Almost Lost Woolheater, Squatching Brush Mountain; Bigfoot's bLog Is BIGFOOT SITE OF THE DAY!

We've had a rich week out here in Willow Creek, with the incursion of The Believe It Tour

(see their awesome photo collection on Flikr here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/believeit/, with more set links below covering their visit to Bigfoot Books, some fine dining, and the venture out to Bluff Creek), along with Texan Craig Woolheater, Sharonlee Lormuno of Bigfoot Field Reporter (blog at: http://www.bigfootlives.blogspot.com/, show at: http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/59501), Linda Martin of Happy Camp's Bigfoot Sightings (http://bigfootsightings.org//), and James Bobo Fay with his friend, Jimi "Slash" Frizzell.

Bigfoot wasn't "proven," but Squatching always proves to be an adventure! See our previous post for information on the Believe Its,
represented on this California 2009 leg by Mike Esordi of Connecticut, Diana Smith of Grand-View-on-Hudson New York, and Brad Pennock (wait, where does he come from?). The Believe Its came on up from San Diego, seeking ghosts out in the desert, and finding Paul Bunyan on the Humboldt/Del Norte coast, and then came on inland to visit us. We looked for bigfoot both in the wild and in history while they were here, and they went on north along the BIGFOOT SCENIC BYWAY (see rare signed poster to left) on their way up to find Lemurians and possibly Extraterrestrials up on Mount Shasta. Read their blog on this part here: http://we-believe-it.blogspot.com/2009/08/bigfoot-country-is-off-grid.html.

But first, let us toot our own horn again and get it over with. Today Bigfoot's bLog was named THE BIGFOOT SITE OF THE DAY by Linda's Bigfoot Sightings website (http://bigfootsightings.org/2009/08/20/the-bigfoot-books-blog-bigfoot-site-of-the-day/)!!!

Well, we are surely humbled by statements such as this, but we do TRY: "I was deeply impressed by the quality of Steven’s writing.... With word skill like that I have the impression that this man will be writing a lot more in the months and years to come." OK, a book is in the mental pipes, but we're not exactly taking orders yet, and the more we look the stranger the possibilities become.

The first night involved dinner at CINNABAR SAM's. I have to say, Bigfooters are often an outdoorsy form of nerd. I have never been so photographed, videoed, documented, recorded and questioned in all my life, and moments later it is Tweeted, then blogged, Flikred, then immortalized on their web site. Documentarians at heart, Bigfoot people will prove each others' existence if they cannot get the Big Hairy One on film. They do love their tech gear! Everyone is instantly famous.

That night we went out Squatching on Friday Ridge Road and up to Brush Mountain Lookout where recent BF activity has been reported

(see our previous post HERE). We had a third-gen night scope and a very cool new thermal imager so refined that it presented clear as day images in a moonless pitch dark. No Squatches made themselves known, but we did encounter some raccoons, acorns falling from trees (and one bigger thing, potentially a tossed rock), and some amazing views of straggler Perseid meteors and the Milky Way (which is astonishing through night vision binoculars!).

The next day was a trip out, as is said, "On the Road to Bluff Creek." Think of "on the road to Loch Ness," a British expression, and translate: CRAZY! Nutso? Off the deep end? Well, maybe we are?

On the way the expedition stopped in at the BLUFF CREEK COMPANY. The store building was standing still. We were shortly visited by owner Phil Smith Sr., though, and found out that he plans to tear the store down by October. And this: the asking price is actually around $600K. But still, what a deal!

One can see how the building is deteriorating, but the owner assured us that it could be restored--it just isn't in his plans to do so. Apparently, the BC Company has no phone, and the property is not on the public market yet, so anyone wanting to save the place must act more or less NOW, and will have to go to the site to inquire.

After lunch at the Orleans Mining Company Diner, where we saw many hundreds of iron skittles (and painted saw blades) on the walls, and a two-headed calf, we headed out on the G-O Road (EyeSee on the sign) up to 12N12/Cedar Camp Road.

Below, the turnoff to the Film Site, and... the Believe It folks get their first baptism in the sacred waters of the film site area of Bluff Creek.

Round the "big bend of the creek" spoken of by Bob Gimlin is the FILM SITE, at the bottom of the now-signed 12N13H. More on this in our next post.

Here Diana and Mike investigate the film site itself, just upstream from the big bend and huge root balls of Douglas Firs.

NEAR DISASTER! GORY DEATH AVOIDED!

For those who might be thinking of going to the Film Site, TAKE HEED! BEWARE! A four-wheel drive vehicle is highly recommended! Not kidding: Craig Woolheater and Crew nearly ended up as Bigfoot and Salamander food, with their truck hanging precariously over the creek below. The rock slide at the bottom of the hill can be treacherous, and on top of that, there is nearly no way to turn around once heading down the road. So, be careful! Read the story HERE and HERE, and see the images HERE.

And at the start of the Bigfoot Byway, two more icons....

In Willow Creek everything is "Squatchy." Here we have famous bigfoot godfather Al Hodgson immortalized by a recently revamped municipal water system drawing water from Willow Creek aquifers just before the creek reaches the Trinity River. He's still living, and will always be a Legend.

Here are Denali and her Dad having some fun "messin' with Sasquatch."
OK, well, all for now. We will have to put the P-G FILM SITE UPDATE in a separate post. For now I will say: WE WALKED IN PATTY'S FOOTSTEPS!

Here are the relevant FLIKR PHOTO SETS taken by the Believe It Tour folks. Check them out, they're grrrreaaat! Links: WILLOW CREEK AND BIGFOOT BOOKS, BLUFF CREEK JOURNEY, and THE FILM SITE.

Oh, and I almost forgot. THE CHURCH OF BIGFOOT also visited this weekend. A fun night celebrating beer in Bigfoot's riverside domain was had by all.

Image here, from The Believe it Tour.

Paranormal Descends upon Willow Creek! Believe-It Tour Hit Film Site, Psychic Sasquatch in Happy Camp, Pseudoscience of Anti-Bigfootology, Book Raven

Touring the nation this summer is the BELIEVE-IT TOUR (http://www.believeittour.com/), now in California and heading toward the Bigfoot Scenic Highway (State Route 96), from Willow Creek to Happy Camp.

This tour seeks to explore all things strange and interesting along the way, as one may see on their Flikr photos page (http://www.flickr.com/photos/believeit/). They are interested in aligators and burritos every bit as much as they are in Skunk Apes, or the beings in their logo: Aliens, Bigfoot, Ghosts, and... Santa Claus. Their logo's motto?: "Explore Life Like You Did As a Child." Check out their progress through their blog at: http://we-believe-it.blogspot.com/
Recently, we at Bigfoot Books received a call from organizer and Believe-It member, Mike Esordi, and were invited to join them on the path up to the Patterson-Gimlin Bluff Creek film site. Unfortunately, their touring van might not do too well on that wretched road. Bobo was to be their guide, but apparently he has Flaming Lips tickets. So, we may be playing local tour guide.
Some major out-of-the-area BF hunters are said to be attending, so keep watching. With recent mysterious noise-making activity reported (and recorded) in Bluff Creek, there may be some more documentable action this coming weekend! See Cliff Barackman's report on the noises here: http://northamericanbigfoot.blogspot.com/2009/08/bluff-creek-update.html.

Here are some mission statements of the Believe-It Tour:
"Overview: Why as children are we so open to believe what as adults we are taught to reject? Mission Focus Areas: Paranormal, Cryptozoology, Extraterrestrial, Monsters, and Folklore. Our Vision: To strengthen our childhood beliefs—to think beyond the reality of what we see. Our Mission: To create a forum for believers in the five focus areas, to share their experiences and interact with one another, to encourage and revive childhood beliefs, and to build a community for all to participate from amateur to expert."

In other "paranormal" news:
We've been receiving the interesting blog feed from Happy Camp Linda's BIGFOOT SIGHTINGS. Recent reports through the RSS feed have included a FLYING BIGFOOT and a STONE-AGE BIGFOOT FOOTPRINT, not to mention a strange one about an upright-walking human-like REPTILIAN creature. Check it out here: http://bigfootsightings.org/, and if you are interested in the Happy Camp area read her archived report here: http://bigfootsightings.org/2008/08/19/life-in-bigfoot-country-happy-camp-california/. It includes some cool photos of BF iconography in her area, including BIGFOOT TOWING's truck logo and the giant metal HAPPY CAMP BIGFOOT STATUE.
Associated with the Happy Camp folks is another group, FRIENDS OF SASQUATCH, which seeks to use "psychic methods in exploring the nature of the Bigfoot phenomenon. (The images are screen shots of the website of the group, which you should view here: http://friendsofsasquatch.com/). Since the creature is a "needle in a haystack" out there, their website says, means such as this can help in the perhaps otherwise nearly hopeless effort of finding it. In fact, the group seeks to make contact: "Our primary level of interest is the facilitation of interspecies communication."

In the screen from the website viewed here one may see one of the group's members asking a tree if it has seen Sasquatch in its lifetime standing there. I quote: "Talking to trees is not new to me. I have felt their auras for years. If you haven’t then try it if you’re open to the experience at all. You can stand near a tree and feel the spirit and energy that emanates from them… especially the older trees. My new interest in talking to trees is to try to pick up impressions of things they’ve seen - Bigfoot in particular. I asked (using clairaudience) if the tree had seen a creature larger than a bear. This tree did not give me a positive answer and I don’t know if it was because it hadn’t seen Sasquatch, or if I wasn’t able to pick up the answer, or if I needed more time than we had to establish adequate communication. While we were there I closed my eyes, hoping for a vision of what the tree may have sensed, but all I could see was a bright green energy coming from the tree."

Before you chuckle, heck, think about it. Maybe THIS is the secret method that the BFRO and other groups need? Maybe the communion-based approach can be more effective than the "hunt-and-capture" modality so many field researchers seem to use. Again, I quote: "Because of the nature of the Sasquatch Research we’re doing, we’ve felt the need for a degree of secrecy. ...What we’re doing deals with broadening our abilities to contact Sasquatch telepathically. The reason for this is that we live in the center of the Klamath National Forest, an area known for frequent Sasquatch sightings, yet it is hard to get people here to talk about what they’ve seen. Therefore we’ve realized that if we’re going to have a chance of finding Sasquatch in this huge forest, we need a competitive edge. [WATCH OUT, BFRO and NABS!!!] Developing psychic abilities is a way of making contact, and improving our chances of finding that needle in a haystack known as Sasquatch, in the middle of the Klamath National Forest. So most of our Sasquatch research activities this past year included attempts at perceptive communication, some of which were more successful than others."

I say, hmmm... all the more luck to them!!!

NOW READING: In preparation for our major (well, maybe not) scholarly work, The Leap of Skepticism, we came across a great essay by old-time UFO researcher and scientist, Stanton Friedman. He appeared recently on the "Art Bell" Coast-to-Coast AM radio show. This work, entitled "The Pseudo-Science of Anti-UFOlogy," may have MAJOR usefulness for bigfoot researchers. In the field of Bigfoot we quite often have to deal with the issue of the "paranormal," when in fact this thing appears by most evidence to be a simple, physical creature, living on the earth as a hominoid ape would (or as a hominid would, we should perhaps say). Check it out here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/16785256/PseudoScience-of-AntiUfology-by-Stanton-T-FriedmanFriedman
or in copy-and-pastable form at:

http://www.theufochronicles.com/search?q=Stanton+Ufology

Here I quote from the Coast-to-Coast AM (http://www.coasttocoastam.com/) newsletter on the show:

"Ufologist Stanton Friedman spoke from Denver, where he'll be presenting at MUFON's 40th Annual International UFO Symposium this week. His topic at the conference is the 'Pseudoscience of Anti-Ufology.' There are a number of people who masquerade as scientific investigators of the UFO phenomenon, he said, but these debunkers don't actually investigate, nor are they scientific. He detailed the 'four basic rules of debunkers': What the public doesn't know, I'm not going to tell. Don't bother me with the facts, my mind is made up. If you can't attack the data, attack the people, it's easier. Do your research by proclamation--investigation is too much trouble, and nobody will notice the difference anyway." Bigfooters, TAKE HEART!

Meanwhile, a while back, a mysterious raven decided to make its perch on the front porch of Bigfoot Books. We were able to get up within a foot, with full eye contact. It did not fly away, apparently posing for this image. A new company logo? Or did it perhaps have other, more MYSTERIOUS motives?

NEWS: Bigfoot Books on Cryptomundo! Save Bluff Creek Company Store! A Meeting with Jerry Hein & Vocalizations, Sasquatch Hair Samples & Footprints

Not to toot our own horn too much, but BIGFOOT BOOKS appeared recently on one of the largest cryptozoological web sites on the planet, CRYPTOMUNDO (http://www.cryptomundo.com/). But hey, it is for a good cause! Perhaps someone out there in the Bigfooting world would like to consider a real estate investment that could also preserve an important piece of Bigfoot history? Check it out here: http://www.cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/save-bf/. Cryptomundo covers all things cryptid. If you want to know more about whatever strange creature may have appeared in your backyard, they probably have a section on it. It worked for me recently when I needed to know more about a Giant Salamander report. Loren Coleman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loren_Colemana.org/wiki/Loren_Coleman), who runs Cryptomundo, is the author or editor of some thirty books, including many dealing with Bigfoot, most notably the fine reference books, "The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates" and "Cryptozoology A to Z," He wrote, as well, a biography of early bigfooter/Abominable Snowman hunter, Tom Slick, who financed the classic Pacific Northwest Expedition in Bluff Creek area in 1959-1962. Coleman's theories are mentioned in the article,"Sex and the Single Sasquatch," as well: http://www.ncbuy.com/news/2003-03-07/1006308.html. He appears frequently in television documentaries on Bigfoot and other topics. Active in the field since the 1960s, he resides in Maine.
The Bluff Creek Company store, where Patterson and Gimlin provisioned up for the 1967 expedition that gave us their famous bigfoot film, may be demolished soon--unless SOMEONE acts. Recently I spoke with the current owner, since 1964, of the business so linked with the mystery of Bluff Creek. He remembered Roger Patterson, but not Bob Gimlin. He also told me of the many Bigfoot incidents that had occurred at the store site, including a nearby "stench worse than a slop truck on a 100 degree day." Here follows the paraphrase of what I said on the issue, done by Loren Coleman:
"Writing recently, Streufert noted that a location that might be in most immediate danger is the 'Bluff Creek Company store, where [Roger] Patterson and [Bob] Gimlin bought supplies in 1967. According to owner, Phil Smith Sr., the old store building and adjacent Bluff Creek Resort with mountain and river acres are going up for sale. Someone in the Bigfoot community should buy this place before the decrepit yet historical Bluff Creek Company Store is demolished! He warns the building is slated for destruction soon. Back behind the store Mr. Smith showed this writer the slab where The Greasy Spoon Restaurant once stood.... I spoke with the owner, Phil Smith, Sr., on my way up to the Yakima Round-Up. He told me then that the building was not usable, and that it would have to be torn down eventually. He’s planning to sell the place, and to put it up on the market soon. I think he’d thought that it would be a selling point to the property if he ‘cleaned it up’ a bit. I tried to convince him of the value of the building, its historical significance (which he agreed with), and that the building would be an asset for that reason. I told him I’d spread the word around the Bigfooting community.'"
“'The asking price would be around $300,000 he tells me, including the going concern of trailer park/campground, riverfront access, and something like 19 acres of nice mountain land. It would make a great Bigfoot museum or expeditionary supply store, I think. It SHOULD be preserved by someone in our field. We can still save it. Phil is getting pretty up in years, and (apparently) tired of the upkeep.... The last time I was up in Bluff Creek I noticed there were some bulldozers in the lot right next to the old Company Store building [it turns out these were from the work being done up on Fish Lake Road]. It put the fear into me that it might be torn down right then. BUT no! I called the Orleans Community Services District today, and spoke with Shirley Reynolds, who runs the office there. She says the thing is still standing, and that she hasn’t heard of any plans to destroy it yet…. Orleans, she says, is the HEART of the Bigfoot Territory (and Willow Creek is only the ‘Gateway’ to Bigfoot Country).'” For more on this issue see our previous post: http://bigfootbooksblog.blogspot.com/2009/06/cryptid-salamander-yakima-writers-block.html

Loren also told me he likes to support bookstores, which we here at BIGFOOT BOOKS do greatly appreciate! All you bigfooters, come on in! We normally have 50-70 Bigfoot/Sasquatch book and video titles in stock, new and used.

IN OTHER NEWS, a visit from Bay Area bigfoot hunter, Jerry Hein.

Mr. Hein, whom we had previously met at the Yakima Bigfoot Round-Up, was passing through Willow Creek while on a camping and bigfoot hunting trip in our area. He had photos of some footprints out of a total of nine he'd found in roadside dust 7.4 miles from the ranger office on Hwy. 88, on T-Bar Road, 28 miles south of Happy Camp, north of Somes Bar and Orleans, on July 13, 2009. See photos below.

At left, Hein's travel map, with the route highlighted in yellow--right near Bluff Creek!

These do have a sasquatch-like shape to them, and were quite large, 14.5 feet by 6.5 inches; there was a distinct four-foot bipedal stride between the impressions. The detail is revealed better in a larger image, where one can more clearly see a heel impression. Upon further investigation some reddish-brown hair was found snagged about 10 feet up in a shrub. A sample was taken and will be tested. It does not look human, and seems too fine to be from a bear (and the height where the sample was found would mitigate it being from a bear).

Jerry also told us of a strange experience he'd had the night before up at Tish-Tang camping area, along the Trinity River right at the south end of the Hoopa Reservation. This site is known for past sightings and footprint finds. He and a few other camp groups in other sites at the spot all heard a very intriguing noise that was not your average hooting owl or chuffing deer. The sound was like a high-pitched and then lower-pitched "shee-wah" or "shee-yuk," which sound would be repeated three times and then stop, and then start up again in a while from another spot. This went on for at least ten minutes. Finally, freaked out by this, two other camp site groups actually packed up their cars in the middle of the night and departed from the area! The remaining guy besides Hein, in a nearby campsite, stayed where he was, obviously way too drunk to drive or even to care. Hair samples found by Jerry Hein off Hwy. 88. They will be tested soon for their origin and possible DNA. Note the interesting cinnamon-brown color. Image, Jerry Hein's amazing collection of Bigfoot merchandise and swag, at Yakima. Captured from Tom Yamarone's YouTube slideshow for "Jerry Crew, He Knew What to Do," viewable in the sidebar of this blog or at his blog site, http://www.bigfootsongs.com/.

This photo, of Scott McClean and Steve at Bigfoot Books, was taken by Tom Yamarone courtesy of his blog.

In one more news flash: BIGFOOT AGAIN MAKES THE COVER OF THE EUREKA TIMES-STANDARD NEWSPAPER. It happened in 1958, again in 1967, and now in 2009. The paper ran a short article on its front page, above the fold, to honor the completion of the Bigfoot Mural done by Duane Flatmo. Check it here: http://www.times-standard.com/localnews/ci_12918007

Regarding Mr. Flatmo--he hasn't had time to respond to our own interview questions, but heck, we're just a blog, right? He swore he'd answer, and we'll post that blog entry when he does.

The massive theory of the "Leap of Skepticism" is still in progress, and may never be finished.