I received the following report concerning cryptid activity in Patapsco State Park in Maryland, very near where I had my Bigfoot encounter in May 1981, and a more recent report:
"Hi Lon. I discovered your website trying to research cryptids in this area. I was shocked to read about your experiences in Patapsco and how there have been other cryptid and paranormal phenomena reported in the park. I don't know how compelling my experiences will be to you as I did not get a visual, but I figured I could share them and if you could possibly shed some light. I'm not sure if these experiences are of the same phenomena, one specifically I know is unrelated but still very strange.
When I lived in Ellicott City we did not use AC in the summer so we slept with the windows open. One summer in particular I routinely heard some large animals in my backyard (that backs up to a treeline), which is less than a mile from Patapsco. Whatever it was was big. It was a big lumbering animal that walked slowly. Definitely not a deer, the footsteps were way too heavy. But the strangest part is the vocalizations. It was a deep squawking. Like a squawking bird but deeper and larger sounding than any bird. The vocalization always accompanied the footsteps. I've heard audio files of Sasquatch before like the one from the Sierra Mountains and the ones in Ontario. This sounded nothing like it. One of my friends said he heard it when he was smoking a cigarette outside. I asked my mom if she heard it and she got upset. My mom is religious and doesn't entertain the idea of the unexplained. This was all at night but I was a teenager at the time and I remember always being awake when it occurred. Like watching TV in my bedroom, I don't remember being woken from sleep to this sound so I definitely did not dream this.
On one occasion in Patapsco, a group of 6 or 7 of us was chased out of the park at night. There was a little clearing we found 50 years or so off the trail. In high school, my friends used to go there at night to drink and smoke weed lol. We were in the park at night every weekend. The sounds of deer and foxes and such were normal to us. We heard heavy footsteps and twigs breaking off in the distance. We said it was deer and kept talking. Then the footsteps got louder and louder. "Just deer" we kept saying to each other. Then whatever it was began charging us. Again this is a decent-sized group of guys. Whatever it was was coming straight at us. My friend Ben was our "leader" back then. He was a little older and generally more mature and tougher than the rest of us. He quickly got to his feet staring in the direction of the charging, white as a ghost, that's when we all realized this truly wasn't normal. We all ran out of the park at once and didn't go back that night.
One time a few years later I was stalked in the park at night. We were 21 now and drinking at the bars in Old Ellicott City. We stayed until the last call. Leaving the bar we weren't ready to go home so we decided to go on a night hike. We were walking along the trail just talking and and telling jokes. That's when we'd hear the sound of heavy footsteps behind us. We'd keep walking 10 or 20 yards then hear the sound at 11 o'clock. We'd walk some more then hear it at 3 o'clock. This went on for a mile or so before we said screw this and left. I've spent my life hiking that park and have never been followed like this before. I was at the back of the line and at one point moved towards the middle. The guy who was behind me, my friend Eric, was an outdoorsman too and had just got back from a tour of Iraq. Tough guy. He said F you to me because he was now in the rear and scared too. He grew up here and never experienced being stalked like this either.
And the last story is different than the rest but equally weird. In high school, we decided to illegally camp in the park. Because we had no money to reserve a camp spot. So there were 4 of us. The plan was that my friend Chris would be dropped off at a park entrance to hike in with our gear. The other two found an inconspicuous place to park so their cars wouldn't be outside the park all night and draw attention. So me and my friend Chris are walking down the path just talking normally. This was on an asphalt path, the entrance was the swinging bridge entrance in Ellicott City. Parallel to the path is a tall ridge and on top of the ridge are the train tracks. So we're walking and we see the glow of a fire on top of the ridge near the tracks. A little odd but we figured it was teenagers like us and kept going. We heard voices as we got closer but again thought it was kids like us. Then we got close enough to hear the voices. It was multiple voices, that sounded like men, yet they were willing to incoherently. Like yelling jibberish, it was like no language I ever heard. It wasn't Spanish, Japanese, German, or anything like that. It sounded like a group of insane people yelling garbled nonsense. We just stood there in silence listening. I kept telling myself I couldn't be hearing this, this is impossible. This can't be real. Then my friend Chris said "We need to get the F out of here" and we tore off back to the entrance. We called our friends to pick us up. We never went camping that night.
One more story for you, I hope these aren't boring to you. My friend lives on a farm that borders Patapsco. So much wood on their land they could hunt on it. He was hunting some small game out there, can't remember. Let me say this is the best, most experienced, and most knowledgeable outdoorsman I know. He spends almost all his free time hunting or doing nature photography, this guy knows these woods. And he told me saw a rotting groundhog crawl out of a hole. He thought it might have rabies or something so he shot it in the face. He said it kept crawling at him like nothing happened. Said he put three more rounds in it before it stopped, turned around, and went back in his hole. I know a zombie groundhog sounds insane. He knows it sounds insane. But I can only say I know and trust this guy and he's not the lie for attention type. He saw this and it freaked him out, he said he had no idea how that was possible. Said he saw the rounds connect, the small indentations in the fur where the rounds went in.
So sorry if that was a lot but hopefully you found it interesting. If you have ANY ideas about what I heard or what chased us out please share them with me if you have the time. Or if you have any idea about the groundhog. If you have any resources about paranormal stuff in this area you could point me to please share them, I'd greatly appreciate it.
Thank you for your time, AH"
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