We might not be alone

Bigfoot sightings abound across Northwest Georgia

Asking someone if they believe in Bigfoot is akin to inquiring about their political preferences or their bank account balance: it’s a subject to be broached with extreme tact — if it’s broached at all.

If you meet a believer, you’ll know by the level stare and the hesitant answers. Those who think there’s something humanoid living in the woods surrounding North Georgia’s towns and cities learn to measure their audience before holding forth. So, when I saw that a Bigfootcentric Facebook post had drawn a mile-long stack of comments from my neighbors late last year, I knew I’d found the rare space where people felt they could open up. There had been a sighting very near my home, which is not far from John’s Mountain Wildlife Management Area.

The discussion revealed John’s Mountain to be a hotbed for such appearances, and this revelation shouldn’t have surprised me. The striations and hollows that draw dusk to themselves prematurely and only give up that darkness for brief periods of the day seem prime for something that might desire seclusion.

THE EXPERT

David Bakara owns Expedition Bigfoot, a museum right by Highway 515 just north of Ellijay. The attraction also functions as a research and reporting center. Bakara confirmed to me that he’s heard of “lots and lots and lots” of sightings across John’s Mountain.

He’s spent 40 years hunting for signs of an otherworldly, bipedal being in the Southern woods. Raised in Florida, his interest in Bigfoot began when he saw TV stories with public officials addressing reports of sightings. But he distinctly remembers not hearing about Bigfoot in school.

“The two things just kept clashing,” he said.

Since he opened Expedition Bigfoot in 2016, he’s heard stories that have run a gamut: “good neighbor” humans receiving gifts from these mysterious woods dwellers and people who have rearranged their lives after a sighting so as to avoid a repeat — that’s how frightening it can be. He confirmed that those who experience sightings rarely open up — people don’t want to be ridiculed.

“There’s probably hundreds of people who have seen them, but we’ll never hear the story,” he said. “It’s not just, ‘I don’t believe.’ It’s even worse than that.”

But those who report sightings are resolute, and the descriptions Bakara’s heard consistently depict a mountain of a figure with superhuman strength.

“When you see one, you realize how big they are,” he said. It’s solid muscle — you’re outclassed.”

These beings vary in their interactions with humans. Some don’t like people, and some will save a human’s life in a dangerous situation in the woods, he said. They use science in a way we can’t yet understand, which explains the supernatural experiences people report, he contended. These instances include beings disappearing behind trees, fading into thin air and having eyes that glow in the dark without reflecting light. Sighting descriptions vary, but you can tell some things about a person by the way they react, he asserted.

“Bigfoot’s interesting,” he said. “But when you see how people deal with it — man!”

THE RESEARCH PROCESS

As I began reading on the subject of nonhuman, bipedal woods inhabitants and started interviewing people for the accounts you’ll read in the next installment, my subconscious kicked into high gear. Living practically in the woods both complicated and enhanced the research process because I essentially began to live it.

Bigfoot was never far from my mind, and I must say I was jumpy. I began feeding my horses long before dark. I lived in apprehension of catching something lumbering toward me in the half light as I turned from filling a water trough. We had a long fall in Northwest Georgia last year, and as the golden days progressed, I found myself with an eye and an ear toward the edge of the woods as I prepped hay and grain.

“‘It’s 4:30 p.m.,’ my husband would say. ‘Why are you feeding horses?’”

“‘Well, Bigfoot,’” was my invariable response.

He would roll his eyes — he’s a staunch nonbeliever.

Yet, gradually, my fear ebbed. I realized I’d been blundering around my farm unaware of the possibility of another humanoid presence for quite some time and that I’d have had a real scare already if I were a target. And then I started thinking about the possibility that, given their apparent elusiveness, these beings, if they exist, might want to live in peace, and if they were roaming my woods that they might be willing to share space as long as I didn’t go looking for them.