Life After Paranormals: Season 1, Episode 3

Was it Bigfoot or some other unknown being? Jeff Boiler speaks about his wild experience in "Watch in the Wilderness."

Can you describe what you saw?
What I saw was a humanoid shape approximately 8-10 feet tall, covered in fur with a conical-shaped head. Its neck wasn't visible, it was like the neck of an NFL linebacker on steroids.

Where was it?
It was at Tam McArthur Rim ... I was going to revisit the grave of a friend I'd helped bury 20 years earlier. It had nothing to do with looking for Bigfoot.
I saw what I believed to be a person while I was walking uphill and it was walking downhill. I was a lawyer and also a policeman, and I was worried that the weapon I was carrying would scare it. So I unsnapped the keeper on my belt and moved the gun to my hip.

When I looked back up, there was 20-30 feet between us. I had an RCA dog moment, where I tilted my head to one side, like, "Huh?" And it mimicked me. I knew for sure then that it was intelligent.

My first thought was to reach for my weapon, but guns in Class 3 holsters are very hard to get out--you have to pull at exactly the right place, and because I had moved it earlier, I couldn't get the gun out without taking my eyes off of it.  That's when it took off and I lost sight of it.

What happened after you lost sight of it?
I thought about it and said to myself, "I have to find out what the hell that is." But I couldn't find tracks, couldn't smell anything. And after about a quarter-mile I felt like I was being watched.

It was getting darker much faster than I thought it would, and I didn't have a flashlight, so I shot an azimuth and headed back to the car. That's when I heard a noise that was like a claymer mine, or something I hadn't heard since I was in the Marine Corps. As soon as I would move I'd hear it, and as soon as I'd stop, it would stop.

I got downhill and I saw a doe, she wasn't scared of me at all. Then her nose started to twitch, she cranked her head in the direction of the snaps and then ran frantically in the other direction.

What did you decide to do then?
Well, when that happened I ran as fast as I could toward the car--it was only a quarter to half-mile downhill, and a fairly open forest. I kept hearing the cracks as I ran, and it got to within about 10 feet of me. I didn't want to look back, though. I fully expected I was going to get snapped in two.

When I got to the car I had to open it with the keys. Then get in and made a three or four-point turn. For the next 15, 20 minutes I thought that this car was not good protection. I had stopped smoking seven or eight years earlier, and the first thing I did was stop and get a pack of cigarettes.

Did you tell anyone what happened?
The sheriff for whom I served made it very clear that sightings like these occur on the east side of the Cascades. But he said, "Don't write a report." This county has more cows than people, and the ranchers and farmers don't want people from Portland or San Francisco going Sasquatch hunting and shooting a cow instead.