Army Veteran’s Terrifying Bigfoot Encounter: What Happened on Mount Wachusett

0:03 You're listening to a Bigfoot Society and I'm Jeremiah Byron Tonight's story isn't from a casual hiker or a curious camper. This is the story of Joseph Bolton, a retired Army officer and an experienced outdoorsman who thought he knew the woods like the back of his hand. But in July of twenty twenty three, while hiking Mount watch Housett in Massachusetts, Joseph encountered something that would challenge everything he knew about the forest and about reality itself. This wasn't just an animal in the woods. This was something much, much stranger, not one, but two Bigfoot creatures observing and following him through the darkness. This is not just another Bigfoot story. This is a first hand account from someone who is there in the woods at the moment when everything changed.

0:46 So stay with us. I Bigfoot Society have got the privilege of talking to mister Joseph Bolton today. He's an individual out there from the great state of Massachusetts. He's a retired Army officer, in a ranger school graduate and also a veteran of over in Afghanistan. It's a pleasure to have you on the show today, Joseph. How's it going. Man, Oh, that's very well, thank you. I'm looking forward to being with you tonight. Absolutely. This is one that I have been definitely looking forward to hearing about. You'll be sharing about a multi night encounter. But you know, I'm gonna want I want to make sure that you have the time to share properly about what you experienced their Joseph. So I'm going to go ahead and turn things over to you and take us back to what you experienced those days.

1:43 Okay, Well, first, you know, you kind of alluded to the fact that I'm an Amori veteran. So I was in the infantry and I spent a lot of time moving through the woods at night in total darkness, as well as BiVO whacking in the woods at night in total darkness. And addition to my army experience being out of the woods at night, I spent I've hiked thousands of miles since I was a child up in New York and Massachusetts, New Hampshire, so I'm kind of experienced way you know how a forest sounds, and you know animals, I've seen all kinds of animals.

2:27 I've seen black bears in the woods. Before seen gear, I kind of see what they how they sound like. So I'm pretty experienced at, you know, understanding the rhythm of the forest at daytime or nighttime as well as the animals. And before this experience, I would say that I was a skeptic. I was not, you know, a hostile skeptic. I was a friendly skeptic. In other words, I had to respect for people who said they had an encounter. I would believe that they were mistaken. They probably saw something else, who knows, But I just really couldn't fathom that Bigfoot was real.

3:14 So onto my experience. It was like July of twenty twenty three, and I had a habit. A lot of other people do this too, is hiking up Mountwoichuset just before the sunset and watching the sunset go down from the top of the mountain and then hiking down, And a lot of other people do that as well, so it's fairly common thing for people to do. So I did this three nights in a row, and they're all kind of related how each night went. So the first night and I took the road up there's a road Mountwachuse for those who may not be familiar with it. Mountwachusett is a belongs to the state of Massachusetts.

3:59 There is the. Ski slope on the mountain. There's about forty five miles of trails around and through and on top of the mountain. There's also a road that goes up to the top of the mountain, and that road crosses the two main ski slopes or ski trails twice as it works. Its way to the top. And there's also a fire tower at the top of the mountain as well, and so it's also very popular popular in the wintertime it gets a lot of traffic and the rest of the year with hikers all throughout the year, day and night. So anyway, on the first night, I was hiking up just before the sunset, and as the road I'd hike the road, and as the road would cross each trail, I would pause and look. If you're looking downslope, you get a nice view off to the north up into New Hampshire, and I would look up because I was always curious about maybe I'd get lucky and see a bear crossing the trail, or maybe a moose, because they are of course on mount would choose it as well. So the first night I was standing.

5:12 I had made the second crossing on the road on the Tenth Mountain Skis trail, and I was looking up the lift line that. Has the actual. Lift and towers that go up go up to the top of the mount would choose it or on the Tenth Mountain trail, and I noticed that there was a large dark shape standing at the foot of one of the towers. And I remember looking at it trying to figure out what it was. And again, the sun was just about ready to go down. It was getting kind of dark, and I looked at it.

5:53 It didn't move. I said, is that a bear? No, it's kind of like upright, And I couldn't figureigure out what it was. And the only thing I could think of at the time was perhaps some of the staff at the mountain were doing maintenance and they had equipment there. So I continued on to the top of the mountain. There were other people at the top watched the sunset. I hiked down the road. Everyone else that I was aware of took the straight trail. There's a trail that goes straight down the mountain called Pine Hill. I was the only one that took the road on down so I hiked it down and by the time I was crossing those trails again, it was a total black you know, it was you know, I could see the kind of see the road at a little bit of ambient light, but for the most part it was pitch black.

6:47 And of course that didn't bother me at the time. I've had a lot of experience of being out of the woods at night, so I hiked back. So the second night, I did basically the same thing. Just before sunset up the road, I got to the crossing of the Tenth Mountain ski trail where the lift line was. So I looked up in that spot by that tower. This is the second night, now, this is the immediate night after the first night, and I was surprised to see there was nothing there. There was nothing next to that tower, so whatever was there the previous night was gone. So I thought it was kind of kind of puzzling.

7:31 The only other thing that I noticed was right where I was standing at that spot, there was an odor, and it was kind of an animalistic odor. I'd never all the years that I'd been hiking in the woods, I never smelled anything like this before. I know some people have had encounters are big, but they they talk about a musky kind of smell, or it was really really strong and pungent. I would say this order wasn't too It wasn't overpoweringly strong, but it was definitely present and it was animalistic. But I couldn't identify it at all. I never smelled. Anything like that, and I thought it was strange.

8:13 You know. What I could think of was that must have been some kind of animal that just crossed this road. But I had no idea what it would be. So anyway, I continued on to the top of the mountain. I watched the sunset, then hiked down, in total darkness, down to the parking lot along the road, and went home. Third night, I hiked up. The mountain just just as it got to you know, to the top of the mountain to watch the sunset, And just as just as soon as the sunset, I decided I was going to hike down immediately, so I started walking down.

8:56 So there was still a little bit. Of ambient light by the time I got to back to the trail crossing. Now, so I'm going down now. This is after I had been to the top, So I'm walking down and I got to the part where the road crosses the Tenth Mountain ski slope, and I looked up because this is where I saw something, saying trail where I saw something two nights earlier, next to the tower, the lift tower. Well, this is the part the strangest. This is when they get really strange. So I'm kind of what we call in the military the military crest of the hill. So the military crest is where if you're looking up a hill, it's where you can kind of see the top, but everything beyond that crest you can't see it because it's kind of although it's still going up, it's kind of hidden by the crest of the hill, so it's not the top of the mountain, but it's kind of like the crest of that trail. Anyway, silhouetted up there there was this huge like shape, roughly like a man shape.

10:03 It was black. I really couldn't see it was too far away from me to see it, and it's too dim for me to see any kind of features. But I had a kind of sense of its shape, and it was looking down at me. It was its body was front towards me, directly towards me, and I had a sense of its head. And it was looking. Down at me, and then it moved to its left, but it never broke its gaze from looking at me. It's kind of like, you know, in football practice, we used to do this kind of exercise where you kind of keep your body, you know, forward, and you're kind of moving sideways, but you're kind of still looking down the field.

10:50 That's exactly what it was like. So this figure moved to its left, maybe about thirty feet, it stopped and squatted down, and then it didn't move. And I remember looking at it. And I said, is that is that what I could think? It could be a bigfoot. I mean, I've seen I ski on this mountain all the time, so I know how big a human being would be on this trail. And the sides of the figure dwarfed what a human being would look like if it was standing on that trail. And I looked at it, looked at it. It's getting darker.

11:32 And you know one thing that I thought to I'd take a picture of it, and I thought, no, if I start fumbling around my phone and take my eyes off it, I'm going to lose sight of it. Because I was getting darker. It's the same thing if you were at If you were let's say it was just getting light in the morning, and you're looking at a start, it's getting gimmer and dimmer, and if you look away from it, you can't find it again. So that's what I was worried about, that if I looked away, I was going to lose sight where it was. I'd watched it. I watched it long as I could to see if it would move. It didn't move again. So by that time I decided to move, it had gotten totally dark because I lost sight, I couldn't see it.

12:13 So I said, Okay, I'm just I'm getting out of here. It's dark. I fought started feeling a little uncomfortable. I said, I wasn't scared because it was way up there and I didn't feel like it was close to me. But I didn't really feel comfortable. My brain really had a hard time getting my mind, getting my mind around what I saw, what I experienced. It wasn't computing, It's the best way I could describe it. So anyway, I continued down the road and back towards the parking lot. So the road kind of continues off to the west after it crosses the trail, it comes down to the bottom of a road intersection, turns right, heads back east and it crosses the trail ski trails again. So I crossed the tenth Mountain trail and by this time it's pitch black.

13:05 I crossed the next trail, kind Offer Trail, and just as I had crossed over it, and I was starting to almost come within sight of the parking lot, I heard this large stick or a piece of wood break, maybe twenty feet off. To my left in the woodline. Now, I've heard animals moving around the woods many times, you know, small animals sometimes can sell loud when they move leaves around Bears when I've seen bears are very very quiet. But this was a large stick and didn't It wasn't a stick falling into the woods.

13:47 It was something broken. It just broke it. And I was like, what the heck is that? And the only thought hit me was did one of those to that bigfoot that I saw up. There follow me down the mountain? Or what I thought. Was it must have come straight down the ski slope and got ahead of me because it knew I was going I was walking on this road, and it knew where the road was, and so I said, okay, what do I do? I just stopped. I didn't say anything. I just listened, but I heard nothing, didn't hear a sound.

14:31 And I said, well, what do I do? Do Do I talk? Do I? I didn't really feel comfortable doing that. Do be going honest? So I said, I'm going to go, and I'm just going to head back. So I walked maybe ten feet fifteen feet, continued on towards the parking lot. And after I walked maybe like I said, that short distance, maybe ten twenty feet, I heard another stick breaking almost exactly the same sound, except it was on the other side of the road. And that's the part probably for me personally, and I'm getting chills describing this when I felt probably the most scared because I realized that there's not one of them, but there's two of them, and they knew where I was going.

15:23 They used almost like i'd call a superhuman speed to get down the ski slope, because it's not easy to move it. No human being could move down that ski slope at night and get a position ahead of me on this road like they did. But there were two of them. There was one on each side of the road, because there's just no way a large animal is going to break a good sized stick on each side of the road. While I was standing there and not making another sound, and I said, what do I do? And I felt a little scared at that time, not because you think intellectually. You know, you hear stories and you're like, you know, bigfoots don't attack people, right, so you're like, what are you worried about? It would be kind of fun and you can see, you know, you're having a big foot encounter. Well, for me, especially in my army background, which I understand what it ambushes, I felt a little little, a little scared actually, kind of the the fight or flight reflex is coming up because I realized that I had absolutely no control of the situation or any control or influence about.

16:36 What happens next. I felt like I was being observed by two intelligences that we're in full control of the full comfortable level in this environment at night in the woods, they had to be under observation. They've demonstrated that they could move very fast, and they were very smart, and they were looking at me, and I was the only human being in there. There's nobody else in the area. At all. It's just me for miles probably, And so what do I do? And I thought, well, I could try talking, but I just couldn't do it. And this is the kind of thing. I'm curious about how other people feel about this, because.

17:23 When you hear about this, you say, well, why didn't you chase after the bigfoot when you saw it if you have a chance encounter, or why didn't you try to, you know, engage the Well, I think for most people, and I think I understand why you don't want to do that. I thought, what would I do? I'm in total blackness and one of those things came on the road and just stood a few feet away from me. What would I do? How would I I mean, what happens next? And what would the encounter be? And so I'm like, I don't care about collecting evidence. I'm not, That's not important to me. It was important for me at that moment was getting back to my car safely and just leaving the area.

18:07 And you know, to this day, although I've hiked them out with you since the time, I've never gone back there at night. I've I just I don't And it's not necessarily a. Rational fear because a lot of people go up there at night all the time, but I just can't you know, I've mentioned about the What mount with Choose it has a lot of people there all the time, and I think that's true. My own personal assessment is that there was a small group of bigfoot. I'm not with chuse it. They were transient to their passing through, and I think they were using a point that point that military crest on that particular ski trail tenth Mountain because it offered a great vantage point of people coming up the mountain, like on a road or a vehicle or looking off to the north because you can see from there you can see all the way out to Mountain dad Knock in Hampshire. So I think they were transient. I don't know how long they were there. I never heard of anybody else seeing the population, so I don't think there are bigfoots there all the time. But I do think in July of twenty twenty three, there was a small group that was passing through, and for better or worse, I had an encounter with them.

19:33 So that's my story, Joseph, that's that is a really really interesting story. Thank you for sharing. What is your view towards Bigfoot. Since that time, how has that affected you what you experienced? Well, I think it's given me more curiosity about other people's experiences, and I think that I'm very curious now about how did that person feel when they encountered it. Did they also feel the same way that I go through the range of emotions that I went through. I think I would say I'm a believer that they have to exist or something exists. I can't explain it scientifically because I mean the logic that I assessed Bigfoot before I had this encounter, you know, it still kind of stands that it doesn't seem to make sense scientifically that this population could exist. So I don't think I can really explain it. But I do think that these creatures exist, and that there's a lot we don't understand or know about their behavior, their range, how many there are, because we don't really have a scientific explanation how they can fit into the environment in North America. But I do

21:06 have a lot more respect for other people who say they've had an experience because I'm like, yep, I know what you're feeling. And I think the common thread that I from reading other people's stories is, and watching videos that people describe it that a bigfoot encounter chance bigfoot encounter when you're not expecting it is a rather unsettling experience because number one, you're seeing something. Your brain automatically tells you what you're seeing can't be real, but it is really you see it, And I think there is a fear because you have, you know, a primitive fight or flight reflex comes up, and you will fear a little bit of fear, even though you know intellectually that they don't hurt you. It's the same thing for example, you know if you were out in the ocean on a little boat and you were surrounded by two orcas or killer whale surrounding your boat, and even though you know that out in the wild orcas don't attack human beings, you're probably not gonna be inclined to just jump in the water with them either.

22:13 So you have a more. Respect for I think also respect for healthy respect for these creatures and their capabilities inside their environment. Absolutely, you know, listening to your account over those three nights, especially with the last one, it feels like they're almost escorting you off the mountain and they're like, okay, it's time to go. I don't know, it's very you know, I've experienced that loud stick break happening in the woods. It really gets you man experience something like that in Orgon. It's weird, dude, Yeah, so weird. Ever since this time, have you ever gone out or have you had any desire to go out looking for bigfoot or to try to get more answers since having this experience.

23:13 You know, I think I would say not really inclined to want to see it or experience it again. Maybe not by myself, maybe with other people. I probably feel okay, especially if I'm not the slowest person right right. But I would say is that, for example, I would never I just don't feel comfortable going on that mountain at night again because the memory, the internal memory of that experience kind of takes. Over and it becomes uncomfortable. I'm definitely curious to talk to other people that have had the experience, because I want to helps me understand my experien and by listening to them and listening to how they felt about it. But I would be interested and open to meeting with any investigators and actually walking the ground and showing them this map that I sent you and say this is what happened, and this is where it happened.

24:19 And you know, I've already reached out to Riding le Blink, who lives you. Know, nearby, and you know we exchange notes and there's maybe a possibility of us getting together at some point because I'd love to show him this or meet other investigators and actually walk the ground. That I would be happy to do. Yeah, I think there's there's a lot of good researchers right now in Massachusetts. I'm thinking, you know, the Squat Squatch's Chusets guys are really good as well. I don't know if you've ever reached out to them, like David McCullough and I did.

24:59 I and they we did. They did an investigation via email. They walked the site. They did that, They walked the site. I wasn't there. But you're not going to find any evidence at this point. For one thing, there's gonna be no evidence on the road. You'd have to go up on the ski slope and this is a while ago. You're not going to see anything. I can see any footprints up there, so but I I so they do know about it. There is a BFRORO report about that and the report I think doesn't have all the details that I shared with you in there, but it is there, so they classified it as a Class BE encounter.

25:46 Did okay, gotcha? Have you looked in into this area around the mountain to see if there's been any other sightings or encounters that have happened in the region. I have looked at. The BFR website and saw that there were encounters in Leminster, which is nearby. It's like Mister State Forest is immediately to the west of Mount Wachoosett State Forest, not that far. It's kind of continuous forest area. So I do know that the people have had encounters out there out in Leminster State Forest. I also know that October Mountain out in the in the Berkshires have also been an area.

26:31 Savoy Mountain State Forest is another area that has a lot of encounters, and I have hiked out in Savoy Mountain State Forest by myself on some of those trails, and I must say that there really is a feeling of being very remote out there. And people don't think of think of Massachusetts and I think of Boston. They think of kind of the city, very well developed, But there are areas in Massachusetts that are very wilderness. This is but you said area leves or State Forests, and it was a nice area of wilderness. There's also the quab And Reservoir region, which is huge in the center of the state, and also in the Berkshires. There are areas that are definitely very wild and I think of those areas so Away Mountain State Forest and October Mountain State Forest are very very remote if you have access those areas.

27:24 The only other combat I was sure you mentioned about they were probably escorting me out. I think I was already because I was already heading out. I think my guess my feeling was that they were they were curious. To see how I would react. That was the sense I got. They were kind of like, let's see if I break this stick, what will he do? And when I didn't really overreact, he's kind of sat there and listening and I started walking, and the second one broke a stick and said kind of like imitating in the other one and maybe also seeing maybe that one will get his attention me being me, So I think I felt like I was being very closely obscurbed, and my sense was that were very curious about me.

28:18 After after those three nights. Did you did you have any experiences outside of that area that were out of the normal or anything unexpected physically that happened to you. No. No, I've never had experience like this before. Yeah, or since. I know my brother's friends, you know, they lived, they lived up in New York near Whitehall, just south of Whitehall, and they recounted stories of being out on West Mountain just I was ode of Queensbury, and they remember sticks, stones or thrown at them out at nine near a reservoir near West Mountain. This is one of the story I know, and I'm also aware of the Whitehall stories about when that happened. But I've not had an experience like this since that time. Although I have been out in the woods by myself and I'm alert, I think I'm probably a lot more alert about my environment and my surroundings. I will frequently stop, look and listen a little bit more, trying to be more alert and observe it.

29:33 Listen for any kind of sounds of the forest movement. I'll stop and look around behind me, around me, see if anything is moving or following behind me as well. So I think that's probably one way it's affected my approach to being in the woods. I'm far more alert and observant and ready for something else to happen, or being alert to observe that there are things in this in the forest. Maybe I don't see you or notice right away, except if you're alert and observant.

30:14 Most witnesses don't share their full name publicly. Is there a reason why you decided to have your full name shared with this encounter? Because I want to let everyone else know has had an encounter that you have nothing to be ashamed about. You have nothing to apologize for, you know. Just stick to your story as accurately as you can recall it and stand by it, and realize that there are other people who have had experiences and have gone through that range of emotions that you have experienced that these encounters will create within you.

30:59 You're not alone. And I think that's one of. The reasons why I decided, you know what, I'm going to give my name because I want to set that example. I don't have anything to be ashamed about. Even though I was a skeptic before this encounter. It happened, It's real, and I stand by it, and I'm not nothing to apologize for or to hide about it. I do know on the friends of what choset web page, for example, Friends about what use web page facebook page. Excuse me, somebody had picked up the story and they didn't know who who posted, but they said, hey, look, somebody says that there they had an encounter on Mount Which use it, and they all they're up at Mount Which use it all the time.

31:44 They thought it was ridiculous. They were kind of joking about it and making fun of it. And you know, so I understand that there is a feeling of worried about being ridiculed, and there are people who don't understand, who are just going who can't imagining something like this happening or the met or can realize that you are telling the truth. So I wanted you to use my name because they wanted people to realize you have nothing to be ashamed about. Yes, there are some people who are going to be very not just skeptics, but they're going to use ridicule. Don't worry about it. As long as you're telling the truth and you're being accurate about what happened and your experience, then you have nothing to be ashamed about.

32:28 And you're not alone. I think that that is that is a great way to put it. You know, there's there's nothing to be ashamed of or afraid of. And the more people that just come out in the open and share what they experienced, you know, who knows where this will will lead if that starts to happen. But Joseph, it has been a very en chat with you about that area of Massachusetts. It's it's so interesting because it's really not that far away from Route to but it really is you know, it kind of leads you into the rest of western Massachusetts, and it'll be interesting to hear if people, if other people come forward and say like, yeah, I've had things happen in that area or you know, just east of it, and is there a way that people can reach out to you or if that's something you're open to or.

33:39 Well, I would say, you mean like people investigators. If an investigator wants to get a hold of me, you know they can they can email me at Bolton JE three six four at gmail dot com. So Bolton J E three six four at gmail dot com. So, or if you had an experience, especially in Massachusetts, and maybe you'd want to talk to somebody else and maybe you haven't shared that experience with anyone, but you would. Now that you know that there are other. People who have had experiences that you want to share, then you also have this need you want to share that with someone else who can understand what that's like.

34:27 That for a person should feel free to reach out to me and let me know, and we can talk about it and kind of share, you know, share stories in here and share and help help each other kind of understand and process that experience. I think even though it's been almost two years, I'm still kind of processing that experience myself. That's great. Thank you Joseph for for being open for people to reach out to you like that and this, you know, thank you for taking some of your time tonight and for sharing what happened to you those three nights up on Mountwatchusetts out there in Massachusetts.

35:09 Well, thank you. Thank you for having me on tonight. Swanda take a minute to say thank you truly for listening to this episode of the Bigfoot Society Podcast. Joseph's story from Mountwatchuset is one that will stay with you long after the episode ends, and we're grateful to him for sharing it. If you've had your own bigfoot encounter, whether in Massachusetts or anywhere else. Would love to hear your story, so shoot us an email at Bigfoot Society at gmail dot com and let's talk about it. Make sure to subscribe to the Bigfoot Society podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube and share this episode with anyone who's into bigfoot or a good old fashioned mystery. And don't forget. Sasquatch Summerfest is just around the corner July eleventh through the twelfth in Oakridge, Oregon. Big for Society listeners can grab a two day pass for the price of a one day admission with code BF at checkout. Tickets are available now at www dot Sasquatch Summerfest dot com. Thanks again for being part of the Bigfoot Society. Until next time, keep your eyes open, trust your gut, and never stop asking what else might be out there And see you in the woods.