Bigfoot Society - Columbia River Gorge Sasquatch! | Washington

Episode Date: February 25, 2025

Join us as we dive deep into the enigmatic wilderness of Columbia River Gorge with James Szubski from Margie's Outdoor Store. James shares fascinating witness accounts and personal experiences involving Sasquatch sightings, mysterious glowing orbs, and the elusive 'Klickitat Ape Cat.' Discover how his background as an infantry veteran, wildland firefighter, and search and rescue EMT shapes his unique approach to investigating these paranormal phenomena.Resources: https://www.margiesoutdoor.comBigfoot Society episode with a potential Klickitat Ape Cat sighting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJN4o830_YQWashington Environmental Atlas: https://documents2.theblackvault.com/documents/usace/Washington1975Atlas-Sasquatch.pdfSasquatch Summerfest this year, is July 11th through the 12th, 2025. It's going to be fantastic. Listeners, if you're going to go, you can get a two day ticket for the cost of one. If you use the code "BFS" like Bigfoot society and it'll get you some off your cost.Priscilla was a nice enough to provide that for my listeners. So there you go. I look forward to seeing you there. So make sure you head over to www. sasquatchsummerfest. com and pick up your tickets today.If you've had similar encounters or experiences, please reach out to [e-mail]. Your story could be the next one we feature!🔴 Subscribe to our Youtube channel and leave a comment here: https://www.youtube.com/@BigfootSociety?sub_confirmation=1Want to call in and leave a voicemail of your encounters for the podcast - Check this out here - https://www.speakpipe.com/bigfootsociety(Use multiple voice mails if needed!)Share this video with a friend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5v75Od-X38Watch more episodes of the Bigfoot Society podcast here – https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3t1vwtsKh-MGeHs0XglFJE5LwUHpmJm_&feature=sharedRecommended Playlist – New Jersey Bigfoot Encounters - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3t1vwtsKh-Mk4032IyZtWgP6LVPU8uat✅ Help me help others share their Bigfoot Encounter by joining the community on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/thebigfootsociety✅ Hear ad-free episodes early by joining the community on Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8Qq45W6iaTU8FE9kelxT7Q/joinLet’s connect:Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/bigfootsociety/Twitter – https://twitter.com/bigfoot_societyTiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@bigfoot.societyAffiliate links mean I earn a commission from qualifying purchases. This helps support my channel at no additional cost to you.My Audio Interface: https://amzn.to/3L1q8XYPut some pep in my step by buying me a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/bigfootsocietyPick up some merch here: https://www.etsy.com/shop/bigfootsociety/?etsrc=sdtSend mail here:Bigfoot Society125 E 1st St. #233Earlham, IA 50072Send business inquiries to: [e-mail]

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at Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. During Memorial Day at Lowe's, shop household must-haves for less. Save $80 on the Charbroil performance series for Burner Grill to chef up something

special. Plus, get up to 45% off select major appliances to keep things fresh. Our best lineup is here at Lowe's. Lowe's, we help you save. VALA through 527, while supplies last. Selection varies by location. See Lowe's.com for details. Visit your nearby Lowe's on West Pico Boulevard in Los Angeles. Welcome to Bigfoot Society. If you have Bigfoot activity to report from the same areas discussed in this episode, please reach out to me directly after this episode. And if you'd like to be on the podcast to discuss a personal Bigfoot Encounter, please reach out to me directly at Bigfoot Society at gmail.com. Do you wish there is more Bigfoot Society to listen to every week? Well, there is now. If you become a supporting member

over at Patreon, you get a special members-only episode every single week on Wednesdays, and sometimes even more episodes. Head on over to patreon.com forward slash the Bigfoot Society, and now let's get on with the show. All right, Pickfoot Society, you've got the privilege of talking to James Shubeski. today from Margie's outdoor store out there in the Columbia River Gorge. It's a pleasure to have you on the show today. James, how's it going? It's going great and thank you so much for having me. Absolutely. You're an individual I've wanted to talk to for a while. I've heard you on a few other shows and you have such a such a cool story up there. I love how you're really going after it. And I mean, the things that you are recording, the witness accounts out there is just simply incredible.

Let me actually share a little bit about yourself first. You're so nice to provide some info. And I want to make sure that I provide that. But you're, uh, veteran, wildland firefighter, and nationally certified search and rescue EMT. And at Margie's, you have a very interesting program where it's pretty much a paranormal reporting program at this outdoor adventure store in the Columbia River Gorge. And you've logged over well, well more than 400 eyewitness accounts of different types of phenomena in the area, which I think is just fascinating. James, I do have to ask you, you know, is this something where you've always been into the

weird in the Bigfoot? Or was it a thing where, you know, you got the store first and then you started to get into things once you had that? Well, you know, I grew up in the 70s and 80s, so that's dating there. And like the Leonard Nimoy show in search of was like huge for all the kids in my neighborhood. And our number one was Bigfoot. Like we talked about him constantly. And you know, we, I lived in Ohio and we were, we knew that Sasquatch was mostly in the Pacific Northwest,

especially back in the 70s. And the best geographic minds of our neighborhood gang was pretty sure that for Sasquatch, Ohio was just a two or three day easy walk for him and that he would definitely be in the woods around our house without any problem. So it's kind of been a lifelong interest from that regard. But I came out to Washington State back in 1988 as a Cold War soldier stationed at Fort Lewis. And it was sort of like, you know, coming to the place where Sasquatch is. And we talked about it a lot as soldiers too because we used to have to do these land-neutral navigation courses out here.

And, you know, you have to do it at the day and have to do it at night. You can't carry a flashlight. And you're in some of the deepest, thickest, Pacific Northwest Forest you can imagine, you know, and having to go on distances and directions and find, you know, basically these coffee cans pinned to trees, you know, several miles worth of course. And, you know, I was a 19 years old convinced that I was walking through the center of a Sasquatch Hive as I was doing these tests. And so it's always been a part of my life.

But it was about four years ago. My mother-in-law, Margie, owned a couple of stores in the Columbia River Gorge. And she passed away. And my wife and I were living up in Seattle at the time. And we decided that we wanted to carry on the family businesses. And so we moved down here. Well, I moved down here first for a year until we got the kids squared away. at school. And the businesses needed some rejuvenating. And so we renamed one of the stores,

Margie's Outdoor Store. And kind of on a whim, I put a Sasquatch in the logo. You know, like there was a Bigfoot in one of the O's. And it wasn't long before people started coming in, you know, a lot of locals, and they were whispering about some of the unusual and remarkable encounters they were having in the wilderness areas of the Columbia River Gorge. And I found it fascinating. So I'll paint a picture for your listeners of what the Columbia River Gorge is like. So the Columbia River forms the border between Southern Washington State and Northern Oregon State. And the Columbia is the largest river in North and South America that flows into the Pacific Ocean. And where the gorge is, it actually flows through the Cascade Mountains.

And so in the gorge, in the 80s it was designated the nation's first national scenic area because it is so jaw-droppingly beautiful out here. And you can go, the rivers just about at sea level, but you can instantly, unless and half a mile rocket up to 3,000 feet. And there are these stunning cliffs. and we've got over 90 named waterfalls, more waterfalls than anywhere else in the United States concentrated. Some of those are over 600 feet tall. And the place is riddled with caves.

There are over 500 caves, mostly volcanic lava tubes out here. And the gorge is like sort of right at the center of the Cascade Mountains. So the western half of the mountains is like this classic. brooding and mysterious Pacific Northwest rainforest with, you know, mist and deep fir and pine trees, cliffs and rivers. And then when you get to the eastern half, it is, you get into the rain shadow. And there is like this sort of austere and almost spiritual desert environment. And you've got, you know, like classic, you know, mesas, you know, flat top beutes. And this really rugged, rocky, cliffy landscape. And then all of that, of course, is surrounded by its Cascade Mountains.

And within 35 miles of my store, there are two glacier-clad strata volcanoes, Mount Adams and Mount Hood. And then they're both 10,000, they're over 10,000 feet. And then there's Mount St. Hallins, which erupted in 1980, it was the most destructive volcanic event in United States history. And that's also just like 40 miles from my store. And so it's sort of like, if you've ever played video games, like one of the coolest open world maps you could possibly imagine. And, you know, you had mentioned that I've got all this outdoor experience.

And so for me, you know, coming down here was like I'd won the lottery. Like it was just utter paradise. And to give you just a little bit sense of like where we are located geographically, the city of Portland, like if you were to come here, you would fly into Portland, and then you'd drive about 60 miles east to the town of Dengen, which is right across the river from the town of Hood River. There's a bridge. And that's where my store is located.

So like we are kind of dead center in the middle of the gorge, like right where the rainforests turn into desert. And so that's the setting that we're talking about. And it is one of the true rugged wilderness, like the true, you know, expedition-worthy wilderness areas left in America, left in the world, in fact. You know, people don't really have a sense of just how vast these wilderness regions are. But the Cascade Mountains, they're combined, like if you took the 10 smallest states in the U.S. and glommed them altogether, they still wouldn't be as big as the Cascade Mountains.

mountains, which range from southern British Columbia and Canada all the way through Washington, Oregon, and Northern California. And it's also the place where there have been tons and tons of Sasquatch sightings throughout the years. In fact, on the Washington side, there are two counties. There's Scamania County and Cliquetet County. My stores are in Cliquette County. My home is in Schumania County. And Scamania County was the first governmental body in the world. to create Sasquatch protection legislation.

All the way back in 1968, they passed laws that made New County a Sasquatch sanctuary. And if you shoot and kill a Sasquatch here in Skimani County, and the coroner determines that it is a humanoid, you'll be charged with manslaughter. And so this is a place where it's taken pretty seriously. What sort of stunned my wife and I, when we first got down here, was that it seemed like everyone we met either knew someone who had a Sasquatch experience or had had one themselves. And we're talking about people whose families have lived here for generations.

And for them, Sasquatch is, this was like no question. It's just a part of the natural world that's out here. Once these people started coming in and talking about all of these just remarkable experiences, and we were hearing about Sasquatch stories, we were hearing UFO stories, We're hearing, you know, ghost stories. We were hearing stories, and this one really captured my imagination. We have over 130 reports of this enormous black panther creature. Locally, it's called the Clickitat ape cat.

And so all of the reports of this creature say that it is a very muscular cat. So cat body form, long black tail, and it always has black fur. And so we know that's not a cougar because science does. not recognize black cougars as a thing. And about half of the reports that we have received to the creature is enormous in size. By that, I mean four to five feet tall at the shoulder, anywhere between 700 and 1,300 pounds. And so that's like half of the reports. And then there's a tiny fraction of the reports, probably less than 10 percent, that say the creature has a face that looks like a monkey. And when they talk about that, they usually say that they are

I always talk about it has a shortened snout, so it doesn't have quite as long of a nose as you'd expect to see in a cat. Oftentimes, they talk about intelligent ape-like eyes, sort of a primate feel through its face. Sometimes it's reported without fur on its face, just like a black leathery skin. And so, you know, like I said, we've had all of these reports, and I'll talk more about that creature in a minute. But when we started it, I gave very specific instructions to the staff. I said, we are going to take everyone who comes in here seriously. We are going to believe the witness, no matter how outlandish it sounds to us and our personal experience, we're going to treat this

person with dignity and respect, and we're going to ask intelligent follow-up questions, and we'll see what happens. I know from research and a bunch of other things that, you know, when you create a safe place for people, you're more likely to get to hear things, right? And to hear the stories and the accounts. And at first, you know, the community was looking at me, you know, with arms crossed and a skeptical raised eyebrow. But over time, you know, we have proven that we treat people with respect, that you're not going to be, we're not going to think that you're crazy, that we're going to protect your

information if you ask us to. We're not going to, you know, lab about who told us what. And eventually, you know, we earn the community's trust. And, you know, there are many times now, you know, after, like I said, close to over 400 reports, where I am the second person that someone is told about, you know, their Sasquatch experience or whatever, the UFO experience, or whatever it is, oftentimes the first person they told was either like a friend or a relative. and that person told them they were crazy or they were on drugs or whatever. And so they just decided that they weren't going to take that social risk ever again. And because we created this place, a safe place for ordinary people to talk about extraordinary experiences,

they have entrusted us with, you know, this remarkable, oftentimes it's 20 seconds to three minutes of their lives that they have never forgotten. And I didn't know it when we started, but that has turned out to be, one of the hidden gems of this whole experience. I mean, you know, we've made these connections on a very human level with people. The relief that people feel when they're believed is amazing. The camaraderie and the rapport that you feel with somebody, especially when I can relate to them other stories that I've heard that are similar to theirs and they have a sense that they're not alone.

Like, that has been beyond rewarding. And in many ways, I have come to feel like these people need a champion, someone who will stand up for them, someone who will talk intelligently about these experiences, take the brunt of whatever criticisms or snickers are out there, and bring these things to light and validate their experiences. And so for me, it's really become sort of a mission in life. You know, it's really cool to have a physical location where people could come. And a lot of the reports that we get, people just come in and they'll talk to us. We do have an online reporting system, and a lot of times we'll get reports that way as well. I try to follow up on all the ones that come in online, especially if they're located in the gorge. But it's just been, like you said, a remarkable and really deeply satisfying and enjoyable experience for me.

And, you know, we knew, I mean, I'm not a fool. Like, I knew people would come in and, you know, tell tall tales or, you know, there'd be people who have legitimate mental health issues that they're working through. Bigfoot Society will be right back after these messages. This is Matt Rogers from Los Culture East us with Matt Rogers and Bowen-Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Los Culture Easters with Matt Rogers and Bowen-Yang. Spend your balance instantly with the Venmo debit card in an herb to 5% cashbacks on your favorite bundle of brands when you joined Venet. Venmo Stash. Your rewards come from bundles of brands you can keep or switch every 30 days, so you can

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Venmo checkout not available at all merchants. It always happens right before the whistle. There's a little voice that says, what if I mess up? What if I'm not ready? I see a whole highlight reel of everything I don't want to happen. Missed shots, turnovers, letting my team down. And for a second, there's doubt.

But then, I realize I've done enough to be where I'm at. The early mornings, the extra reps, the days I wanted to quit and didn't. So, I smile. Self-doubt is natural, but my smile is a reminder that I'm resilient. To put more smiles out into the world, Colgate has supported female athletes for over 50 years with the Colgate Women's Games. The Colgate Women's Games is the nation's longest running indoor track and field series for girls and women. Colgate, your smile is your strength. Plan B made over-the-counter emergency contraception legal more than 20 years ago.

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I'm just going to be a human being, a curious and compassionate human being, and see where it leads us. And I have been really surprised at, you know, it's a tiny, vanishing a number of people who've come in clearly, they're joking around. You know, like they sign their reports, see more butts or something like that. But there's not many people that come in and do that. The majority of people are people who have had some kind of legitimate experience that they don't have context for. And we help try to provide that. But now it's gotten to the point. So, you know, it's evolved.

And I'm pretty well known in the Gorge. I've got an FJ Cruiser, four by four, that I've modified. And it's got, you know, lights and logos and everything on it and cameras and drones and It's a paranormal research vehicle. We call it the license plates that are crypted. And so it's pretty recognizable. And people will stop me at the post office or at the grocery store or at a restaurant and say, oh, James, I've been meeting to talk to you.

We have this really incredible story to tell you. And so that's been, like I said, it's been fun to watch the community's opinion change and for them to really get behind it and see it as a value. I think one of the most, you know, rewarding parts of the experiences, we, the store has earned 13 Best of the Gorge Awards in the past three years. And that's because of all the love we get from people recognizing that we're doing something kind of special. I think that is so, that has got to be so rewarding, knowing that you're able to affect or give people a outlet in order for them to feel. that they're safe, respectful environment. And it's very similar to what I try to do here.

But the cool thing is that you are extremely boots on the ground and you are the place to go there in that area for people to share and people are realizing that they can trust you. But the ape cat, I find that is so fascinating. And it's because now that I think about it, it. I had an episode a few, maybe about a few months ago, and it was

a elk hunter up by Astoria, and he had a Bigfoot report he was sharing. But then he came back on in another episode, and he actually had shared a sighting of a strange creature that had a

long tail in a very strange face. And the more that I hear about the ape cat creature, it sounds like this could be kind of similar. Now, it's not in the gorge, but it was up by Longview. I don't know. Does this creature seem to have a pretty wide environment range,

or does it kind of just stick down to where you guys are? Well, you know, we've done research on big cats, and these animals can travel 25 miles in a day. The gorge is maybe 100 miles from Astoria, and it's connected to the Columbia River. I mean, the story is where the Columbia River empties into the ocean. And so I absolutely would not be at all surprised. I've even heard reports of myself from relatives of mine who live in Hokwium,

which is just north of Astoria, who have seen the cat on their property out there. And so we're pretty sure that these creatures aren't obese, any lines of geography. And they're apparently excellent swimmers. And so the notion that they could easily cross the river, I mean, we're certain that they have because we have reports in both Oregon and Washington. But, you know, you had asked me earlier, like, have I had any experiences myself?

And my answer was yes. And some of them occurred before we even started the reporting program. and recognizing that was, I think, part of my motivation for taking people seriously with their reports. So, you know, back in 2021, sort of like early days before we had really even kicked off the program, I was standing along the river's edge and taking a picture of a really cool, like, pencil-thin beam of sunlight coming down to the clouds into the gorge onto the river. and when I looked at the photographs afterwards, there is this incredible blue glowing orb on there. And I've got a bit of experience with digital photography.

And I know what lens flares are and how they occur and things like that. And it was obvious that this was not a lens flare. I can go through all the characteristics, but they're kind of an important. The important thing is that I captured this thing on film. And that was an interesting data point for me. like, oh, wow, that's kind of unusual. We have, you know, dozens scores and scores of reports of glowing orbs in the gorge.

In fact, it's one of the most common phenomenon we hear about. My wife and I have seen them with our naked eyes while driving on Highway 14 out here. And so that was one of those experiences that we've had. And, you know, as I look back over the reports that we've received over the years, oftentimes we have gluing orbs reported in association with Sasquatch sightings. I can't say for sure that, you know, they are connected, but they do seem like they're correlated. And, you know, we'll get reports of we were watching these glowing orbs. And, you know, they range anywhere in size from softball size to 12 feet in diameter,

to things that look like they could be a craft of some type. And so we hear stories of people, yeah, we saw these white orbs and they were on the ridge line and then quickly turned into Sasquatch encounter at their campsite. Other people will hear vocalizations and then see orbs leaving the area where the vocalizations came from. So that was one of those personal experiences that I've had. The other one was I was out in an area called Horse Thief Butte. So Horse Thief Butte is like a desert mesa. It's got these high walls flat top.

And from the road, it looks like. like a classic monolith, you know, just a solid piece of rock. And it's sandwich between Highway 14 and the Columbia River. But when you get close to it, it is riddled with a labyrinth of hidden passageways and amphitheaters. There are petroglyphs on the walls, the Native Americans considered a place of, you know, great spiritual power. And they would go there in ancient times to go on vision quests to find their spirit animals. And, you know, there's evidence that the gorge is one of the oldest inhabited areas in America. Right near this horse thief butte area is considered one of the most important archaeological sites in all in North America.

And in fact, people have been living here from 10,000 years before the pyramids were built in Egypt, just to give you a sense of, like, how steeped and hoary with, you know, history this place is. And I was climbing around up in these cliffs. It's a really cool area. And it was getting close to sunset. From the Butte, you can see Mount Hood, you know, shining its pointed peak in the distance. And at the base of the but there's like this sort of flat land. It's a scabland. It runs about, I don't know, two, three hundred yards. And then it drops off a cliff. And then there's this lake. It's called horse thief lake. And then on the far side of horse thief lake, this wall of petrocliffs. And I was up there, I think it was in June, at getting close to sunset,

and still plenty of light, though. And I was looking down into the lake, and I saw this creature swimming around in the water. And I couldn't figure out what it was. There were ducks on the water. And so I could kind of get an estimate of its size. And it was probably 700, 800, 800 yards away from me at the time. So not a good look at it. Didn't have binoculars with me. And the creature had dark coloration. So if it had fur, it would have been dark fur. And it seemed to be patrolling the center of the lake. It looked like it was larger than a man, but smaller than a car.

So somewhere in that size scale. And I observed it submerged underwater, sometimes for up to five minutes, and then come back up and continue patrolling the center of the lake. And I have spent tens of thousands of hours. in the wilderness. And I could not figure out what the hell I was looking at. You know, went through the inventory of the creatures that live out here. And, you know, we've got a lot of black bear.

You know, black bears are good swimmers, but they're typically point-to-point swimmers and that's kind of creature that'll submerge. We've got elk that are that big, but they're not submerging creatures and they definitely are point-to-point swimmers as well. That's something to be patrolling the center of a lake. And, you know, I kind of went through this inventory. I had no idea what it could be. And again, this was before we had started our reporting program.

And then, so I just sort of chalked it up to do not know what that was, but it is unlike any creature I have ever seen in my life. And then later, you know, we were, as these reports of these cats came in, I started doing more research. And I learned that jaguars are excellent swimmers. And they can hold their breath for 15 minutes. you know, they are just really, really strong swimmers. And that, you know, sort of made me start to wonder, was I looking at a cat down there?

I honestly don't know. And then there was another experience that I had. So, you know, I live in Skamania County and I had my FJ cruiser, you know, and I was working on, I think, some of the spotlights or something like that in the garage one night. And I heard this bellowing noise. And I thought, man, that kind of sounds like a Sasquatch. like from the reports that I had heard. And there was stick knocking, you know, like that knocking of sticks.

And so I called my 11-year-old daughter out into the garage. And I said, listen, listen, listen, do you hear it? And she said, yeah, I do. I said, what do you think it is? She's like, I don't know. And like, we didn't think it was an elk because they have sort of a higher whistle kind of a sound to it. This was sort of a lower thing.

But it was definitely being created by a very large creature, like at least 1,000 pounds. It was not a small noise. And I called my wife out and she listened to it too. And then we listened to elk recordings and we were certain it wasn't an elk. And I thought, man, we might be listening to a Sasquatch out there. So the next day, I got in the rig, the cryptid, and sort of started driving around looking for the area where the sound is coming from. And it sounded like it was maybe a quarter mile away from my house.

So it wasn't that far. and I got out there and was sort of scoping out the area and then I had a pasture and in that pasture was a big bull, a big steer cattle and then he opened his mouth and he made that same noise that I had heard the night before. And I love this story because it's easy to get squash fever and think that, you know, everything that happens weird in the out here in the gorge is some kind of, you know, clearly, you're definitely seeing in squash. But here's one when we went out and we verified. It's the purpose of our investigations is to find the ones that are real and make sure that if there's something that's got a rational explanation that, you know, we're not glomping things together that don't belong in unusual phenomenon. And so that was one of those kind of deals where I was pretty sure I was listening.

to a Sasquatch. I still don't know where the stick knocking came from. Maybe that was, you know, something different. But the noise that I, the whole family heard turned out to actually be a cow and not a Sasquatch at all. I think that's a great lesson. And yes, you are, you are correct. As a lot of listeners know, it is very easy to get, you know, Sasquatch fever or Bigfoot

on the brain. And there's many different ways to say it. But it is so important to. kind of, you know, maybe sometimes take a little bit of a step back and be aware of, you know, what's going on in the area. But, I mean, sometimes, yeah, you take a step back, but you still can't, you know, logically explain away what's going on. But it's important to do that. These reports that you're getting at Margie's, have you found that are most of the Bigfoot reports more peaceful or passive? or there are also some reports in the area of maybe more aggressive Sasquatch?

So we have had no hostile encounters reported at the store. And that goes for Sasquatch and for the 8 cat as well. With the 8 cat, there was one story where a guy thought that the cat was going after his goats. And so he shot at it with a 22. But that was, no human was in danger. And, you know, so the short answer is, no, we really don't get a lot of reports of hostile encounters. We get a lot of reports of people being scared crapples. And so, like, that's a real thing.

And, you know, the stories that we've heard, you know, there's some where these creatures are 13 feet tall. And we have an 11-foot Sasquatch in the store. You know, it's sort of a piece of insulating foam covered with fur in the silhouette of a shot-squatch. And you stand next to that thing, you're like, geez, Louise, that's just gigantic. You know, until you're actually standing next to an 11-foot-tall thing, it is hard to wrap your head around how big it is, but I'm 6'5, and I come up to his butt. And it's just like, man, that is huge. And but the, so there's a ton of stories to talk about in this regard.

Bigfoot Society will be right back after these messages. This is Matt Rogers from Los Culture East, us with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Los Culture Research with Matt Rogers and Boen Yang. Spend your balance instantly with the Venmo debit card and earn up to 5% cashbacks on your favorite bundle of brands when you join Venmo's stash. Your rewards come from bundles of brands you can keep or switch every 30 days so you can choose the ones that match your everyday spending. The more you do with Venmo, the more you get. Earn 2% cash back when you set up auto reloads. Earn 5% cashback with direct deposit. Great for anyone who doesn't want to transfer funds or wait days. No monthly fee, no minimum balance. Cashback is earned automatically.

Just use your Venmo debit card and the rewards show up without extra steps. It's a simple way to get rewarded on things you're already buying, whether that's groceries, coffee, or your go-to-on-line shops. Everything lives right inside the Venmo app so you can track your spending, check your balance, and see your rewards all in one place. The Venmo debit card works just like the app you already use, fast, flexible, and built around your day-to-day life. It's a great option if you want a debit card that fits seamlessly into your routine and gives you a little extra back on the things you're already doing. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bankcorp Bank N.A. pursuant to license by MasterCard International Incorporated. Venmo stash bundle terms and exclusion supply.

Max $100 cash back per month. Requires $500 plus in direct deposits. See terms at Venmo.me. forward slash stash terms. It always happens right before the whistle. There's a little voice that says, what if I mess up? What if I'm not ready?

I see a whole highlight reel of everything I don't want to happen. Missed shots, turnovers, letting my team down. And for a second, there's doubt. But then, I realize I've done enough to be where I'm at. The early mornings, the extra reps, the days I wanted to quit and didn't. So, I smile. Self-doubt is natural, but my smile is a reminder that I'm resilient. To put more smiles out into the world,

Colgate has supported female athletes for over 50 years with the Colgate Women's Games. The Colgate Women's Games is the nation's longest running indoor track and field series for girls and women. Colgate, your smile is your strength. Plan B made over-the-counter emergency contraception legal more than 20 years ago. It's a safe, effective backup birth control

option that helps prevent pregnancy before it starts by temporarily delaying ovulation. Plan B is the number one OBGYN recommended brand and the only one that you can find at all major retailers in all 50 U.S. states. There's no minimum age requirement and you don't need an ID to buy it.

You can order it through DoorDash, another major delivery platforms too. That's freedom to be. Use as directed. There are some folks that see them quite a bit. And there's one guy who I've been out to his property a couple of times. And he has seen, he's brought me hair samples. You know, he has seen pregnant ones. He's heard them giving birth. He's seen blonde ones and red-furred ones and brown ones and black ones. We've had reports of white-ford ones as well out here in the gorge. One night he said that, there were 13 of them that he counted on his property. And they were sort of lining up to cross the road.

It's sort of like they would cross one at a time. And there was sort of a leader one. And he lives in an area on the maps. We've had reports in the store that Native Americans have treaties with these creatures for berry picking areas and mushroom gathering areas and salmon harvesting areas. And so there, I mean, like it's, when you hear this many stories and you live amongst these people, you know, you say either everyone here is a liar, which I don't believe at all. And that's just rude. I mean, like if you are going to accuse people lying that you've never met, like, what are you doing? Like how are you raised? Or they're diluted. And I know that they're not diluted. These are, you know, intelligent people. They're my neighbors. They're my friends. And, you know, the, you know, many of them, like some of them are, you know, businessmen, insurance salesmen, store owners, police officers. And so people are definitely encountering these creatures out there.

And they seem to be really good at hiding, you know, really capable. You know, when I was a soldier, we could hide a whole platoon of guys, you know, in a area, you know, 50 feet by 50 feet. And you would walk right on top of us and not even know we were there. And we just worked in the woods. Like these creatures live there. And their livelihood, their survival depends on being able to blend in with the wilderness. And to anyone who thinks, so how could they hide and how could you not see them, they just have no idea, A, how vast it is out here.

And B, like, how you can hide in this kind of wilderness. Like, it really is something. Like, you just have to be here to understand. how that could work and it absolutely can work. So, but, you know, you asked what, you know, are they, is it benevolent? Are there any of these hostile encounters? And I had a very unusual experience myself. And my ultimate conclusion was this, it was a benevolent experience.

So we have this place up here called the Big Lafabed. It's called the Big Laavabed on many maps. A lot of locals call it Brokelet Boroughs. And it is an area approximately the size of the island of Manhattan in New York. So, you know, three, four miles across and, you know, seven to nine miles long. And basically, 8,000 years ago, there was a volcanic vent opened up, and it created this giant lava bed. And the way to imagine it is, like, imagine just a tangled mass of rocks that sort of bulldozed itself and filled an entire, mountain valley.

And so there are like these micro-canions and jagged rocks. If you have any Tolkien fans out there, it's like I'm on wheel, it's an impassable lava, lava, lava, the razor-sharp rocks. These rocks are covered with moss. There are tons of hidden lava tubes in there. So a lava tube is when the lava starts flowing. The surface, the top of the lava, cools and hardened and creates a sort of an insulated tube and then the rest of the lava runs through there and then it runs out and then the hollow

tube is left behind and so we have like i said over 500 lava tube caves up here and sometimes those caves will collapse and form trenches and so this place is really really weird as a you know as a soldier and a searcher rescue mt and a firefighter i have been professionally trained on land navigation since I was a teenager. And I, among the skills that I have, land navigation is one of them. I mean, literally in the jobs that I've had, whether I be search and rescue or the soldier, you know, lives depended on me knowing how to navigate and doing it well. And so I was out in this area and a couple things about it. There are no trails in there. The hunters, local hunters, don't like to go in there.

We've had dozens of people go missing in that area. Compasses don't work reliably out there. Cell phones absolutely don't work out there. And it's got this sort of weird scrubby forest on it. You know, it's like a hard living for a tree. And so there are some areas that are barren, and it's almost like the surface of the moon with moss. Other areas have got these weird stunted forests in them.

And it's just a really mysterious and intriguing place. We have numerous Southwestwitch sightings in this area, numerous ape cat sightings in this area, and localizations, tree knockings, trees getting knocked over, like lots of stuff, like lots of activity. And the place is so big that, like, you could have, you know, five or six Ewok villages of Sasquatches out there, and no one would ever know. And occasionally, someone to go looking for caves in there, and we'll go missing. And, you know, we have search and rescue teams come out and look for them.

And there's been some weird stories about, you know, like the U.S. military has showed up on a search and rescue for a random civilian. I have been on scores of search and rescue missions. And the only time the military will put boots on the ground is if it's one of their aircraft that's gone down or one of their people that's missing or, you know, it's a civilian flight that's gone down. Other than that, you're lucky to get a chopper out of the Coast Guard. But for searches out here, they'll deploy the nation's most elite pararescue team to go look for people out here.

And it's weird because, you know, there are back in the 1975, the Army Corps of an Engineers produced a document called the Washington Environmental Atlas. And it basically went through like all of the natural things that are in Washington state. So it went through the geology, it went through the plant life, went through the animal life, the archaeological sites and everything. And basically it was a complete description of what the land was Washington State. And there's a section in it that talks about all the animals. And on page 73, there is an entry for Sasquatch. And it is noted as one of the creatures that lives here in Washington State.

And on page 73, there is also a map that shows Bigfoot habitation sites. And this Broke Lake boroughs area is on that map. Mount St. Helens is on that map. And so, you know, it seems pretty clear that the U.S. government is at least aware, or parts of it are aware that there are creatures living out here like Sasquatch. I mean, the entry is Bigfoot. I mean, there's no question about it. What you're seeing there in that document.

So getting back to the story, though, I was out there, and I find this place incredibly intriguing. I've navigated in deserts and swamps and glaciers and forests and you name it. But this place kind of gives me the hebi-jeebies. Like it's the one land navigation challenge that scares me because those rocks are so dangerous, like if you slip and fall in there, you could really hurt yourself. I mean, like, yeah, it's kind of crazy. And also, like all of the things like your compass not working and, you know, it's sometimes

It's hard to get a lock with GPS out there. But I drove up there and I parked my car at the edge of the lava bed in the middle of the forest and walked in about 100 yards and was flying my drone up and down this trench. Let's just say, for the sake of description, it was a north-south trench. And I flew my drone up and down a couple times and then it hit a tree branch at the south end of that trench. And I went and picked it up, put the drone away, and walked to the north end of the trench. probably 100 yards. And then, to my recollection, I took a 90-degree turn

and then walked another 400 yards west into the lava bed. Exploring as I was going, checking things out. And as a professional land navigator, there's a ton of things that you're doing in the background whenever you're in the forest. And you are doing things like noting landmarks, watching the position of the sun, doing your pace count. you know, there's a whole set of techniques and tricks and things like that where you are always

maintaining your location relative to where you started and relative to where you were. And I thought that I was doing all those things. I mean, like I have done a thousand times before. And I came upon another really interesting trench. And this one was fascinating. And so I started to get the drone out again and I began flying the drone up and down what I thought was a new trench. And then like waking up from a dream, I realized slowly that I was right back where I had originally crashed the drone. Now this was five, six hundred yards from where I thought I was, where I should have been. I have no memory, none whatsoever of how I got from where I thought I was to where I ended up. And the only thing that sort of tipped me off was I looked over my

shoulder and I could see my car 100 yards away. And it was the most disconcerting, discombobulating feeling I've ever had. I mean, you know, I cannot remember the last time I got turned around or lost in a wilderness setting. Like I said, lives depend on me knowing how to do this. In fact, like I'm the kind of person you call when someone else gets lost in the woods and you need someone competent and capable to find them and get them out. And to be that turned around and that just flambozled about how I had arrived where I was and having no recollection of getting there. Like my memories were seamlessly edited. And at first I was like a little bit creeped out. I was like, what does happen to me?

Like, you know, I'm the kind of person, like, when you see a person's face and then you walk away for 15 minutes and you come back and you see it again, like you know their face, like that's what like a wilderness location is like for me, especially one unique like this trench. And then I had like no, like I thought I was in a brand new place. That is like just unheard of for me. And as I started contemplating like what had happened, you know, the first I was like, what? like just sort of like sort of off put by it then I was excited that you know we've had many people come in in tell us reports of having time loss and spatial displacement and so like that and this experience had actually happened to me and as I thought about it I thought you know if if there was something like a Sasquatch or whatever that didn't want me to go deeper into

that lava bed on that day this was the most bened way possible to put me back at start. They put me in a place that was relatively safe, where I could quickly find my vehicle, easily get out of this really rugged and actually pretty dangerous terrain area, and do it in a way that did me no harm and caused me no trouble. And so the overwhelming sense that I had, like once I get over being completely, you know, bamboozled by being lost in the woods for the first time in decades was, wow, like this was a, like the kindest, softest, most benevolent way of just bumping me out of a place that I shouldn't have been on that day at that time. So, yeah, those are some of the lived experiences I've had out here. And it's really been amazing. It's absolutely just fascinating to hear about that area.

And I've never specifically heard that about that Atlas before. I've known I've seen like the screenshot of the Sasquatch. But just I've never really heard about that. It calls out certain spots on the map. Does it call out other places in Washington State too? or does it really just focus on that one area in that Atlas? Yeah. There's a, I'm remembering, you know, like, yeah, you can easily look it up on my.

You just go up. Okay. Army Corps of Engineers, Washington Environmental Atlas. And it's not hard to find. Like, you download a PDF, I'm like, oh, you know, however many hundred pages are in there. And on page 73, there's a Sasquatch. It definitely shows it up north. You know, there's an area called Index, which is where, you know,

Harry and the Henderson's was filmed. We used to do a lot of rock climbing back in the day. And I'm pretty sure there are marks in that area. Their place is in Spokane. In fact, in Spokane, there's a Fairchild Air Force Base, and they have a Sear School, which is survival, escape, resistance, and evasion. It's like if a pilot gets down, you know, they train how to get back to friendly territory. And they issue them a map of Washington State. And on that map, it's got pictures of all the dangerous, you know, all the animals and wildlife and there's a section on dangerous animals and they've got you know our orcas and our bears and that kind of stuff and there's a picture of Sasquatch and it's a 2007 map from the

Sears School at Fairchild Air Force Base that also show a Sasquatch so either they're hilarious jokesters or the U.S. government is aware that these creatures live here in Washington state Bigfoot Society will be right back after these messages. This is Matt Rogers from Los Culture East. Matt Rogers and Bowen-Yang. This is Bowen-Yang from Los Culture Research with Matt Rogers and Bowen-Jang. Spend your balance instantly with the Venmo debit card and earn up to 5% cashbacks on your favorite bundle of brands when you join Venmo's stash. Your rewards come from bundles of brands you can keep or switch every 30 days so you can choose the ones that match your everyday spending.

The more you do with Venmo, the more you get. Earn 2% cash back when you set up auto reloads. Earn 5% cash back with direct deposit. Great for anyone who doesn't want to transfer funds or wait days. No monthly fee, no minimum balance. And now you can earn up to 5% cash back. Back at select brands in your bundle every time you check out online with the Venmo button. Cashback is earned automatically. Just use your Venmo debit card and the rewards show up without extra steps. It's a simple way to get rewarded on things you're already buying, whether that's groceries, coffee, or your go-to-online shops. Everything lives right inside the Venmo app so you can track your spending, check your balance, and see your rewards all in one place. The Venmo debit card works just like the app you already use, fast, flexible, and built around your day-to-day life.

It's a great option if you want a debit card that fits seamlessly into your routine, it gives you a little extra back on the things you're already. already doing. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bankcourt Bank N.A. Pursuant to license by MasterCard International Incorporated. Venmo Stash Bundle Terms in Exclusion Supply. Max $100 cash back per month. Requires $500 plus in direct deposits. See terms at Venmo.com. Forward slash stash terms. Venmo checkout not available at all merchants. It always happens right before the whistle. There's a little voice that says, what if I mess up? What if I'm not ready? I see a whole highlight reel of everything I don't want to happen. Missed shots, turnovers, letting my team down. And for a second, there's doubt. But then, I realize I've done enough to be where I'm at. The early mornings,

the extra reps, the days I wanted to quit and didn't. So I smile. Self-doubt is natural, but my smile is a reminder that I'm resilient. To put more smiles out into the world, Colgate has supported female athletes for over 50 years with the Colgate Women's Games. The Colgate Women's Games is the nation's longest running indoor track and field series for girls and women. Colgate, your smile is your strength. Plan B made over-the-counter emergency contraception legal more than 20 years ago. It's a safe, effective backup birth control option that helps prevent pregnancy before it starts by temporarily delaying ovulation. Plan B is the number one OBGYN-R recommended brand,

and the only one that you can find at all major retailers in all 50 U.S. states. There's no minimum age requirement and you don't need an ID to buy it. You can order it through DoorDash and other major delivery platforms too. That's freedom to be. Use as directed. You know, that's the kind of thing that really, it makes me wish that people that were in the know, in government for that state or Oregon, or whatever out there would just start coming forward and man we just got to start getting some answers because or i mean i feel we already have the answers but it would be nice if people from in government

would just be like oh yeah yeah it's it's real you know just just throw it all out there why not we're doing all the uap stuff we might as well do uh the the sask watch yeah exactly why not The problem, I don't think, is the evidence. Like anyone who's been in the Bigfoot community for any amount of time knows there's genetic evidence, there's tons of photographic and video evidence. So the problem isn't the evidence, it's the audience. And Bigfoot has been around for decades in the public imagination. And on any given day, 70% of the population, the minute they hear the word Bigfoot thinks

that automatically, without even considering anything other than the name, the brand Bigfoot, it's a hoax. Like straight up, there's just no getting around it. And so because there's been disclosures, there's been all the things that we would have hoped for. And, like, you know, Bigfoot's got a branding problem. And that's sort of the way that it's, it's just the weight of his history. And to be sure, there are people who have created. hoaxes, you know, and try to do fakes and stuff like that. You know, and I had mentioned earlier

that one of my passions is sort of being a champion for witnesses, for true witnesses, right? And a part of that is debunking, you know, what I would call the enthusiastically mistaken. Like that night that I found that we heard the cow, I was enthusiastically mistaken that I was hearing a Sasquatch, right? We got a really cool photograph in a report. It was from a trail cam. And it looked for all the world like a black cat leaping. And I thought, geez, this is like, we got it right here. Look at this thing. But the problem was, the photo from a second before didn't have it in there and the photo from a second afterwards didn't have it in there. And I was like, what, how could this be? And it was a silhouette so you couldn't get a lot of detail. So I took it back

to the store and did some image analysis on it and, you know, worked with some contrast and filters. And it turned out that, nope, actually it was a crow and it's winning. Things were just in a very unusual configuration at a unique angle. And it wasn't a cat leaping at all. It was just, again, enthusiastically mistaken. So the point is, is that there is, it's the problem with the audience, like, not the evidence. And if you're going to be a champion for the true witnesses, the people who've, the ordinary people who have seen extraordinary things, then, you know, I've been asking myself, like, what, what can I do?

you know, we've got easily one of the most active paranormal hotspots in North America here in the Gorge. There's lots of interesting theories about why that might be, but like this is a really interesting testing or proving grounds, right? So this spring, we're going to be offering a $10,000 reward for the most compelling evidence of strange phenomenon in the gorge. And, you know, we'll take evidence on, yeah, on everything from Bigfoot to this ape cat, to the UFOs people are seeing here. And there's a team of volunteers here in the gorge. We're going to investigate the evidence.

And at the end of the summer, we're going to announce who the $10,000 winner is. And there's a couple of reasons why I'm doing this. One of the big ones is that we're crowdsourcing evidence gathering, right? So there are 2.5 million people that live in the Portland area, metro area. And they come to the gorge to recreate and hike and do all the kind of stuff. And of course, there's the 80,000. people who live here already. And a lot of these folks see these creatures on the regular. And there's enough, you know, social stigma and hurdles to bring in evidence and bring it forward, right?

And so $10,000, I hope is motivating enough to put your neck out a little bit and say, yes, I've got something worth looking at here. Right. And the investigation team is, you know, we're going to be alert for hoaxes, but we are trying to confirm that their evidence is real. Like that's, our goal is, okay, you've given us a good foothold. Now we're going to go and figure out all of the conditions around it. And what's really cool is because all of these investigators live here in the gorge, like we can respond within hours to a report.

Like if someone says, yeah, I just saw him up on, you know, the incline road. Like, we can hop in my crypted four by four. and zip on out there and look for prints and look for hair and do all the other kind of things. And, you know, ensure that take our own video of it. There are many folks who live out here who have reoccurring experiences like the cats show up regularly in their orchard and they have a name for it and it's kittens. There are folks that have, you know, see Sasquatch on their property all the time. And so, you know, they can provide us with some initial footage and then, you know, we can

go up there and do a stakeout and try to capture it with our own camera. And one of the things that I've been wanting to bring to the Bigfoot community that your audience specifically is what would be the ideal footage? Like if you could give someone instructions on how to take the best photographic video evidence of something that another researcher could follow up on your work and verify what you've done, like what instructions would you give that person? at the top of my head, I would say things like ensure that your geolocation settings are on on your camera. Another thing that I would say is narrate your experience as you're having it. Tell us the time, the day, the weather, what it is that you're filming, why you're filming it. You know, is there anyone else there with you? If you have a buddy, film it from two different angles, I would say things like kick an X in the ground where you're filming from,

so that we can put our camera there and then go down range and then be able to approximate the height because we know where your camera was and then we can go down range and ask to figure out where he was. I would say before you're finished filming, you know, turn your camera 360 degrees around so we can see the entire environment where you're at and more accurate, locate your location. I'm sure that your audience has more ideas on, you know, what kind of things you could do to create that best evidence, the kind of evidence that other researchers could verify your footage with. And I don't know, do you have any thoughts on what, like, you've probably seen tons of different videos and different things. And like, man, I wish that they had, you know, steadied their camera or leaned up.

against a tree or, you know, whatever it is. So it's, it's something I've been working over the last year, because it's a thing where as, as AI, as AI progresses, the video side of thing, the things is beginning to get better and better. I've seen, thankfully, you know, most of the Bigfoot stuff in, in the video. form, you can pick out right away that it's fake. I've seen one or two where I'm like, ooh, that's, yes, a little bit too close for comfort where it's, it's, we're starting to get there. But I think, you know, if I was trying to do something like this, it would be very, very

important that I would see the original media that it was on, whether it would be like old school VHSC tape or even, you know, maybe it's someone's going to bring in the the next old school Patterson Gimlin. It's like on an old real, you know, real whatever. But I think it's going to be very very important for that. And also, I mean, if you do end up getting like digital media to be able to see like the metadata on it and there are especially when you're throwing 10k into the mix it's going to get very very interesting I think I can't wait to see the type of stuff that you you get but it's you know it's also like if you're getting a video from a person where you know they were just out there in the gorge and like they just randomly you know it's

probably going to be a pretty, it's not going to have all the bells and whistles. Like we have our ideas, like, you know, make sure you get a whole thing of the surroundings. And it's probably going to be pretty, pretty rough like those, you know, if you see a bald eagle or there's this, you know, I drove by a bald eagle once. And it happens so quick. I just didn't have the time to even get out my phone to take a picture. It's like, this stuff happens. And, seconds but in the best case scenario if a person could get all that stuff that you said oh man that would be just amazing the things that you could use to to replicate by going into the area and if you had the GPS coordinates and all that good stuff i mean i'm excited to hear in the future

and not too far off i mean this is going to all happen pretty quick i mean you you should be able to get some really cool stuff from this experiment. It's really an experiment, you know. Yeah. You know, that AI thing has got me concerned as well. Like, you know, obviously you can recommend people get polarized. And in our investigation bag, we have Polaroid cameras. So that, you know, if we're taking pictures, we at least have a physical medium,

much harder to futz within a digital one, right? So it makes it more compelling. but one of the team members happens to be a psychic medium who finds dead people for a living. And she, you know, it's a tricky thing because to the outside observer, you're trying to find something that doesn't exist with, you know, something that doesn't exist. Like if you don't believe in Sasquatch, you probably don't believe in psychic mediums. But our, but Jamie is remarkable. She has been basically talking to dead people since she was eight years old.

And she has clients on five continents. She's helped law enforcement across the country. And the sheriff out here, the sheriff of Schemania County, is willing to help us with our project. And so, you know, we'll be working with her to verify some of the things that we're going with as well. But it is, like you said with this AI, it becomes a really challenging, it becomes harder and harder to believe anything you see on video. And so, you know, I think that, you know, this cat, you know, we have video of the cat. I've seen video of the cat.

We have seen your law enforcement. People who've reported that they've seen the cat to me. You know, we've got decades of reports. And I'm pretty sure, like, and, you know, people say they see it on their property all the time. And, you know, that's one where I'm pretty sure that we'll be able to demonstrate that there's a population of large bag cats, currently not recognized by science, living here in the gorge by the end of the summer. And I feel like we might have a better bet of proving that crypted than Bigfoot. Because Bigfoot, like I said, we've got decades of branding and, you know, issues.

People don't know if they believe in big black cats or not. And if we can, you know, get them exposed to this idea and then a few months later demonstrate that these creatures are actually living out here, we will then show that, yes, it is possible for a large mammal to live in the United States. undetected or unrecognized by science, and then bring that to the fore. And I think that can bulldoze a pathway that makes Bigfoot so much more believable. That makes the mountains of evidence that the creature is real, gives people a reason to believe that or take another look at it.

And again, for me, it all goes down to, I'm honestly more interested in validating the witnesses than necessarily proving that this stuff exists. Like, that's where my motivation is really centered on this whole project. I'm so excited. Like, I, you know, we have to wait for the snow to melt out here before we announce the workers, but weren't getting hurt. We had two Bigfoot searchers die on Christmas because they died of exposure because they didn't have, they weren't properly prepared.

So that's one of the reasons why I'm working with the sheriff is we don't want anyone getting hurt out here with this project. And so her and I are going to create some safety videos and things like that. but I'm super excited. And I really hope that, you know, some of the competent people who have this as a passion in the life come out to the gorge. And, you know, those are the people that are going to know how to create good footage and help us capture some hopefully stuff that will give the world another reason to consider this stuff.

Is it a thing where there's going to be updates about the project, like on the Margie's website or where will that happen? Yeah. So, yeah, Margie's Outdoor Store as soon as we're ready to start making announcements and given all the conditions and everything like that, we'll definitely be on Margie's OutdoorStore.com, Margie's Outdoor Store on Facebook, on Instagram, and on YouTube. But we're going to film all of our investigations and put them up on a YouTube channel

called Gorge Mysteries. So not now, but soon there'll be a Gorge Mysteries website and Facebook page and YouTube channel. And so the idea is that we will film the investigations and as quickly as we can, we'll get them out. And one of our visions is we would love the community to help us with the investigations. You know, we think of it as an online posse. There's some stuff that, you know, we can do as boots on the ground.

But like when we get UFO sightings or or. sightings like we would love to have the online community scrub the FAA records and the you know astrological astronomical event records and see if you know we can eliminate any of those kind of things but I I love the idea of this being not my project but the community's project and finding ways for more and more people to get engaged and I mean at the end of the day I am living the dream like I successful stores here in the gorge you know hundreds of people have come to me and told me about these extraordinary experiences i've got this a really cool four by four that you know me and my

my friends dash off into the woods when we get these reports and we investigate like these amazing semi-mythical phenomena that's out here and it's such a joyful satisfying way to live and i want this for as many people as possible, you know, to live this kind of adventure and to have these, it's almost like we're citizen scientists and there's this sense of like actual wonder in the world for us. You know, we live in a place where the wonders are real and the joy and satisfaction of that. And it comes from, you know, opening a space in your mind where you say it's, I don't know if these facts are real, but it's possible. And that's when the dull gray nine to five world opens up into full color. And the experiences that you get to have are utterly remarkable. And, you know,

you feel so much more alive when you haven't predetermined that what you're looking for isn't real. So anyway, oh my goodness. It's very, very exciting. Just, to think, I have, I've been thinking that 2025, there's some really cool stuff that's going to come out in this year. And I mean, I didn't know anything about, about all this that you just shared. And I think some, it's going to be absolutely fantastic to see this all take place. And it's exciting, James. And thank you for sharing it on, on my show tonight. If any of your audience member want to send me a note, You can send it to staff at Margie's, Margiestores.com.

So staff at Margiestores.com. And I think that there's a link on our website to an email address. It might be the same one. But like if you want to get a hold of me and you've got some thoughts or ideas, you want to share about what we're doing, yeah, we are asking for input. Because like, I'm a newcomer to this Bigfoot thing. There are people who've been doing this their whole lives. And, you know, the state of Washington tourism, like I'm trying to introduce them to this idea of paranormal tourism.

You know, I told them there's a study from Scotland that says Nessie drives $54 million a year in incremental revenue to local businesses. And it's Nessie's a huge part of their international marketing campaign. And I'm not trying to commercialize Sasquatch around these things. what I'm trying to do is give the powers that be an economic interest in promoting them, in not shuffling it off to the side and saying this isn't real, this is BS, but to say, hey, you know what, if Washington state embraces paranormal tourism, and, you know, we have elected officials who are endorsing some of these things that we're finding, or we're giving them reasons to care and not just, you know, put us at the kid table,

I think that that's where you start to get some of those things that you were talking about earlier. Like, can these government officials come forward and talk about this kind of stuff? Like right now they have no incentive to do that. And again, with my mission of validating the true witnesses, like there's no reason to stop or, or to pull punches, you know, like in addition to all my outdoor awesomeness, you know, I spent 30 years, you know, as a businessman and doing, you know, international global projects. I know how to speak a financial language to people and make it worth their while and give them

incentives to do things. And so for me, like, this is kind of what my mission in life is right now. But I can't do it alone. And I need help from people. who are wiser than me, who've been doing this longer, who have fallen into all the pits and climbed their way out and can help the whole community. But anyway, I'm super excited about it. I love it. Yeah. And you're definitely talking to the right community.

I'm sure there'll be many people that will reach out to you with ideas. And I'll have all the links and everything that people want to check out. out in the description and show notes of this episode. But, you know, James Schubski has been just a privilege to talk to you tonight. And thank you for sharing your heart and for what you've been and what you've been figuring out about the gorge and the mysteries of the gorge. And it'll be very cool to see where this goes next. Yeah. Again, thank you for lending your platform to me to be able to talk about this kind of stuff and communicate with the people who care passionately about it. So thank you. I just want to take a few minutes to say thank you to you,

all my listeners, for listening to the podcast. Please take a minute to help out the show by subscribing on YouTube, making sure you hit the bell so you don't miss any notifications, and share the episode on YouTube with a friend. Also, if you're listening to us on a podcast, thank you so much. Make sure that you're subscribed. Share the show with a friend. Really, it's all about sharing the show wherever you can. If you've had a Bigfoot encounter related to the following or know someone who has, please reach out to me at Bigfoot Society at Gmail.com or pass on my email.

Here's the list. The Suttall Lake area of Oregon, Rainbow, Oregon, McKinsey Bridge area, sweet home, pretty much the entire area, the north part, if you get what I mean. I'll see you back next time, listeners. Saswit Summerfest, this year, July 11th through the 12th,

it's going to be fantastic. July 11th through 12th in Greenwater's Park in Oakridge, Oregon. And listeners, if you're going to go, you can get a two-day ticket for the cost of one. If you use the code BFS,

like Bigfoot Society. but BFS and I'll get you some off your cost. Priscilla was nice enough to provide that for my listeners. So there you go. I look forward to seeing you there. So make sure you head over to www.sasquatch summerfest.com and pick up your tickets today. This is Matt Rogers from Los Culture Eastas with Matt Rogers and Boen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Los Culture Rees with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.

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