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The first bottle missed my head by a few inches. I heard it before I saw it. Then it struck a sycamore trunk and exploded, spraying glass across the creek bank.
Three true off-the-grid horror stories involving dangerous encounters in remote wilderness areas, told with vivid detail and suspense.
Key Takeaways
- Remote wilderness areas can harbor real dangers beyond natural wildlife, including hostile humans.
- Being prepared and aware of surroundings is crucial when working or traveling off the grid.
- Human voices in the wild often signal danger and should not be ignored.
- Illicit activities like meth labs increase risks in certain remote areas.
- Survival often depends on quick thinking, stealth, and knowledge of the terrain.
What the video covers
- A water sampler is attacked with bottles while collecting samples near meth lab territory, narrowly escaping a hostile group in dense woods.
- The narrator describes a tense backpacking trip on the Loyalsock Trail where mysterious voices and unknown figures create a chilling atmosphere.
- Encounters with strange, possibly mentally ill or dangerous individuals are recounted, including a man with white makeup and a man with a cane.
- The narrator uses outdoor survival skills and caution to avoid detection and harm during these encounters.
- The stories highlight the dangers of isolated wilderness areas, especially where illicit activities or unstable people may be present.
- The narrator reflects on the psychological impact and the difficulty of proving threats in remote locations.
- The tension builds through detailed descriptions of sounds, movements, and the narrator’s reactions to being hunted or watched.
- The video uses animation to enhance the storytelling of these real-life horror experiences off the grid.
- The narrator emphasizes the importance of recognizing human voices as the most dangerous sound in the wilderness.
- Despite the fear and danger, the narrator survives and shares these stories to warn others about the risks of remote outdoor adventures.
Chapters
- 00:00Bottle Attack in Meth Lab Territory
- 01:04Escaping Through the Hollow
- 01:58Pursuit and Hiding in Mountain Laurel
- 03:48Close Encounter with Armed Men
- 05:54Reflection and Aftermath of the Attack
- 06:52Backpacking on the Loyalsock Trail
- 07:51Strange Voices and Nighttime Watch
- 08:47Mysterious Figures and Unsettling Encounters
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
Speaker A
I dropped instinctively, one knee plunging into the mud, water chemistry kit banging up against my hip.
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Before I could turn, a second bottle came tumbling out of the trees, and this one shattered up against the rock in the stream, close enough that fragments of glass ended up striking my face.
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Somebody laughed from the hillside. "Keep bombing him!" somebody hollered. I was working alone in a narrow hollow near Myrtle Beach, collecting water samples from a stream that wound through one of the worst areas in the county.
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That place had a reputation for meth labs and abandoned trailers. These were folks that didn't want strangers wandering around with cameras or government equipment.
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I wasn't law enforcement, but the blaze orange vest, clipboard, and sampling bottles made it look halfway official. To anybody cooking meth in those woods, I might as well have been Barney Fife.
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I grabbed my case and started moving upstream, keeping low beneath the bank. That hollow was steep on both sides, crowded with mountain laurel and thorny underbrush. There was no trail, no quick route back to the truck, and no
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cell service. I'd hiked nearly a mile to reach the sampling point. Whoever had thrown those bottles was somewhere behind me, hidden above the stream.
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Then a man shouted out again. "There's someone in the woods!" I stopped. Another voice answered from further up the hillside, but I couldn't quite make out the words.
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It was quick, angry, and saying something crazy. Laughter then leaked out high and low from the trees.
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For one terrible second, that hollow then went completely silent. Then I heard people running.
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The sound was coming from both sides of the stream. These weren't hikers moving carefully through rough country. They were through it like a stampede.
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I couldn't tell how many there were, only that one of them seemed to be coming from behind me, while at least one more crashed through the brush up ahead.
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Whether they planned it or not, I was caught between them. And the only thing I could do was book it.
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The creek was only open ground, so I splashed straight through it. Behind me, somebody yelled again, but I couldn't understand the words. But I did hear the fury. The brush exploded to my right as something or someone came barreling down
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that slope. I glanced over and caught a flash of pale skin between the trees, followed by a dirty white shirt moving fast up the laurel.
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They were closing in, and there were a lot of them. The blaze orange vest suddenly felt like a target painted across my back.
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I ripped it off while running, nearly strangling myself on the zipper. My equipment case was even worse.
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Plastic sample bottles rattled inside it with every single step, broadcasting my position throughout that hollow.
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I veered underneath this eroded bank, dropped to my knees, and shoved the vest, clipboard, and anything else that might reflect light into that case.
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Then I wedged the entire kit beneath a fallen log and covered it up with wet leaves.
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The footsteps kept coming, pounding through the earth to my brief hiding spot. I crawled uphill into the thickest mountain laurel that I could find. The branches clawed at my clothes and scraped at my neck, but I forced myself
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deeper into that vegetation and closed it behind me. There was a pocket beneath these twisted trunks, barely large enough for a person.
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I flattened myself up against the ground and pulled dead leaves over my legs. Seconds later, a man splashed into the creek below.
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I could only see him in pieces through the foliage, muddy boots, bare calves covered in scratches, and the bottom of a stained shirt.
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He'd stopped almost directly beneath me. His breathing was harsh, almost as gassed as I was. Where'd he go?
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He shouted. And a second man answered from somewhere downstream. He was right here. The man below me turned and searched the bank.
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Something hung from his right hand and at first I thought it was a stick.
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Then it caught a sliver of daylight and I saw the narrow edge of steel.
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I pressed my face deep into the dirt. My heart was beating so hard that I was certain the laurel was shaking along with it. An ant crawled across my cheek and another worked beneath
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my collar. I didn't dare move. I didn't
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brush them away. I barely even took any breaths. And despite my stillness, the ants bit me anyway. It took everything in me not to scream.
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The man stepped onto the bank and began climbing toward me. Each footfall would bring him closer.
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Soil crumbled beneath his boots and branches cracked as he used them to pull himself uphill.
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I could smell cigarettes and something chemical on him, sharp and sour, almost like ammonia.
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He stopped close enough that I could hear his teeth grinding. For several seconds, neither of us moved. Then I heard a bottle shatter somewhere downstream.
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The man jerked around and somebody yelled that they'd seen me near the creek bend and he went crashing back downhill.
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He landed in the water, cursed, and took off with the others. Their voices moved away throughout that hollow.
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I stayed beneath that laurel until my muscles cramped. Even after the woods went quiet, I continued to wait.
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When I finally crawled out, I left the equipment beneath the log. I kept the orange vest hidden and climbed to the steepest side of the hollow using roots to pull myself upward.
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I avoided the creek, the trail, and every abandoned structure between there and the road.
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I didn't stop until I reached my truck, locked the doors, then drove several miles before pulling over to call my supervisor.
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Spoiler alert, but nothing official happened as nobody was caught. I couldn't prove that the men intended to rob me, hurt me, or simply fight me away from something I wasn't supposed to see.
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But I knew what that hollow had sounded like when they realized that I was alone. My superiors did not.
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And it honestly sounded like I was being hunted. I went to college in the middle of Pennsylvania. Whenever I had a long weekend, I went backpacking.
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I was an Eagle Scout and spent countless nights outdoors and knew the difference between something dangerous and something unfamiliar.
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Coyotes can sound like screaming children and raccoons can tear through a campsite like burglars.
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You spend enough time outside and those noises will stop frightening you. You learn that the only sound in the woods you should never dismiss is another human voice.
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So one fall, I invited a friend to go hike the Loyalsock Trail with me. He had never attempted an extended backpacking trip, and the four-day weekend gave us enough time to cover more than 50 miles.
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By our second night, we were approximately 20 miles into that trail. The terrain was thick with hardwoods and underbrush, and the fallen leaves made it impossible to move quietly.
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I normally camp at least 100 yards off the trail, partly for privacy and partly because I like sleeping past the procession of early morning hikers.
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That evening, we found an incredible location where a creek emptied into a river. The water surrounded this narrow peninsula on three sides, leaving only one practical way in or out.
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We pushed through the brush, found level ground beneath the bare trees, and pitched our tents far enough from the trail that even our flashlights should have been invisible.
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We cooked dinner, shared a little whiskey, and sat beside the fire until almost midnight.
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Neither of us drank enough to become intoxicated. I remember that specifically because I spent years afterward wondering whether anything could have been distorted on what we saw.
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Before bed, I drowned the fire, stirred the ashes until the pit was cold. The moon was bright enough to cast the tr...
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Then, sometime throughout the night, I woke up to voices. They sounded distant, two or three people speaking somewhere near the trail.
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I checked my watch. 3:04 in the morning. We were 20 miles into a demanding backpacking route with no road or established campground nearby.
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Nobody casually wandered into that section at 3:00 in the morning. Stranger still, I couldn't see any flashlights moving throughout the trees.
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I slipped from my sleeping bag, grabbed my knife, and slowly unzipped my tent. [music] Across the campsite, my friend was already peeking through his own opening.
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The instant he saw me, he pressed one finger up against his lips, [music] then pointed frantically toward the only approach to the peninsula.
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Four figures were coming through the trees. There were three men and one woman, all adults. They walked single file, stepping across the rocks and fallen branches without any light source.
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Only one was carrying a backpack. [music] The others had no visible equipment, water, or sleeping gear.
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Their clothes were far too light for the cold, and none of them appeared to be second-guessing their footing, either.
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Moments earlier, we had heard them talking. Now, they were moving in absolute silence [music] directly toward the campsite they could have not have seen from the trail.
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They entered then without saying a word. One of the men sat beside our extinguished fire. [music] The others lowered themselves around the pit, facing the fire ring as if it were burning.
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Nobody introduced themselves nor explained how they had found us. They simply watched while my friend and I crawled outside to confront them.
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I kept my knife beside my leg knowing it provided almost no protection against four people.
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My friend finally asked out loud, "What are you doing in our campsite?" One of them smiled and responded [music] back, "Do you have any food?" We'd packed lightly, but I carried two extra dehydrated meals.
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I pulled one from my bag and tossed it across the pit. The man caught it and then sat it in his lap. He made no attempt to open it or even to thank me.
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"Why aren't you guys using any lights?" I asked. "Do you need help finding the trail and why are you out hiking this late?" Different members of the group answered each question.
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"We don't use lights." "We know where the trail is." "It is safer to hike at night." My friend would tell them they need to leave and the woman scoffed as if he'd said something out of line.
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She asked whether we wanted to relight the fire and hang out for a little while. I said no.
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My friend then repeated that they need to go. For several seconds none of them moved [music] until all four stood together at the same time.
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They did not return the way they entered. Instead, they spread out and began walking around our campsite.
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One passed behind my tent, another behind my friend's. While the remaining two moved along the water.
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They circled slowly, their shoes barely even disturbing the leaves. Whenever one came into view, that person stared directly at us. No whispering or taunting, just those expressionless faces turning to follow us as they walked around.
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They completed one circle and then another. My friend and I stood back to back near the dead fire, turning as they passed us. I told them to stop, but nobody reacted. I threatened to call the [music] police, though we had no signal
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and I think they knew it. The four would continue to circle, sometimes disappearing behind the tents before emerging in a different order.
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The woman dragged her fingertips across the rainfly at my tent as she passed. One man stopped beside my friend's open tent, [music] leaned forward and stared into the darkness inside before he continued on as well.
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This went on for nearly 20 minutes. [music] Then during one pass behind us, the footsteps stopped. We spun around and the campsite was empty.
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There was only one dry route off that peninsula and we could see most of it beneath the moonlight.
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Nobody crossed [music] it. We heard no leaves crunching, no branches snapping, no splashing from the surrounding water.
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Four adults had been moving within feet of us and then they were simply just gone.
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We stayed awake until sunrise taking turns watching [music] the trees. Only after daylight filled up the campsite did we risk some sleep.
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When we finally awoke that afternoon, the entire encounter felt feverish and unreal until I found this dark, fuzzy cap lying behind my tent.
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And it did not belong to either of us. I still have that cap, [music] too, and I've never learned who those people were or how they found us or where they went.
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Eight years [music] have passed now since that trip and I've continued hiking in other places, but I have never returned to the Loyal Sock Trail.
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Earlier this year, people around Natick started talking about a man on the Cochituate Rail Trail.
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At first, the story sounded like the usual neighborhood [ __ ] A guy in an old black coat had startled a runner.
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Someone with white makeup had jumped out of the trees. A cyclist claimed he'd been followed for half a mile by a man waving a cane.
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Every version added something new. The top hat, the strange faces, that theatrical movements. I live close enough the trail that rumors were coming from every side.
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Neighbors mentioned him outside the grocery [music] store and people posted warnings about it in local groups.
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My girlfriend showed me a message from a woman who claimed she had turned around less than 2 minutes into a run because he was standing inside the bushes smiling at her.
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I assumed it was one disturbed person [music] whose behavior had been inflated by social media, but then the photographs started appearing.
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The first few were blurry, taken from car windows or far away on the trail.
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They showed a man in black walking with a cane, his white face shining up against the trees.
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I studied them, unsure of what I was looking at. There was something strangely [music] familiar about the outfit.
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Polished shoes, tailored trousers, a vest beneath the coat. A dark hat that made him look like he'd stepped out of an old photograph.
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Then somebody [music] posted a closer photo and I stared at it in total shock.
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Under the paint [music] and the exaggerated smile, I thought I recognized him. One of my friends from school, Kevin. It was his uncle.
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He was around constantly when we were teenagers. He never lived with Kevin's family, but he was there almost every day. He drove this old Buick and gave us rides home from school or to the movies.
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He bought us hamburgers, made fun of our music. Offered us all of our edgy firsts like beer and cigarettes. He had a dry sense of humor and dressed neatly, though nothing like the man in these photographs. More importantly,
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he'd been normal. And I mean completely forgettably normal. If you asked me to list every adult from my childhood who might someday paint his face white and chase strangers through the woods, he would have been near the bottom of
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that list. Still, the resemblance was uncanny. Everything about his face, the posture told me I knew this man.
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I actually searched for Kevin online and sent him a message. "Hey, man. This is going to sound strange." I wrote.
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"But is that your uncle people keep seeing on the rail trail?" I got no [music] response. Kevin had moved a few years earlier and we hadn't spoken since our late teens. I didn't know whether he even used his social
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media accounts or if he would want to hear from me at all. I sent another message several days later and still got nothing back. But by then, I couldn't let it go.
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I started walking the trail in the evenings, telling myself it couldn't be him. The truth was I wanted to see the man close enough to know for sure.
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I went three times the first week and twice the next. I saw plenty of people who had encountered something themselves.
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Nervous runners scanning the trees, dog walkers gripping their leashes [music] tightly, cyclists slowing down to warn people about coming from the opposite direction. [music] One afternoon, a woman with a German Shepherd stopped me near the trailhead.
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"Are you going in there alone?" "Yes." She looked behind me toward the parking [music] lot. "Just be careful. That man is out again." "What man?" She looked me up and down.
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"The one with the painted face? You haven't heard?" I asked where she'd seen him at, but she only pointed vaguely down the trail into the left. I think I walked [music] nearly 4 miles that day and still got
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nothing. After around 2 weeks, I thought about just giving it [music] all up. Even if it was him, what exactly did I plan to do with it? Walk up and ask why he'd become this local nightmare?
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Demand an explanation for something that might involve mental illness, drugs, or a private [music] tragedy that I knew nothing about?
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I just decided to stop looking, but 2 days later, I found him. I was leaving a pharmacy when traffic slowed near the entrance to a fast [music] food restaurant.
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There was a man in this long black coat that stepped into the crosswalk. One hand holding a cane, the other resting lightly on the brim of his hat.
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The white face turned toward my car. No [ __ ] way. I drove past [music] the restaurant, circled the block, and returned. Through the windows, I could see him standing at the counter.
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I made another lap, then parked right at a clear view of inside. He'd chosen a booth along the far wall, but the glare in the glass was concealing the details of his face.
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This was the closest I'd ever been. I sat in my car for almost 5 minutes arguing with myself, but finally, I just went inside.
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I ordered a meal that I didn't plan on eating and chose a booth across the room. From there, I could watch him without turning completely in his direction. Coming in as a customer kept me low profile. He hadn't even so much
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as looked at me yet. He'd removed a lot of the costume. The black coat lay folded on the bench beside him, and his hat rested on the table next to a paper cup.
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Beneath the coat, he wore this crisp white shirt, dark vest, and a small pocket with a watch on the chain.
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Without the outer layers, he looked even more like a time traveler. Then I noticed the wireless earbud that was in his right ear.
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The tiny modern detail made the whole thing bizarro. It reminded me that this was not just [music] some character from a forgotten period. This was a man who woke up, selected these clothes, painted his face, and walked into public knowing
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exactly what people saw. He couldn't be that crazy if he was still streaming [music] a Spotify playlist.
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He ate, and as he did, he was doom scrolling. I couldn't believe it. Every so often, his lips moved as he read something, and all of it made my skin crawl. [music] Just as he settled into being normal,
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he'd start making these goofy faces again. A grin would begin, disappear, and then return as a frown.
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It reminded me of somebody that was tripping on acid. I studied the face beneath the makeup.
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[music] The paint had been applied generously, but not carefully, if that makes sense. It collected in the creases near his eyes and around his nostrils.
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His eyebrows were partially covered, [music] making his forehead look strangely large and smooth. Even so, the longer I watched, the more certain I become.
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It was definitely him. His hairline had receded, his face was thinner. He looked older than I expected, [music] but it was definitely, definitely him.
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I ate half my food, waited until he seemed absorbed into whatever was on his phone.
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I then stood, carried my tray toward the trash can, [music] choosing a path that took me past his booth.
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When I was almost beside him, I stopped. [music] The reaction was almost immediate. His entire face convulsed.
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His mouth opened wide while his chin pulled inward, creating a grotesque, almost childlike expression of surprise.
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For a second, he looked exactly like the man from the trail photos. [music] Not startled, but performing the act of being startled.
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Then, everything relaxed. He returned to that [music] distant, empty expression and slowly turned his face to me.
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His eyes scanned every part of me. Recognition appeared almost instantly, and he smiled. And it wasn't cartoony.
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This was the smile that I knew him for. He winked and said, "Nice to see you, Matt." Hearing my name actually kind of scared the [ __ ] out of me. I had not seen him [music] in nearly 10 years. I'd been a
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teenager the last time we spoke. I wasn't the long-haired pudgy boy that I'd been the last time we met, and still, he knew me right away.
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"Do you remember me?" I asked. He picked up a french fry and held it between us.
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He then placed the fry in his mouth, but didn't chew it. I tried again.
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Are you okay? Nothing. It was as if the moment he said my name I ceased to exist. [music] He didn't look angry or confused. He just withdrew somewhere behind the painted face again and refused to come back [music] out.
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People nearby had started to watch us so I left. Kevin would finally respond to me a few weeks later and his message was this simple.
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Don't contact him and don't say his name. I'm too afraid to ask why.
Topics:off the gridhorror storieswilderness encountersmeth lab territorybackpacking horrorsurvival storyanimated true storiesremote wilderness dangerhuman threat outdoorsLoyalsock Trail
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