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Posted: 7/15/2026 8:20:58 PM EDT
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Whats up, new to the forum. I love northern AZ, and have previously camped in a couple places up there. I decided to head out near Happy Jack. Gorgeous place, lots of pines, very quiet and isolated once you get out in the forest. Didnt do much checking out the area because I got up there late and daylight was fading. I set up camp and cooked dinner on my propane stove. By then it was fully dark. It was december so it was cold up there, but I was prepared. I stayed up a little quietly listening to my small battery radio just enjoying the peace. It was a little windy but nothing crazy. It had been dark for a couple hours when I decided to hit the sack. "Its quiet" I thought... Man, there wasnt a sound. I hadnt heard any animals all evening. As I laid in my tent, I realized that it wasnt windy anymore either. No sounds anywhere. It was so strangely quiet and still. I had never been outdoors before anywhere so quiet and still. It was starting to creep me out a little. I eventually fell asleep, but woke up some time later in the night cause I had to take a leak, but it was so unsettling how silent and still everything was outside. I probably fought the urge to go for an hour before finally getting up. I made it to morning, and thought Id probably never return due to how unsettling the silence there was... Well, a few months later I went back to the general area maybe a couple miles away for another camping trip. The same deafening silence. Nothing. Not a sound, a breeze, any form of anything. So quiet that I felt like I stood out just laying there. This time I was even more creeped out. Same old story of waking up having to take a leak again, but this time I thought "Nope, not getting out of the tent". So I slowly, quietly unzipped the tent and hung it out the door of the tent. lol. I never went back there again. That place gave me such strange vibes. Ive camped alone plenty of times, but the silence of this area was just way too unsettling. |
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Being alone in complete silence is unsettling to our brains. During the days when our brains were evolving, being alone in complete silence often meant that you messed up bigly, were completely separated from your group, something had gone horribly wrong, and you were probably going to get killed and eaten by a predator. Especially if it was nice and dark. These days, it's just something you have to learn to ignore or get over. But yeah, I remember the first time hiking through a place completely silent... like "I can hear the blood flow in my ears" silent. It was real, real weird. Also... keep an empty, large-mouth gatorade bottle in your tent for the overnight pee trip. 
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Not even birds, bugs, buzzing mosquitoes? You sure you weren't camping in a toxic chemical test site, lol! BFE Arizona in December there should at least be coyotes singing in the early evening. I'd be looking out for a Wendigo or Skinwalker. |
"According to Argonne National Laboratory, it takes 100 pounds of battery in an EV to go a distance achieved by only one pound of gasoline in an ICE vehicle"
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AZ native here, car camped with my GF at the time in the forest around Munds Park and Mormon lake way back in the late 80's and we both got creeped out bad enough -- but with no tangible reason -- to pack up and leave at like 2AM. No real story, just got a really bad vibe all of a sudden. Didn't feel that way in the late afternoon and early evening. |
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One of the creepiest things I've yet seen is, a guy told us a story once, about camping......... And.....this is really unsettling......he....didn't use any paragraphs at all. The memory still haunts me... Welcome to the forum. I've done alot of camping by myself, and there have been times where I heard, and sensed, some unknown creature. Always had a rifle with me though, so I faced the darkness with confidence. Still felt strange though. |
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Joined:
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VA, USA
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Originally Posted By JoeDevola: One of the creepiest things I've yet seen is, a guy told us a story once, about camping......... And.....this is really unsettling......he....didn't use any paragraphs at all. The memory still haunts me... Welcome to the forum. I've done alot of camping by myself, and there have been times where I heard, and sensed, some unknown creature. Always had a rifle with me though, so I faced the darkness with confidence. Still felt strange though. Youll be glad to hear that i spared you further horror. New members are limited to 2000 character posts |
Wyoming's Cirque of the Towers in October is a different experience. The ridgeline of Warrior group paces the arc of the sun for hours, down in camp for 4 maybe 5 hours of the day, right around midday, the sun is nearly perfectly half-shrouded by the ridge as it arcs across the sky, creating lighting that's akin to what you see during a partial solar eclipse. Everything you previously knew dulls to greying half-tones. Eerie. And if nobody is in the Cirque, eerier, still. In summer, the area is abound with climbers and hikers. Shoulder season, the only party in there, or maybe even in there by yourself, it's not an inviting feeling.  
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Originally Posted By MyRealName: Youll be glad to hear that i spared you further horror. New members are limited to 2000 character posts For real? Wow times have changed. |
"According to Argonne National Laboratory, it takes 100 pounds of battery in an EV to go a distance achieved by only one pound of gasoline in an ICE vehicle"
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Originally Posted By MyRealName: Whats up, new to the forum. I love northern AZ, and have previously camped in a couple places up there. I decided to head out near Happy Jack. Gorgeous place, lots of pines, very quiet and isolated once you get out in the forest. Didnt do much checking out the area because I got up there late and daylight was fading. I set up camp and cooked dinner on my propane stove. By then it was fully dark. It was december so it was cold up there, but I was prepared. I stayed up a little quietly listening to my small battery radio just enjoying the peace. It was a little windy but nothing crazy. It had been dark for a couple hours when I decided to hit the sack. "Its quiet" I thought... Man, there wasnt a sound. I hadnt heard any animals all evening. As I laid in my tent, I realized that it wasnt windy anymore either. No sounds anywhere. It was so strangely quiet and still. I had never been outdoors before anywhere so quiet and still. It was starting to creep me out a little. I eventually fell asleep, but woke up some time later in the night cause I had to take a leak, but it was so unsettling how silent and still everything was outside. I probably fought the urge to go for an hour before finally getting up. I made it to morning, and thought Id probably never return due to how unsettling the silence there was... Well, a few months later I went back to the general area maybe a couple miles away for another camping trip. The same deafening silence. Nothing. Not a sound, a breeze, any form of anything. So quiet that I felt like I stood out just laying there. This time I was even more creeped out. Same old story of waking up having to take a leak again, but this time I thought "Nope, not getting out of the tent". So I slowly, quietly unzipped the tent and hung it out the door of the tent. lol. I never went back there again. That place gave me such strange vibes. Ive camped alone plenty of times, but the silence of this area was just way too unsettling. PM me your coords? I go all over the Southwest. That sounds peaceful to me. My unsettling experience was being woken up by the sound of a pack of coyotes howling. The Mrs claimed to hear foot steps around the tent at the same time. I of course got up to check and saw nothing. Heard a lot though. |
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I camp up on Mingus Mtn, at happy Jack and up by Williams quite often. Even going this weekend. Never had any issues. But Winter camping is truly much more silent. All the bugs are either dead or frozen, all the critters are in their burrows and even the ELk and Deer are nestled in their Disney beds just waiting on daylight. But, thats normal in Winter. In Montana, when I was young, you would go out on a cold, snowy morning and it would be dead silence. The snow would literally absorb sound. You couldnt hear a car 300 yards away. All the animals are down for the night. Just enjoy the silence, get a tent stove and a hot tent and enjoy |
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I've had a few experiences like that. Once, in a place north of Cle Elum, WA, it's a place with heavy timber tucked into a deep canyon, always dark, damp, and quiet. I had the place go completely silent on me during a deer hunt, it was so quiet I stopped and looked around. Squirrels, birds, everything just stopped. I figured there was a big cat or something in the area Another time north of Ellensburg, similar to what OP describes. I was camped in an area that had burned several years prior. The burned trees and general lack of vegetation made it spooky. I rolled out my sleeping bag on the ground behind my truck. Around midnight I woke up and it was dead still, dark and quiet like the inside of a cave. No moon, no stars, no wind or animal noises. Once on a mountain bike ride, birds just stopped singing. I figured that one was a big cat. I've also learned to pay attention to squirrels. If they start barking there might be something hunting nearby. For that Cle Elum site, I've got a story in the creepy thread about a weird encounter we had later that evening. It's a pretty good ghost story. |
I know I'll never go home.
So set fire to your ships, and past regrets, and be free.
So set fire to your ships, and past regrets, and be free.
| Years ago I camped with the kid's BSA troop right outside an old cemetery in Kentucky's Land Between the Lakes. I was not too worried about those folks, they don't do any harm - but what did give me a reason to question my campsite was the Copperhead that slithered out of a pile of leaves right beside my open front shelter |
Steve Rose - RAS
"Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks"
Thomas Jefferson - 1785
"Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks"
Thomas Jefferson - 1785
| Yep but set up camp anyway. I definitely needed serious rest and I knew creepy feelings were just that, feelings. Woke up alive the next morning. |
If you think I am sexy now just wait until you find out I have full medical and dental.
Personal pronouns are; Bro/Dude
Personal pronouns are; Bro/Dude
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The Sonoran desert down near the Mexican border was, well, it was probably outright dangerous. Drug runners, and coyotes and tow were a potential problem. But they mostly seemed to move during the day. Mostly. I didn't think it was that big of a deal, but LE thought I was nuts. All the LE I encountered. It was the supposed setting for Sicaro. Probably for a reason. One set of LE came across me thinking I was a dead body. That was one hell of an entertaining way to wake up in the morning. 
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It was winter of either 1993-94 or 94-95, and I was stationed at Strassburg Kaserne in Idar-Oberstein, West Germany. A friend and I backpacked to different places within a day’s walk 1 or 2 times a month, and the forested area outside the Kaserne had lots of places to camp as well. On that winter night I decided on the spur of the moment that I wanted to camp so I threw my sleeping bag and pad in the ruck and headed out. I hiked maybe 30 minutes to this goat trail off the dirt road, followed that for a bit, then rolled out the pad and bag in the snow under some low branches and went to sleep. I don’t know how long I was asleep, but all of a sudden UUUNNHH! I awoke so abruptly my eyelids clicked. I don’t know what woke me up but I know it wasn’t a bad dream or a full bladder. I laid there silently for a while, head inside the sleeping bag and eyes closed so I could hear better, listening for some sound that might have been what woke me up to repeat. Between the sleeping bag muffling sound and my heart pounding I couldn’t hear anything, though. I eventually fell back to sleep, when I woke up in the morning it was light enough to see so I checked my immediate area while still in the bag and didn’t see any sign of anything that could have woken me up. No tracks in the snow other than mine, no broken branches, nothing. I didn’t sleep in that spot again and never had another experience like that, not even when camping here in the wilderness of NW Maine. |
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Originally Posted By L_JE: Wyoming's Cirque of the Towers in October is a different experience. The ridgeline of Warrior group paces the arc of the sun for hours, down in camp for 4 maybe 5 hours of the day, right around midday, the sun is nearly perfectly half-shrouded by the ridge as it arcs across the sky, creating lighting that's akin to what you see during a partial solar eclipse. Everything you previously knew dulls to greying half-tones. Eerie. And if nobody is in the Cirque, eerier, still. In summer, the area is abound with climbers and hikers. Shoulder season, the only party in there, or maybe even in there by yourself, it's not an inviting feeling. https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-dPfRcV5/0/LvpgQSMTP9bV4VtPnSzfC58gMDPFrvhDRCcrzPdcB/XL/_DSC6321B%20-%208k-XL.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-xNmgw4d/0/MpDssJW5BQjhNpvBpWp9TLvb5hVg3DPxz7n82KjWf/XL/GOPR6540A1z%20-%202160-XL.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-Hfcgm92/0/LCGrr47tsn83WW3WPXkmdj9pQ8tCd2PfFz7ZXbXKv/X2/GH016662_01A%20-%202160-X2.jpg Gorgeous photos! Makes me think of Ansel Adams, e.g. the range of light. |
“War is a racket….”
Smedley D. Butler, Maj.-Gen., USMC
Smedley D. Butler, Maj.-Gen., USMC
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Never. Not even as a child. Bear in mind, I work all by myself way the hell back in the woods. I understand the forest. What lives there. What I can expect to happen. |
ProTip: Never pick a fight with a tree planter. He swings a hoedad for 9 hours a day, carries 30-40 pounds of seedlings on his back, and has 12-14 friends just like him hiding out on the other side of the junk butt pile. They will fuck your shit up.
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When I went to NCO school down at Ft. Knox in 1978 they split the squads up into different bivouac sites. We were at the end of a little dirt road running down to a river. The dirt road joined a larger gravel road in the woods. We came in by truck and it was a long time ago so I have no idea exactly where we were on Ft. Knox. I do know there was an old graveyard between our bivouac site and the squad closest to the gravel road. Every morning the deuce&1/2 would drive down to that first squad's bivouac site and stop and we had to walk up the dirt road to the truck to get a hot meal for breakfast. We had guys in the squad who went hungry every morning for a week because they were too scared to walk past that graveyard in the dark. Yes, most of us thought that was pretty darned funny and we let the fraidy cats hear about it. I never even walked through the brush to see the old gravestones up close, just walked up/down that dirt road when I had to. |
How you live your life is important. Just be sure the memory of how you died doesn't overshadow the tales of how you lived your life.
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Originally Posted By TigerForce: Gorgeous photos! Makes me think of Ansel Adams, e.g. the range of light. Originally Posted By TigerForce: Originally Posted By L_JE: Wyoming's Cirque of the Towers in October is a different experience. The ridgeline of Warrior group paces the arc of the sun for hours, down in camp for 4 maybe 5 hours of the day, right around midday, the sun is nearly perfectly half-shrouded by the ridge as it arcs across the sky, creating lighting that's akin to what you see during a partial solar eclipse. Everything you previously knew dulls to greying half-tones. Eerie. And if nobody is in the Cirque, eerier, still. In summer, the area is abound with climbers and hikers. Shoulder season, the only party in there, or maybe even in there by yourself, it's not an inviting feeling. https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-dPfRcV5/0/LvpgQSMTP9bV4VtPnSzfC58gMDPFrvhDRCcrzPdcB/XL/_DSC6321B%20-%208k-XL.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-xNmgw4d/0/MpDssJW5BQjhNpvBpWp9TLvb5hVg3DPxz7n82KjWf/XL/GOPR6540A1z%20-%202160-XL.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/Climbing-Outings/20201001-West/i-Hfcgm92/0/LCGrr47tsn83WW3WPXkmdj9pQ8tCd2PfFz7ZXbXKv/X2/GH016662_01A%20-%202160-X2.jpg Gorgeous photos! Makes me think of Ansel Adams, e.g. the range of light. Thanks. That photo of the tower is one of my friend's favorites. At 45MP, it's like you can see every hand hold on the routes we climbed that season, every hand jam. We were in there for a week, and I only saw two people, and my climbing partner saw nobody except me. All the while knowing a snow storm was forecast to be coming through on our last planned day in there. From that same trip [October of 2020]:   For me, there are times when I'll well up with tears when I'm in there. Years and years ago, almost twenty years ago, my daughter and I were in the Cirque, with plans to do a loop all the way out to Mt Hooker, but one of our dogs tore up her paws from all the back and forth on the trail, so we holed up in the Cirque for a few days for the dog to recover a bit. My daughter is now grown, out on her own, and there are times when I just feel empty, hollow. Sitting there, surrounded by all these peaks, but it's incomplete. You don't get those days back. |
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On the very back of my childhood homes land my dad built a small cabin that was used as a hunting cabin ( the deer ran the ravine below the cabin, and the other side of the ravine was owned by an absentee landowner who never developed his hundred or so acres ) and the kids used it the rest of the year to camp in. Potbelly wood stove, propane stove, small fridge, it slept four. It could get pretty creepy for a young kids mind on a dark night with no ambient light. That cabin was still standing when my own kids were young, and they'd spend time back there just as I did Unfortunately, some time in the last decade a large tree fell right on the building and blew it six ways to Sunday. I had to pay someone to remove the remnants when I was getting ready to sell the property this year |
*post contains personal opinion only and should not be considered information released in an official capacity*
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In 2013 a chick wandered off naked from a campground one evening on a "spiritual quest" and was never seen again. The campground was later abandoned by the Forest Service and mostly cut off due to a landslide. In 2021 we were able to make it through after they had started, but not finished the slide repairs and stayed a night. It was us and only one other group in the campground. It's in a secluded spot in a canyon to begin with and knowing her skeleton was probably out there not far from us was kinda spooky. And speaking of complete silence, there's very scenic little lake here that we've camped at a few times, but in the mid-late summer after the waterfall dries up, it's completely silent at night. I have a hard time sleeping in complete silence. I was actually asleep in my hammock one night and some assholes camped at the trailhead hiked down at 1am and fired four 9mm rounds into the lake, maybe 100ft from where we were camped, and then left. Never mind there were others camped on the other side of the lake. And those people probably thought it was us, as we had a pleasant conversation earlier that day and they would have seen that I was armed. |
"You can't tourniquet a taint, folks." - Andrew Branca
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Originally Posted By L_JE: The Sonoran desert down near the Mexican border was, well, it was probably outright dangerous. Drug runners, and coyotes and tow were a potential problem. But they mostly seemed to move during the day. Mostly. I didn't think it was that big of a deal, but LE thought I was nuts. All the LE I encountered. It was the supposed setting for Sicaro. Probably for a reason. One set of LE came across me thinking I was a dead body. That was one hell of an entertaining way to wake up in the morning. https://photos.smugmug.com/Desert-Southwest/i-6RMhTvQ/0/KJNb3d2tP3KvzRj3mzdBMDHvhPtwGZbnpzH3SdrKd/L/Baboquivari-%20Perigrine%20023Az%20-%201920-L.jpg The sonoran desert is such an amazing place. So unique and untouched. Its a shame its so dangerous with the criminal activity near the border. Ive wanted to camp out there but kinda have the same train of thought of the LE you encountered lol... just seems way too dangerous. Aravaipa canyon is pretty neat too. Far enough from the border I assume. I think there is even some remains of a ghost town if you hike in far enough, but I could be wrong. |
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WY, USA
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In the mid to late 80s I was hiking in the Midwest with a friend. Friday nights were always the same. We’d hike in somewhere, camp light for the night and hike out at first light. We were in a realitively populated area hiking in when we thought we saw light occasionally thru the trees in front of us. We came near a clearing and saw a group of people in black robes in a circle around what looked like a tree stump on fire. The weird part was the flames were blue. I mean BLUE. We back out and ended up going home that night. Spoke to a local sheriff deputy and he said “devil worshippers” were active in the area. This was the height of the “devil worship hysteria” era, but we know what we saw and it was not a Christian tent revival. Have experienced a few other things which is to be expected when you’ve hiked and camped for five decades over many states, countries, continents and islands. |
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One of thrilling aspects of solo hiking and camping is learning the local flora and fauna . I remember one night hearing what sounded like a child wailing. It happened for so long I went looking for the sound (rifle in hand). Never found it. Spoke to some locals and after they stopped laughing they told me I heard cats mating. I’ve heard it since and they were spot on. At the time it triggered my “defend” sensibility. The feeling you’re being tracked / hunted / stalked is bad, but it’s really bad when you notice the forest or glen is COMPLETELY silent. |
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A few years ago my wife and I were on the AT section that runs along the Tennessee / North Carolina border. We came up on a blad with a church youth group camped in a loose / non defensible array. They were a friendly lot and offered to let us stay on the bald with them. We moved on wanting to get more miles in that day. Eventually a really weird and dirty hippy couple over took us on the trail. In the awkward exchange I noticed he had a Mora dangling from his pack’s belt (and it had what looked like dried blood on it). Their behavior and appearance was very unsettling to my wife (despite the fact I had a Glock 20 with 5 mags in the chest pack clipped to my ruck). Anyway, we decided to turn back to use the youth group’s area as a “security in numbers” camp site. When we returned it was completely abandoned. I mean they took their gear; doused fires; and hauled out. Same day. Maybe 3 hours time. They were all happy and setting up for s’mores, etc when we passed thru the first time. |
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Thought I caught a glimpse of a cross between a Sasquatch and Yeti up in northern Canada back in the winter of 2023. I was able to glass it, and turned out to be a piebald moose. This was a fortunate turn as I do not believe in Bigfoot and was not looking forward to having a long rethink on my world view. |
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Last summer we were out and heard what sounded like some form of primate argument. Two sections of wood along a river. It was late, but enough moonlight to see the canopy. Anyway, it was actually barred owls in a territorial dispute. Had cell coverage and was able to analyze it. For a minute I had images of the movie Congo in my head and found myself in want of a FNFAL. |
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Originally Posted By GaryT1776: One of thrilling aspects of solo hiking and camping is learning the local flora and fauna . I remember one night hearing what sounded like a child wailing. It happened for so long I went looking for the sound (rifle in hand). Never found it. Spoke to some locals and after they stopped laughing they told me I heard cats mating. I’ve heard it since and they were spot on. At the time it triggered my “defend” sensibility. The feeling you’re being tracked / hunted / stalked is bad, but it’s really bad when you notice the forest or glen is COMPLETELY silent. Caterwauling |
*post contains personal opinion only and should not be considered information released in an official capacity*
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