Welcome back to Dark Florida, where the moss
hangs low and the whispers run deep, and the
unknown is just waiting to be explored. I'm your
host, Brooke Morland, and whether you've been
here since episode one or just stumbled out of
the woods to join us, I'm so Glad you're here.
Before we dive in, don't forget to follow Dark
Florida on Instagram at Dark Florida Podcast.
Subscribe to us on YouTube and check out the
link in the episode description if you'd like
to support the show. You can also send your own
strange encounters or stories to me at darkfloridapodcast
at gmail .com. And wherever you're listening,
be sure to leave a five star review. really helps
the show. Now let's get to tonight's guest, Rachel.
She brings something truly special to the campfire
with a triple major in biology. geology, and
microbiology. In over 20 years of experience
as an industrial hygienist, she's got a sharp
scientific mind and a serious investigative edge.
She's participated in fish behavior studies in
Honduras, endangered species surveys in Australia,
and primate observation in the Kansas City Zoo,
as well as being a geological research on ancient
impact zones. She has seen it all. But It's not
just the science that's shaped her story. She
also grew up in a deeply religious town in the
heart of the Midwest, a place that was brimming
with spook lights, haunted buildings, whispers
of witches, and buried giants. So it's no surprise
that her life has taken her deep into the realms
of folklore and the unexplained. And it gets
even stranger. Today, we'll talk about a Bigfoot
sighting when she was a geology student in Colorado.
a recent possible sighting of her own with her
son in Lithia Springs, right here in Florida,
and the eerie coincidence of a missing 4 -1 -1
case that took place in the very same area 60
years prior. This episode is a reminder that
The High Strange doesn't always give you a heads
up. Sometimes you're just in the right place
or wrong place at the right time and always,
always bring two GoPros. So grab a flashlight,
settle in, and let's get weird. Welcome back
to another episode of Dark Florida. Today I am
joined by Rachel and I'm so excited to have you
here. I know that we've gotten a chance to talk
and I've read the email you sent me and I have
just so many questions. But first, Welcome to
the show. Thank you very much. It's a pleasure
to be here. Yeah. So do you mind just sharing
with the audience just a little bit about your
background and who you are? Sure. Absolutely.
So to explain what I do, I'm an industrial hygienist
and a lot of people are not familiar with my
field. It's a specialized field of public health.
And basically what it entails is background with
respect to toxicology, epidemiology, biostatistics.
What I do is I travel across the U .S. going
to environmental locations or industrial sites,
monitoring those sites to see if there could
be something that has an effect upon public health.
So my particular focus of interest are things
that are beyond human senses. So what could be
impacting worker psychology or their health long
term that maybe they can't sense, either visually
or audially or maybe by odor. So it's a really
fascinating field to work in. Not very well known,
very well specialized, but I really enjoy what
I do. I've had the opportunity to participate
in disaster response and it's a rewarding field.
It definitely seems like there will never be
a dull day. No, it's always different and I never
really know what I'm going to encounter, certainly,
especially when I was consulting. I could be
brought in for either health concerns or maybe
there was something going on there that they
wanted to be proactive about that the personnel
were handling on site or exposed to in the environment
in some way. been a rewarding career and any
time I've been involved with a disaster response
from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill to Hurricane
Katrina to moving around the U .S. monitoring
different different environments and conditions.
It's been a really great career. It sounds like
it. Have you ever been called out to anything
that you've been suspicious, maybe has some more
of that paranormal or supernatural aspect to
it? Or have you ever come across anything that's
left you feeling kind of like you've encountered
something unexplained? So I go to a lot of areas
where maybe something has gone wrong. And I come
in after the fact to help put a picture together
of what might have happened. And in some cases,
it's a need to to know type scenario. And one
situation that I'm thinking of immediately, I
was brought to a site and they wanted to do a
combination of assessing for as best as containing
materials on site, but then also looking for
things like mold and fungi and collecting spores
and assessing the area that what we were told
was that. a large water tank on top of the building
had leaked and it impacted the floors below and
they wanted to get the building back to reoccupancy.
So I came in there with another coworker and
we split out, we were doing our respective things
and you know it was a pharmaceutical facility
and it was interesting because there were some
areas where it looked like equipment had just
been ripped off of the walls and walking through
those spaces alone with partial power and hearing
containment breach alarms and going through airlocks
that had been opened. It felt a little bit like
I was on the set of a movie, I'm not gonna lie,
but that one immediately comes to mind. It's
always really kind of stuck out. Was this really
a water leak or could we have been brought in
because maybe something got out? And yeah, you
know, I'll never really answer that question.
it was a need -to -know type assessment, so I'll
never know. You're originally from Kansas, but
you have had your own cryptid sightings. And
in your email, you talk about how you kind of
grew up hearing whispers of legends of potential
military exercises, things like that. And one
of the things that stick out to me was you had
mentioned some giant mounds. Now, are we talking
giant Indian burial mounds or the serpent mounds
that are up in Ohio? There are some burial mounds
found throughout the Midwestern US that were
used by indigenous cultures to bury artifacts,
bury ancestors, or they were built for some type
of religious significance. And interestingly
enough, I was looking at one specific area that
was close to... It was close to a military testing
range near Canopolis State Park, and there had
been a missing 411 case in that area. There aren't
very many missing 411 cases that involve the
state of Kansas, but because I was familiar with
it, I was looking it up. And on the aerial map,
you can see a mound that is called out as a point
of interest. And if you look at the comments,
then there are comments made by individuals who
claim that there are rumors that giants are buried
in the mound. Giants. as in giant skeletons.
I thought that was very interesting, but it's
an unusual area. You know, we used to see military
aircraft flying around in that space while we
were out hiking. And you never quite knew what
you were going to run into out in the woods out
in that area. Sounds like it. You bring up the
missing 411. That is a case study that I find
just So interesting. Anytime I hear Missing 411,
my ears kind of perk up. Absolutely. And you
know, if it weren't for Missing 411, I wouldn't
be talking about some of the strange things that
have that have happened to me out in the outdoors.
That was really what got me open up to with respect
to a Bigfoot sighting that I had when I was in
college. Yeah, you know, I saw Missing 411, the
hunted one night and something clicked. And then
I needed to know more. I got all of the books.
I watched the two documentaries that were available
at that time. I couldn't get enough of it. And
it really made me think and consider that some
of these situations really are strange. And everything
that I've looked up after the fact has been corroborated
by what I've read in the books. Very fascinating.
It is. Absolutely. So, okay. So with that being
said, I guess that's a good segue into this next
part. We mentioned that you had a sighting. Do
you mind kind of explaining what happened with
that? Sure. So at the time I was a geology student
and I was working in Colorado. and not as a student
that year, but as an orderly for the field camp
that the students would attend every year. So
late in their career, they would be going to
the field camp to learn how to do field exercises,
primarily mapping of geological units out where
there's some interesting topography in Colorado.
That year I had an unusual job. I was sent out.
prior to being a student as just sort of a field
orderly to help maintain the camp while the students
were out during the day. And it meant that I
had the run of the mountains. I had basically
full use of the camp while everyone was gone.
And one day, you know, I had been spending my
days hiking around the mountains. There was a
gap between two classes. There were two to three
week long classes and the students finished their
first class and typically celebrated the weekend
between the two classes. And that weekend, You
know, we did some whitewater rafting, but they
also invited me to summit a mountain with them.
And I thought that sounded like a good idea.
So long story short, I felt suddenly pretty sick
as we were going up the mountain and. I assumed
it was altitude sickness, and I didn't want to
mess up the summit experience for the three students
that invited me to go along with them. So I said,
I know where I'm at with respect to how to get
back. I'm fine. You guys go on ahead. I'll take
a quick break here and then head back by myself.
I feel perfectly comfortable doing that. I'm
very familiar with this area. Go on ahead. So
we split up. The three of them continued up the
mountain. I took I took a brief break. I put
my backpack down on the rock that, you know,
I sat down on when they left and thought while
I was there and I had a good vantage point, I
would take a few pictures and I turn around and
I come back. My backpack is nowhere to be found.
I can't find it. You know, I thought it was just
maybe 20 or 30 feet behind me on the rock I'd
been sitting on and I couldn't find it. Or at
least it wasn't on the rock that I thought it
was on. So I spent a lot of time. looking around
the area trying to find my backpack and getting
pretty upset probably getting starting to get
pretty vocal at that point about it certainly
not something I wanted to leave behind you know
otherwise I would have had to completely replace
everything in my pack and of course I didn't
want to do that it had my water and everything
in it and I still needed to get down the mountain
so eventually I noticed that it's right there.
It's right where I thought it was. And at this
point, I know that I'm needing to make up some
time to get back down. So put on my pack. I don't
question it, but I don't take the exact route
that I took on the way up. You know, we weren't
really on a trail per se, but I wanted to make
up some time. So I thought I would take a more
direct route, kind of a shortcut. And I ended
up to make a long story short on the wrong side
of a saddle and came down between two cliffs.
And there was a river that it switched back twice
in front of me so I would have to cross it twice.
And I really didn't want to have to do that.
I was by myself. And as I'm standing there kind
of milling between these two cliffs, there were
these large limestone boulders that had fallen
down from the cliffs at some point in time and
were sitting in the, you know, kind of buried,
partially buried into the ground. And I'm not
sure what to do because I certainly don't want
to have to go back up the mountain and potentially
run the risk of feeling ill again. And I hear
this rock hitting a rock and I look up and I
see what I can only describe as a Sasquatch standing
there at the edge of the cliff looking down at
me. And I could tell that it seemed like it waited
for me to see it. And as soon as I saw it, then
it was like an acknowledgement happened and it
moved away from the cliff edge immediately out
of view. And it was really hard for me to digest
that. I spent years trying to rationalize what
could have possibly been other than that, but...
You know, even if you put someone in a suit,
somehow you found someone who happened to have
very unusual body proportions and were about...
seven feet tall and artificially elongated their
forearms or something like that. I don't think
that a person could have replicated the movement.
It was just so fast and smooth and unlike your
standard run -of -the -mill human, the way that
it moved away from the edge of the cliff, it
was so fast. Yeah, I knew that I'd seen something
unusual. I was very afraid at that point in time.
I made a beeline to get out of there and get...
back to the camp. There was no question I was
going across the creek twice, whatever it took.
And I was afraid to look behind myself. Just
knew that something was there. I felt like I
was being watched, maybe pursued the whole time,
and eventually made it back to camp. And I did
tell two of the students who hadn't made the
summit attempt when I, you know, as soon as I
saw someone, I was like, hey guys, I think I
saw a Bigfoot. And they started laughing. They
thought it was hilarious. And I really thought
my life was in danger. So I clammed up about
it and I didn't speak of it for almost 20 years,
actually. My spouse didn't know about it. And
anyway, I got back to camp, didn't mention it
again. About a week later, something started
circling my cabin at night. And I really, to
this day, feel like that's what it was. It was
the creature that I'd seen that day. I was sharing
a cabin with a teaching assistant and we mentioned
it once in the morning, the first morning after
it happened. And he said, Hey, did you hear that?
bear circling our cabin last night. I just kind
of acknowledged him and we never spoke of it
after that point. But, you know, if I'd really
thought it had been a black bear, I would have
been looking out of the window for sure, right?
I mean, I'm not that bothered by bears really,
especially being inside a cabin, but neither
of us, both of us were not looking out of the
windows to see what it was that was circling
our cabins. That was my, that was my into questioning
everything that I thought that I knew at that
point. I'm sure that was a very life -changing
event. And it's interesting you said that about
your pack kind of being displaced, changing locations
on you. On episode 14 of this show, I interviewed
a woman named Marcia Clark. And she talks about
during her encounter that she had this very specific
pen, right? Because she had been left in this
national forest and it had a light on the tip
of it. So when she could write notes about any
activity or things like that, you can see at
night. and that there were things happening at
the camp. I think vocalizations or maybe some
sort of sound, some sort of audio was happening
and it was diverting her attention away. And
when she had come back, the pen was gone. So
she's looking all over. She's like, what? I know
I just hadn't left it right here. This is crazy.
Search, search, search. Some more stuff had happened.
Come back and the pen is exactly where she had
remembered it being before and had already searched
and it wasn't there. prior. And that's when she
says, Oh, my gosh, okay, something was messing
with me. So that's the first thing I want to
point out is that I have heard people talk about
that with encounters, almost like they're toying
with you or playing a game with you of some sort.
That's exactly how I felt in hindsight, you know,
and it didn't it didn't really sink in until
maybe a few years ago, I thought about it. But
I had always written it off as oh, I was just
incompetent and disoriented and all the rocks
look the same out there and I must have lost
track of my backpack. But now I really feel like
something was messing with me up there. And that
area was the same area that would have been attached
to that cliff where I ended up having the sighting.
it definitely seems like maybe something was
messing with me up there. And somehow it's bothersome
to think of it actually, because I know that
I could have been really close to it and had
absolutely no idea. No, that's what I was thinking.
Talk about missing 411 when you talked about
being disoriented. Were you already hiking when
you started to kind of feel off? Yes. And, you
know, and this is the this is the other thing.
So I have two experiences that really bother
me. One of them is this sighting and in both
scenarios and I'm also interested in folklore,
by the way. There is so much folklore out there
that makes mention of the fact that, you know,
you shouldn't be disrespectful. You shouldn't
say things that in a joking manner that could
offend an entity of some kind. And this is one
of the two situations where I had made a joke
as we were climbing. And the reason I'd made
a joke is I saw some unusual scat shortly before
I started to feel ill. It looked sort of like
it had the same composition of the bear skin
that we had been seeing, but the shape was a
bit different. It was more like almost like a
cow pie shape. I had made this really loud joke
that, oh, I'm going to get this analyzed for
Bigfoot DNA. I'm going to take home a sample
and was laughing about it, you know, and just
being a little bit obnoxious. And shortly after
that is when I started to feel. pretty sick.
And I'd always chalked it up to altitude sickness.
Of course, that's the first thing you're going
to think of when you're in the mountains. And
the best thing to do is to get down to a lower
elevation, which is why I thought, oh, I'll just
go down to a lower elevation. I'll be fine. And
had no issues with the rest of the group splitting
off from me. But yeah, in hindsight, thinking
about it, that always bothered me too. I made
maybe a disrespectful joke and I felt like I
was singled out in some way or maybe made sick,
if that makes sense. No, it does. And for lack
of a better word, some people don't like this
term. But I have heard reports of people and
solo individuals feeling zapped, that nauseousness,
that sickness, headaches, that type of a thing,
feeling like they're going to pass out, like
they need to sit down. You hear that in these
sightings. I do have to agree. I think sometimes
the universe does have a way of humbling us in
funny ways. You have a background in geology
and you spoke about the limestone. And I think
that's part of the Missing 411 profile points
is that limestone and that granite. Perhaps those
areas are supercharged for this type of activity.
And what do you think the correlation between
something like Sasquatch and this limestone and
granite, how are those two things connected?
Well, you know, what's interesting about that
area, right? So they're The cliffs that I was
looking at, the large cliffs on either side of
the creek switchback, were all limestone cliffs.
And the boulders that were surrounding me in
that field between the two cliffs were all limestone
that had fallen from the cliffs. But underneath
it is all precambrian granite. So I didn't mention
that, but you did, so I'm going to go there.
If you actually go down in that creek and you
bring a magnet with you, put a plastic bag over
it to keep the magnet from getting contaminated,
you can collect a lot of magnetite. out of that
creek. I had done that before and had done that
during some field exercises out there. I came
back the following year when I was a student
and that was part of my mapping area. But the
whole area is, you know, under underlain by the
Precambrian granite which is full of magnetite.
So who knows what that is and who knows if that
could potentially be part of it. I almost feel
like it could be because there are a lot of cases
out there that seem to correlate with presence
of granite, granite boulders, and maybe there's
something to that magnetite presence out there.
Something conducting some extra energy and maybe
harnessing some of that ley line, high strangeness
energy. Right. Well, and fault lines as well.
You can see that through some of those areas.
Some of the areas we were in specifically, we
wanted to map out. the fault lines and areas
where water travels through rock. You could see
and this was you know I have a bit of a botanical
interest background as well in terms of understanding
flora and fauna in an area. doing ecological
and wetlands assessments, I'm always looking
at the types of plants that are growing in an
area. I had an advantage during the field mapping
exercises because I could tell where the faults
were by the change in the plants. There would
be plants that would grow where there was more
water and typically where the water was being
transmitted, it would move very easily through
a fault line through rocks. So I had a bit of
an advantage there. I could look at the plants
and see where they were changing and then start
focusing in on those areas to see where the fault
lines might be. And typically that would lead
me to geologically maybe something more interesting
that might be missed otherwise. I love that you're
looking for clues that a lot of people maybe
overlook or just don't have the background to
notice. But as far as being more science -based,
you had this encounter happen about 20 years
ago. Your friends, your peers laughed it off.
And I'm sure that coming from that background,
you were probably, if I had to assume, maybe
worried about how it would be received by other
peers and colleagues, when did you kind of step
into your truth? And I'm sure that being able
to talk about it and dissect it, that has to
feel good because holding on to that trauma,
that's scary. You know, knowing that you were
so close to something, not sure what the intentions
are behind some of the things that you saw, it
probably feels good to be able to talk about
it and try to make more sense of it. What got
you to out of your shell, so to speak, and wrap
your head around what happened to you. Yeah,
of course. And that's such a great topic. And
I got to say, I feel so much better now being
open about it. It's nice to meet other people
that have had similar experiences. I feel like
when I have a conversation with someone that's
gone through something similar to that, there's
kind of a kinship that's there because there's
so many shared experiences that are hard to explain.
I was really afraid to talk about it for a long
time. For a long time, I refused to acknowledge
that it happened. It was almost like it was locked
away. And I mentioned that I saw it missing 411,
the 100, and that was kind of the door opening
there. That's when I started thinking about it.
That's when I started wanting to learn more.
So that was in 2021. And a few months after the
fact, I brought it up to... my spouse and told
him what was going on and then I told others
that were you know a handful of people that were
really close to me and to my surprise this time
I really wasn't laughed at they could tell I
was serious about it and understood that I was
in that moment really afraid you know to to be
somewhere where no one knows where you are and
to see something that just outclasses you in
every possible way it's and you don't know the
rules of how to interact with it or what the
intention is there very clearly I felt wanted
me to understand that it was there and I needed
to leave whatever area I was in. Yeah, it's just
not something that ever leaves you. And it was
really hard for me to deal with emotionally until
I could open up about it. And then it was a huge
relief, especially when I found some others that
I had some common ground with. And I went on
a trip with some friends of mine from my hometown.
You know, we had kind of a reunion trip, so to
say, we kind of met from different parts of the
country and rented a cabin together in the Midwest
and caught up on old times. And while we were
out there, somehow the topic came up and I, you
know, while we were walking in the woods, I mentioned
my sighting. Everybody was great about it. They
wanted to know more, ask questions about it.
Nobody, I didn't feel like I was saying anything
ridiculous, but what got very interesting about
it was come to find out one of my childhood friends
has become a therapist and she has a client that
had an experience that was very similar to mine
only in California. And her client was seeing
her because this person was having a very hard
time psychologically handling it. And so when
she heard it from me, she looked at me very seriously
and said, you know what, my perspective on this
has changed quite a bit after hearing you relate
this. And we started going back and forth. with
text messages about it and eventually I sent
her some recommendations for books that I had
read to kind of learn more that really helped
me deal with things and she got back to me and
said you know what my client lit up like a Christmas
tree when I told her about you and I started
sharing materials that you'd recommended because
There was such a relief there and her client
said, you know, I'm just so relieved it's not
just me that went through this. And there was
some common ground with someone and I was, you
know, it felt good for me to help someone else
deal with it because it's not an easy thing.
You know, like I said, it never leaves you and
I still have a hard night. sometimes remembering
that how I felt in that moment and after the
fact. My heart always goes out for people who
have situations like that because it absolutely
can break your paradigm when you see something
that's unexplainable that you have been taught
does not exist and but you're looking at it and
you had a very real and scary experience with
it that always gets to me. While we're on the
topic of it, what were some of the characteristics
that you noticed about it? What did it look like?
I couldn't make out any of the detail. It was
more like a silhouette on the top of the cliff
than anything else. I could clearly see the body
outline when it moved and how it moved. But I
could tell it was covered in very, very dark
hair, either black or potentially very dark brown.
But it was just so dark that I couldn't make
out. any of the detail. And I don't know if that's
a good or a bad thing. Definitely been curious
about it, but at the same time, and I'd love
to see what one looks like up close, you know,
if I if I can do that in a safe way and be absolutely
assured that, you know, nothing bad was going
to happen about it. I'd love to know what the
detail is of maybe what their facial features
look like. But as far as gender or details of
the face, I really couldn't say because I couldn't
see anything. But I could see the physiology
and the shape. And I'm not sure if you're familiar
with the Harvey Pratt composite drawings, but
there are a few of his drawings that match what
I saw almost exactly in terms of body shape,
which I've one in particular, I've spent a lot
of time looking at it because it just, every
time I see it, it brings me back to that day.
Now you're speaking my language. I actually got
Dave Palladis to sign my copy of the Hooper project.
That's one of my favorite. I did see it at the
conference. Yeah, a couple of years ago. Oh,
really? That's awesome. That's one of my favorite
books. And there's some really good sketches
in there. I love Harvey Pratt. I love that they
were able to team up and go interview these witnesses
and really get a glimpse as close as we can to
what they saw without actually having been there
or taken a picture. I think that's so cool. Yeah.
The Hoopa Project and Tribal Bigfoot are two
of my favorite books. And a lot of it has to
do with the Harvey Pratt drawings are just so
fascinating. This was your first sighting. Seeing
that unlocked your memory, you kind of hidden
that away and maybe suppressed it over all those
years. I've only had the one sighting. However,
and this is a big part of the driver of why I'm
wanting to look more into the phenomenon is,
you know, I have children now and in 2023 we
were at a playground. in Florida, Atthea Springs,
for anyone that might be curious. While we were
at the playground, and this is a very busy park
in the summer, especially all of the pavilions
are occupied. You're lucky to get one. You got
to show up right away if you want to get one.
And there's a circle drive, so it's not against
remote woods or anything like that. But there
is a patch of woods next to where the playground
was at that point in time. And suddenly I noticed
that my youngest son, who would have been three,
He had wandered away from the playground. He
was standing at the edge of the woods and it
almost looked like there was a game trail where
he was standing and he was kind of looking at
something in there. I got up and was like, okay,
what are you doing? You know, why are you trying
to wander into the woods? And he told me that
he saw Krampus standing there. I was like, that
doesn't sound good. So I dropped what I was doing,
went down that trail, partially looked around,
couldn't see anything, you know, and keep in
mind this little section of woods is completely
surrounded by road. There's no way anything could
leave without having to cross a road with very
crowded. pavilions of people out picnicking within
eyesight. I'm looking around. I'm looking up
and down. I couldn't see anything, but I did
notice that if there was, you know, a very large
person or something standing in the woods, it
could watch the kids very clearly from the playground
there. It just thinking about my kids being around
something like that or potentially having the
feeling that I did after Colorado, it really
bothered me. We were spooked. We left. And then
the conference, the same one we were just talking
about with David Politis and the year that Ron
Morehead and Jeff Meldrum were there, had those
great t -shirts, right, with the Bigfoot walking
the alligator on a leash. I had to get on a leash.
I came home with one. My three -year -old immediately,
when he saw my shirt, points at me and says,
mommy, it's Krampus next to the playground. And
I'm just like, oh, you know, no, I don't want...
my kids to be necessarily interacting with these
things. Not unless I know that it's safe, right?
And that's what's driving my interest in the
research is I want my kids to have the same love
of the outdoors that I do. You don't want them
to be scared. No, I don't want them to have this,
to maybe have the burden of being terrified of
things that are out there. But at the same time,
I can't really tell them that we understand everything.
that could be in the woods now. It's a really
frustrating place to be as a parent. And we just
got back from a trip to the Midwest. And when
you grow up in a farming family and you marry
into a farming family, at some point in time,
whenever you go back, you're going to get put
to work on somebody's farm. We happened to be
soybean planting while we were out there. And
while we were out, you know, in one of the fields
that the kids were kind of rotating who gets
to ride in the tractor that was pulling the soybean
planter. There was a patch of woods that used
to be part of an old homestead next to the soybean
field, a little bit of a marshy area that the
tractor had to move around. And then this area
where there were these mulberry trees. And my
husband was trying to take the kids back there
to pick some mulberries. And I hung back. I took
a couple of pictures and then, you know, I was
just about to catch up to them on the edge of
the woods. And suddenly my husband is shooing
the kids toward my direction and I was like what's
going on you know because he was acting weird
and the kids were making a booking it to get
out and he's like I saw something in the woods
what'd you see well it was I couldn't really
see it but it was black had it looked like maybe
it had furrows about three feet off of the ground
and it was moving away from us and I didn't hear
anything crashing through the woods but you know
at least three feet tall there aren't a lot of
things in a state with no bears or an area without
wild hogs that are that big right and usually
if something is that big it's going to make some
noise crashing through the woods. It was absolutely
silent. I wasn't that far away from them. So
that was day one. Almost 24 hours later, exactly,
we're out in a side -by -side and the three kids,
my husband and I, are all in the side -by -side
and we're moving on the border of a field with
with woods on our right and the soybean field
that had just been planted on the left. Suddenly
my oldest son, my nine -year -old, was like,
I just saw something move. He's like, well, I
don't know what it was. It was black and it jumped
out of a tree and then it hid in the grass. What
would do that? So, you know, we're like, well,
was it a snake? You know, thinking something
black, is it a snake? Was it a raccoon? He's
like, no, no, it was not. And later I was like,
all right, tell me what you saw. And he described
it as just under the height of a doorknob if
it was standing up. So about three feet tall,
but covered with hair. And I asked him to tell
me what the closest animal would be that he saw
if he compared to something said well it had
arms it looked like an orangutan. I was like
what? But he said the fur was so black it was
like looking like it was like looking at a hole
only he could see two shiny eyes and I had him
draw it for me and I did happen to have a camera
running that while we were out I'd started it
when we left the house and it was continuously
running on us and he's he drops immediately drops
a topic While we're in this side -by -side and
immediately like I saw something move and he
starts talking about at that point so I wish
like heck I'd had another camera that was facing
out into the woods and we went back out there
and I did have cameras facing the woods but we
that was the only time that we saw it but two
sightings within hours of Something and I asked
him. Well, do you think maybe it could have been?
a juvenile Bigfoot. And he liked that idea. Thinking
about all the sightings now, two of my kids,
my spouse is like, well, it could have been anything.
So he's not really sure. He's not convinced.
And I had one that I know for sure couldn't have
been explained by anything else. It's a little
too close to home. What is it about us? That's
now four out of five of us that I suspect have
seen something that isn't officially recognized
in some way. I was wondering if you guys have
any sort of, do you have any German? On my side,
not that I'm aware of, but my husband is 75 %
German ancestry. It's interesting though, that
you were the one who it was kicked off with your
experience back in 2001 to now having things
happen in 2025. I think some people have been
toying around with the idea of higher consciousness,
potentially hive mind things. Do you become a
marked individual after having these things?
I had a family member, my nanny, she had a sighting,
and then obviously I've gotten into it and whatnot.
Does it affect a family lineage or a family tree?
Do you become marked, so to speak, and you're
maybe more primed to have these types of things
and encounters happen? It sounds like you're
also in some very rural remote areas too. Right,
right. I mean, the area of woods we were in,
they do have a hunting lease out there, but it's
been in the family for 150 years, you know, was
Sac and Fox Nationland that was briefly sold
to a railroad and then became the family farmland
after the fact. But other than that, has been
continuously in the family. That's not someplace
where members of the public go because it's private
land unless they're out there for the hunting
lease reasons. So, yeah, isolated. Well, in your
email and without giving away any sort of exact
location, you said that you found a missing 411
case that kind of correlated to the same general
area where one of these sightings occurred. Right.
So that where my son had his sighting within
about, if I had to estimate it, I would say within
about 30 feet, there was a body located in 1965
associated with missing 411 case that happened.
on the land which is crazy to think about because
I mean two very strange experiences happening
in almost on top of each other separated by 60
years is just what are the odds, right? It's
just very strange. What's your theory on all
this? I know you come from a very science driven
background, but you also have been exposed to
some of the folklore and legend. So there's definitely
something there, a very real creature that and
why it's not acknowledged. That's the big question,
isn't it? I really wonder about that. And it's
interesting that you brought up the marked thought.
earlier because that has been weighing in the
back of my mind especially since we just had
these two sightings now when we went back to
the Midwest. It's really bothering me somewhat.
It's like why us? And I've read other instances
where there there may be families or groups of
people that have been visited or had some type
of interaction with something while they're living
in a remote area they move somewhere else across
country and then they start to have the same
things happen when they relocate right and it's
almost like the locals know that they're in the
know somehow and so they come up and start messing
with them i i just i just can't get get rid of
the thought that maybe once there maybe there's
a belief aspect to it that once someone has an
experience or gets to the point where they know
to some degree or they believe then does the
belief give it some type of way to to still interact
or or just i don't know i really don't know maybe
these things aren't being acknowledged because
there's a certain amount of danger if people
did believe yeah So it and and you know I so
and this is I love folklore because I think you
can learn things that have a very real explanation
by Looking into you know, what what did people
believe before? I mean we always find real scientific
explanations for phenomenon that weren't understood
sometimes by looking at at folklore and in mythology
and legend and things that people believe over
time I found a book that I'd had for I don't
even know how long that was called meeting the
other crowd which I got because it was interesting.
It was Irish folklore and I got to this section
of the book and I don't remember that I'd really
taken note of this before I'd started getting
into more of the cryptid research but one section
really stood out and it was this story of Eve
and that Eve had had children with someone other
than Adam and hid them from God and God of course
found out about it because God would know. And
the response was, well, if you will hide your
children from me, then I will hide these children
from man. And I thought that was a really interesting
thing, you know, just from a folklore aspect
of it. But that's kind of weird. It is kind of
weird. And I love that you bring that up, especially
about the belief aspect. It's like an egregore
when you put it off. belief and focus. And I
mean, I believe manifesting is a real thing.
There's still that belief and that faith that's
there. And I think that there's a lot of that
with Bigfoot. And I think if you get enough people
focusing on something, you can make that a reality.
I think there's a lot of power in that. And I
think that energy is a very real thing. I believe
you focus on the good, the good gets better.
You focus on all the bad in your life. Well,
all you're going to see is bad perception is
reality. So with something like a Bigfoot with
that belief aspect. Yeah, it absolutely is. And
then if you want to take it back to the science
aspect of it, you know, some really the issue
with with samples that have been collected and
submitted as they keep being identified as human.
Right. And one possible reason for that would
be, well, if if they're so closely related to
us that we share mitochondrial DNA, then of course
they're going to look. like they're human, if
we share mitochondrial Eve, so to speak. So there's
that part of it too, because the science, if
we perhaps are closely enough related to them
that we share mitochondrial DNA by sharing a
common female ancestor at some point, then it's
weird to me that, but very interesting, that
you have the mitochondrial Eve part of it, which
is very backed up in science. But then there's
this whole Irish folklore part of Eve and the
hidden children. Right? So all of us have what's
called mitochondrial DNA that we inherit from
our mother. And each woman puts her own stamp
on mitochondrial DNA that will go to her children.
So, you know, my children will have a unique
stamp from my mitochondrial DNA. And if I had
daughters, then they would put their stamp on
it. So you can trace your mother's all the way
back through human history. And at some point
in time, we all shared a common female ancestor.
And that is the only mitochondrial DNA that still
exists, that still receives a stamp from each
continuous woman in the chain of inheritance,
so to say. But you know, it can be traced back
to a single female ancestor at some point in
time. And the DNA studies that have been done
suggest that Bigfoot, whatever it may be, shares
mitochondrial DNA, human mitochondrial DNA, meaning
that we shared a common female ancestor at some
point. What's also interesting is that there
have been unidentified matches on the nuclear
DNA side, so that's DNA that doesn't necessarily
come from... the mother, so to say. And recently
there's been some news about three -parent babies
that are being made with some genetic engineering
technology where you would use an egg, a donor
egg with... the mother's mitochondrial DNA associated
with that donor egg. And the nuclear DNA is basically
fertilized with nuclear DNA from another woman
and a man who are, for whatever reason, they
can't use the woman's mitochondrial DNA. So you
now have these three parent, so to say, babies
that are being produced. That's a new thing in
the news, but I hope that's a decent enough explanation.
It certainly is. Now, you have any just off the
cuff thoughts on what that unidentified DNA could
be? Do you have any theories on that? I really
don't. It could be another type of human. Certainly
some of the things that have been published on
the DNA results have been really interesting
and I really wasn't a part of those studies so
I'm not sure I feel comfortable necessarily speaking
about that. But one thing I'd really like to
see is hopefully it would be great to see researchers
able to get DNA samples in some way and and maybe
get some more maybe more of a bank of information
out there so that way we could look at it and
what what I would really like to do is identify
um you know get have some DNA samples that are
collected in a way that meets scientific rigor
right meets some kind of a standard and is able
to be corroborated across locations but has unique
sequences that wouldn't be compatible with life
as we know it traditionally with a human. If
we find something like that And we also see that
the mitochondrial DNA is shared. Then I think
it would help to support maybe some of the work
that's already been done in which maybe we've
had samples that have been written off because
the mitochondrial DNA has been human. And so
they're automatically, well, this is human DNA
that we're seeing here. These must be contaminated
samples. lab that that would be their first thing
they would argue would be that cross contamination.
Absolutely. That's the first thing that any lab
is going to suggest because while we see human
mitochondrial DNA here, therefore we know this
is a contaminated sample. They're not going to
be thinking, well, maybe this is something that's
so closely related to a human that we share a
common ancestor. In your email, you talked about
how you had some unexplainable noises that happened
to you when you were out in some various locations.
Now, when you say that, are you talking about
are we still on the Bigfoot vein here or are
we drifting into maybe the paranormal? Well,
where I'm thinking is, you know, I've had some
things that I haven't been able to explain from
traveling. So I mentioned earlier that, you know,
I've really had two experiences that I can't
explain, but bothered me to some degree. The
cryptociting bothered me because I'd seen something
that could clearly overpower me that was out
in the woods. The other experience that I had
that I really have a hard time dealing with sometimes
was actually a hotel stay when I was a consultant
and I was traveling. I happened to be coming
back from some field work in the New Orleans
area. This would have been about It was either
2008 or 2009 timeframe. I almost think it was
2009. If you're familiar with the formaldehyde
sampling and mobile homes and manufactured trailers
that was in the news, I was involved with that
project for sampling trailers for formaldehyde.
And I was doing that for a period of years out
in that. in that area. But anyway, I was on my
way coming back to Florida from New Orleans and
I had to get a hotel room in the New Orleans
area before flying out the next morning. And
I was staying in a place called the Maison St.
Charles, which was on St. Charles. You know,
if you've ever been to New Orleans, it's in the
Garden District or close to it. Well, I had a
hard time locating my room and I got there relatively
late that night and I had all of my inspection
and sampling equipment with me. So I was lugging
around all these extra cases and really getting
sort of impatient. And eventually I found my
room and it was an entire wing of, you know,
kind of an isolated building area of the hotel,
which I didn't expect at all because the price
that I was paying was dirt cheap to be getting
what I was getting out of it. You know, it had
a very formal sitting room. It had two bathrooms.
The bedroom was very nice and, you know, it had
no windows in it and it had these sort of French
doors that you could isolate the room off from
from the rest of the suite. and I just couldn't
believe what I was getting for that price and
so I actually broke out my video camera and I
started filming the room like oh man this room's
got to be haunted for the deal I'm getting on
it and you know again sort of being obnoxious
like I was when I was making the scat jokes on
the for sampling for Bigfoot on the mountain
anyway. So I get to my room and usually I think
it's a great thing if my room is completely dark
and this one was, you know, because I could isolate
it with those French doors. So it's about three
in the morning and I hear this what seemed to
me like a deafening noise that was happening
almost over my bed and it seemed like a really
tall person. was over my bed holding a loud speaker
that was making this loud static noise like blasting
a noise like it was almost like a combination
of if you were like crumpling wrapping paper
really loud like after Christmas and there's
a pile of wrapping paper or like static from
a TV but it went from no noise at all to this
blasting noise like immediately over my bed and
I was terrified because I thought someone was
in the room and I was about to get into a fight
to defend myself so I'm very nearsighted and
I'm fumbling around the nightstand trying to
find my glasses because as soon as I get the
glasses on my face I'm turning the light on and
I'm gonna deal with whatever whomever is in my
room because I'm sure there's a person standing
over the foot of my bed. I get my glasses, I
throw them on my face, turn on the light and
the noise immediately stops. And I had no idea
what to do or what that was. I was wide awake
at that point. I had all of my inspection equipment
with me. So I, you know, I got dressed. I got
dressed and basically ready to go because I wasn't
going to be sleeping at that point. I tore the
room apart trying to find any kind of an explanation
for the noise. Couldn't find it. It was really
disturbing. And it bothered me after the fact
to the point that, you know, I started Googling
that room. I happened to be staying in room 126.
I'll never forget it. I come to find out the
Louisiana State Paranormal Society had done an
investigation in that room, calling it the Devil's
Room. There was an account of a bride -to -be
who was brutally murdered on her wedding night,
apparently in that suite that I had been staying
in. I don't know if there's any truth to it.
But then also, you know, there is this story
that the devil himself owned that hotel and had
a mistress who lived there. with him who ended
up being unfaithful and he the devil of course
found out about this because you can't hide something
like that and killed this woman and her lover
and you know threw them out into the street and
I found all sorts of things but they were all
based on that room that I was staying in and
so then I tried to see if they were still letting
people stay in the room and at that point in
time I checked like more than a year out so I
don't know if they let anyone stay there anymore
but there was something definitely wrong with
that room that I periodically would when I couldn't
sleep and I was thinking about it, I would Google
the room. And so I found all of these things
on it. So yeah, unexplained noise, certainly
couldn't explain it. It was, it was, yeah, it
just, it just really got to me. And, and then
to find all of these things that corroborated
some certainly something strange happening in
the same, in the very same room, who knows. That
is really crazy. It sounds like you definitely
encountered some kind of energy, whether it be
spirit or a poltergeist or an angry bride or
maybe even the devil himself. But it sounds like
you definitely got the haunted hotel special.
Yeah, definitely the haunted hotel special. I
drove a coworker past the outside of the building
after the fact, and he was really creeped out,
you know, just even looking at the building from
the outside. I was like, yeah, that's that's
where this happened. I mean, it is New Orleans,
so that doesn't surprise me in the slightest.
And how you were saying you made another joke.
Maybe you're not making jokes. Maybe you're just
having little premonitions. Maybe I'm. vocalizing
something that seems a little bit off and I'm
trying to laugh it off. Yeah, it could be onto
something there. I always say if you can laugh
about it, you can get through it. And I think
people would probably tell me I'm a serious but
I'm also like a not serious person at the same
time. And I think you have to have humor in some
of these situations. So I think I would be right
there with you probably cracking jokes and then
being scared when things started popping off.
I think maybe you have a sixth sense and you're,
you just don't know it yet. Yeah. Well, you know
what? It could be, it could be just a, a feeling
that something is off and trying to make light
of it and deal with it in some way. And then,
and then the stuff hits the fan. You're, you're
trying to cope using dark humor. Yeah. You could,
you could be onto something there. I'd never
thought of it that way before, but there could
be something to that. Well, you know, In addition
to noises, I have stayed in a couple of other
rooms where things moved on their own that I
haven't been able to explain. There was, and
it's interesting too because in two of those
locations, the exact same thing happened only
I was staying in a different place. So old, old
cabin in Colorado, you know, the lights. So I
kept falling asleep at night and I would be reading
a book and the lights, I'd fall asleep with the
lights on and wake up and realize that the lights
were off. And I thought my roommate was turning
them off and This went on for about a week or
two and I said something to her. I'm like, hey,
by the way, you know, because we didn't really
have doors on the entrances to our rooms. We
had these kind of curtain things. So it'd be
easy enough for if it was bothering her and she
was on her way to the restroom or something,
she could just, you know, reach in a couple inches
and flick the light off if it was in the middle
of the night. And clearly I'd fallen asleep.
It's like, hey, by the way, thanks for turning
the light off. I'm sorry if that's been bothering
you. And she just looked at me weird. She's like,
I haven't been turning your light off. Like,
OK. And that spooked both of us out. And the
same roommate, same summer, one morning we woke
up and we discovered that the attic hatch on
the porch had completely opened somehow in the
middle of the night. It took us putting a chair
on top of a table to even get to the attic hatch
to close it. It made a lot of noise and it was
heavy and it took some trouble for us to get
there. And it was an old cabin with kind of a
creaking porch and a screen door that was latched,
it would have taken a lot of noise and effort
for somebody to come in there and do that. So
we couldn't explain how on earth the attic hatch
happened to open on its own in the middle of
the night without us hearing it and hearing or
hearing something, especially considering the
amount of trouble that we had to go to to shut
it. But what's interesting is several years later,
I'm in New Orleans, I'm staying in a bed and
breakfast in the garden area, garden district
again. Different place. This was the Maison Perrier
instead of the Maison St. Charles. Anyway, I
was staying in a nice room and the lights were
turning off by themselves at night again. Don't
know. I didn't feel threatened in that sense
like I did with the other experience with the
noise. I almost felt like something was maybe
looking out for me. Kind of like a, oh I'll turn
out the lights for you kind of thing. But it
was weird because it was the same thing that
had been happening in the other location. I don't
know. But there was another room in the same
place that they called the sports ghost room
because there was an odor of cigars and the TV
would turn on by itself and always be playing
a sports station. I had some coworkers that absolutely
refused to stay anywhere near that room because
they were bothered by it. One of them ended up
having an instance of sleep paralysis in the
middle of the night in the TV. was on and he
didn't remember turning it on but wasn't sure
if you know maybe he just did it on accident
but after the fact considering we'd heard all
the stories about the tv turning on by itself
who knows that's so scary yeah it's weird sleep
paralysis i've never had that and i i pray that
i never do i really hope i never have that that
just sounds horrifying yeah the stories from
it are absolutely terrifying right right especially
when someone sees an entity or something like
that and they can't move. I just can't imagine
something like that. I hope I never experience
it. Likewise. Yeah, I definitely don't want to
experience that. But with a couple of the things
you've talked about tonight, I don't think we'll
find the answer to at least today, but something
that will definitely be lingering in my mind
and I'm sure yours, but the idea of similar things
happening in different locations. Right. How?
Why? Yeah, the ability of something to seem to
follow someone over thousands of miles. Or is
it just that they're more open to it? It's happened
to them so they're more likely to notice it?
Because I think that maybe things happen to people
all the time and they just don't notice it or
they write it off as a normal thing and forget
about it. Maybe that's the case. I think that
the cryptid... Cases are certainly very interesting
because there have been so many accounts that
have similar types of occurrences and maybe evidence
that seems to line up, maybe apply different
techniques, learn about different equipment that
can be used. What I'm really trying to do is
find some reliable locations that are not accessible
by the public where I can put monitoring equipment
that I've used professionally for work reasons
when I'm monitoring working environments for
different exposures for things. what I would
like to do is get some type of evidence that
for example sound frequencies if we can if we
can document the full sound frequency of something
and that for sure is outside of being produced
by human vocal cords and doesn't align with anything
in databases that we have for vocalizations for
other known creatures. That becomes evidence
that's really hard to dismiss or argue with.
So I'm looking for avenues like that, but what
can we do as a community to find things that
can be documented that put together a case and
maybe develop standards? techniques and ways
to evaluate the phenomenon so that way we've
got more of a solid case and some official recognition.
That certainly would be nice. Yeah, definitely.
I've really just psychologically felt so much
relief from getting to know others that have
had similar experiences as we've talked about,
but also getting to know other researchers and
being able to share. techniques and discuss what
labs to use and really be able to compare and
contrast different methods of how to study and
collect evidence and documentation. putting things
together in a formal way that would be recognized
as a paper that would be publishable, you know,
that to me is is fantastic. And I can't wait
to see where the field goes because I just feel
like there's so many exciting things happening
right now. I really think that we are on the
precipice of something great. And I think that
this community has only just begun to show the
world what it is capable of. I think that. the
research that's being done even just across the
United States and the world into cryptozoology
and specifically the phenomena of Sasquatch.
It's challenging everything that we think we
know. I think we really are building something
great just as a collective. This is just the
beginning. Yeah, I agree. It's a really exciting
time, I feel like. And also, you know, the fact
that you have people like me who wouldn't have
spoken out five years ago that now I'm comfortable
talking about it. that level of support I don't
think was there. It seems as if something has
shifted to make it suddenly more acceptable of
a topic. So I'm encouraged by that. But I really
appreciate the opportunity to be on your show.
I've really enjoyed listening to your podcast
and yeah, it's really been great. Thank you so
much. Thank you. Thanks for hanging out with
me tonight. I know that the listeners are going
to love this. That concludes another episode
of Dark Florida. Thank you so much for joining
me on this strange and fascinating ride. And
a huge thank you again to Rachel for sharing
her stories, insight, and that wild blend of
science and mystery that helps keep us all on
our toes. If you've had your own unexplained
encounter, Bigfoot, cryptids, ghosts. or anything
in between, I'd love to hear from you. Shoot
me an email at DarkFloridaPodcast at gmail .com
if you want to share your story or be a guest
on a future episode. Be sure to follow Dark Florida
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coffee at buymeacoffee .com slash dark Florida.
Thank you so much for listening. It truly means
the world to me. And until next time, keep your
eyes open, your gear ready, and always trust
your instincts in the wild. This is Brooke Morland
signing off from the shadows. Stay curious and
stay strange. you