A friend of mine was in legal troubles. He sued an awful lawyer. The awful lawyer did wild shit like brazenly trying to steal businesses by walking into them and claiming he was the heir of the owner or stuff like that. Those kinds of shenanigans ended up being done to my friend, who owns and runs a restaurant. And that restaurant was claimed by the awful lawyer, despite the fact that my friend’s family had owned and ran the place for decades. Needless to say, that is why my friend was suing the lawyer.

Turns out, one night, the lawyer was in the woods that surround my friend’s house. To everyone’s surprise, the lawyer had been going there every other night. Or so they told me. I didn’t believe it.

I happened to be with my friend that night. We heard the infamous sounds in the woods just as we were playing board games. I heard a voice from above whispering “He’s here!” The voice was my friend’s teenage son, who was supposed to be asleep but apparently woke up every time the lawyer came.

I couldn’t believe it. I was gripped by naive excitement. I got into a very playful mood. We could finally figure out what the sound was. We could investigate.

I didn’t really put much thought into it, but I decided the best way of investigating would be by surprising the supposed lawyer. I decided we should dazzle the lawyer with every single source of light in the house.

A bit to my surprise, my friend and his son agreed. Why did they agree? That’s a great question.

Part of me thinks that they just wanted resolution in this whole episode in their lives, this whole awful lawyer and lawsuit thing. Another part of me thinks maybe they didn’t fear the man. Regardless, for whatever reason, we were all on board. We all thought a bit of light would do no harm. Dazzling was the way.

We then quietly coordinated our light-attack. We gathered flashlights and located the light switches. We each went to our designated positions and got ready.

It was time for the attack. I silently walked through the kitchen up to the back door. I slowly opened it and felt the cool air from the woods. And I waited for the signal.

At this point of the story I want to point out that, to any sane person, this whole plan sounds insane. I’m quite aware of that. As you can tell, we weren’t aware of that that night. We did what we did.

To be fair, as I waited for the signal, I did feel a bit scared. Yes, I thought it was practically impossible for a man to camp right outside my friend’s house. But as I waited for the signal my brain started imagining the man’s face and clothes being lit up by our lights.

In retrospect, a man holding a suitcase was the least of my problems. What if this was a massive animal? There are many life-threatening scenarios I didn’t contemplate. But, as it turned out, at the time, our minds were fixated on “lawyer”. They wanted to see if it was the lawyer. I wanted to disprove that it was the lawyer.

And so the signal came: my friend’s son turned on his gazillion-lumen flashlight. Immediately, I also turned on mine. In an instant, the whole house lit up, as well as the forest. Or at least that’s what I assumed, because I couldn’t really see the forest. I was dazzled.

Our plan was so astoundingly short-sighted that we were all blinded by our own lights.

However, something moved outside. And just as our eyes adjusted to our light-attack, we all simultaneously saw the source of the sound: an opossum.

Turns out, the opossum had been going there every other night and making sound all along.

The sound had been misinterpreted by my friend’s son. The poor kid thought that the insane lawyer could actually camp outside. This sort of makes sense because the poor kid was only told that a man was getting sued by his parents. That and that this man sometimes walked into restaurants and stores and claimed them as his.

So what happened? That night, we all had a good laugh. The opossum was given a name, the name of the lawyer. As to the lawsuit, the charges were dropped because my friend realized this man was not targeting them in particular. This man was an opportunist, and he was crushed by other lawsuits and debt.

I’ll sometimes hear what sounds like eerie cries of agony coming from the woods. I looked it up, it turns it was just foxes.

On a long hike, pushed the whole ‘stop and set up camp’ thing way too late, so it’s already dark as I’m starting to pitch the tent. Start feeling really uneasy like I’m being watched, so I do a quick sweep of my surroundings with my flashlight - and sure as shit two reflective eyes become visible for half a second before the critter that owns them gets spooked by light and runs off. Couldn’t see the actual animal, just the eyes, but now I’m borderline shitting myself with fear, so I get in the semi-pitched-but-fuck-it tent and lay down listening for footsteps or something.

Never did hear footsteps, but about 20 mins later that little shit let out an incredibly loud and absolutely blood curdling scream… like, women getting actively murdered whilst screaming into a megaphone, kind of scream… right outside the tent.

Then nothing for the remainder of the night.

I get home and start searching the web for what the actual fuck that was: 99% sure I was being stalked by a cougar.

I was wandering through a local forest during the summer. It was a beautiful day and being in the shade was real nice. I didn’t know the route super well, so after a long hike I stop at a crossroad and wonder how to get back to the start. I rest for a bit and winder if I could take the overgrown path leading straight back to where I came from. The sun is also getting low, so I better hurry. I don’t want to be in the woods at evening/night. I drink up and decide to get on it. The moment I wanted to set that thought in motion, I hear howling barks and growls above me. I look up the hills but can’t see anything. Fuck the overgrown path, fuck getting adveterous and I hurry back the path I came from.

Was camping in Killarney Provincial Park with friends in uni. Woke up to hear noises in bush. Girlfriend got scared and I hushed her so I could hear what might be going on outside.

Lots of noise. Grunting. Brush moving, dirt being kicked around. Finally something hits our tent. Girlfriend screams.

It’s Dave. Drunk as fuck and can’t find designated shitter so after pissing in bushes, then pacing around deciding how to deal with stage 4 dook, decides to wake me for light and directions to shitter.

We all have a good laugh.

Wake up hour later, same thing. Fuckoff Dave. Dave? No. Blackbears.

I was camping by myself near the Indian Heaven Wilderness in the south Cascades and two owls were having a hootenanny for about 15 minutes, and it was echoing in the canyon. It was such a cool, spooky experience, I loved it.

Was doing some geocaching deep in the woods at night when I saw a bunch of eyes reflecting back in the distance. It was definitely animals, since at least one pair followed me for a bit. But they kept their distance and I eventually lost them.

I’ve only been camping in a tent three times as an adult. I heard some interesting things. Never anything ur am legend worthy.

One was a bachelor’s party. Some of the folks got into some things, I didn’t partake. I was super anxious about the trip already. It was in the southern most part of the Appalachian mountains. Honestly probably not really even in the mountains. Maybe more in the Blue Ridge area. Anyways, it’s quiet. I hear a weird noise. I immediately recognize as a helicopter. With no other sounds and being surrounded by hills and trees they sounds WEIRD! You can hear them from way further. It sounded so ominous. I jokingly turn to the group and ask “Is that the trumpet?” Implying the trumpets that will sound during the rapture. I think I sort of got a few of 'em before they realized what it was!

From that same trip I remember finally being in my tent alone. First time being in a tent alone. As a kid I always had a buddy in bot scouts or parent. I was so fucking cold. I forgot a mat to put my sleeping bag on. As I’m laying there cold, cold as hell, trying to not panic about being “alone” (because my friends are so close! Just in the other tents!) I just hear the wind. Again, in the middle of a quiet forest with only the wind creeping along my imagination takes over. I imagine it as a giant air serpent creeping along through the trees, weaving and rustling all the leaves.

The last one was with my wife for a friend’s birthday party. We hear leaves crunch near the tent and hear little sniffs by our heads outside the tent. Based on the sounds I think it was a racoon or a opossum. So cute!

The other time we went camping was with my parents. They were in their RV and my wife and I just slept in the tent outside lol. It’s the only time we brought our dog camping. She was such a good watch pup. Just sat on the bed, very alert. I think she was nervous. If she could talk she probably has weird stories about that night. It’s interesting to think that all the noises you hear at a large campsite with RVs that you know are just folks doing stuff probably freak the dog out. She doesn’t know. Even if she does, she knows she’s supposed to protect us from people. Or at least thinks she does.

Not that scary, more just interesting. I was camping on a full moon near a creek with a lot of quail. For a while in the night I heard these periodic short screams, probably something hunting them and just hearing their last cry. I’m guessing the moon gave whatever more light to hunt with. It made me sad when it was happening but in retrospec it was kinda neat.

In the Southern Appalachians, if you hear something strange, no you didn’t. You’re alone, but you hear someone say your name, no you didn’t. If you see something you can’t explain, no you didn’t.

Can’t recall anything I’ve seen or heard that’s out of the ordinary, nope. No I didn’t.