MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories - Something is in the Woods

Episode Date: February 20, 2025

Today’s podcast will feature 3 horrifying stories that will make you wonder who or what may be lurking in the forest. The audio from all three stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.Story names, previews & links to original YouTube videos:#3 -- "Pound Cake" -- Girl takes a "shortcut" on the Appalachian Trail (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cf9ahZB9yfY)#2 -- "The Dream" -- 3 hikers attempt a rugged hike in bad weather (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNpctf6WJx8)#1 -- "Big Footprint" -- A mysterious set of footprints are found in a marsh (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZCCCxnSMxs)For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallenIf you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Today's podcast will feature three horrifying stories that will make you wonder who or what may be lurking in the forest. The audio from all three of these stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel and has been remastered for today's episode. The links to the original YouTube videos are in the description.

The first story you'll hear is called Pound Cake, and it's about a girl who takes a shortcut on the Appalachian Trail. The second story you'll hear is called The Dream, and it's about three hikers who attempt a rugged hike in terrible weather. And the third and final story you'll hear is called Big Footprint, and it's about a mysterious set of footprints that are found in a marsh. But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to their phone for you to input your own number, Venmo yourself $1,000 and then hand their phone back. Okay, let's get into The Rosamocas Show. If you're looking for something hilarious to watch, I've got a recommendation for you. Check out CBC Gem where you can stream

TV shows, movies, documentaries and more from across Canada and around the world. And if you're in the mood for a comedy that's all about navigating life's ups and downs, check out Small Achievable Goals. It's the hilarious, hormonal, new CBC comedy about Julie and Chris, two women unexpectedly paired to produce a podcast while coping with office politics, relationships, and of course, menopause. It's full of mood swings, hot flashes, the maelstrom of menopause, and the unexpected friendship. Small Achievable Goals premiering on February 25th at 9pm Eastern. Catch it free on CBC Gem. Redacted Declassified Mysteries is a new podcast hosted by me, Luke Lamanna. Each week I dive into the hidden truths behind the world's most powerful institutions.

From covert government experiments to bizarre assassination attempts, follow Redacted on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. In 1989, 22-year-old Eloise Lindsay was a fresh college graduate, and she was at a crossroads in her life, because even though she'd just earned her degree, she really didn't know what she wanted to do with her life. And because she was an experienced backpacker, she thought a good way to, you know, kind of get her life together would be to go on a sort of retreat, go out into the woods, go out into nature, and kind of find herself. So she had planned this very detailed 43.3 mile hike along the Appalachian trail

starting in South Carolina, where the first seven days of the hike she would be totally on her own, and then at the seven day mark she would meet up with a friend at a particular rendezvous point her friend would give her resupplies and would be her companion for the rest of the hike. When Eloise told her parents what her plans were, they were not concerned for her safety because she was an experienced backpacker. She had made trips like this before and so they said great we'll see you when you get back. So on November 4th Eloise sets out to begin her journey down the Appalachian Trail. And the first couple of days of her hike were great. The weather was beautiful, the scenery was amazing, and she had all this time to just

kind of be by herself and look internal and think hard about what she wanted to do with her life. But on the third day, when she woke up, she was sleeping inside of a tent she had camped just off the trail she woke up and she had this intense sense of dread. She couldn't really place where it was coming from but she knew something was wrong and she's kind of doing inventory of her life like what did I forget is there something that I'm just not thinking about right now but she kind of pushes it aside mentally and thinks okay you know what I'm just gonna pack up my campsite here and get hiking and I'm bound

to come up with what it is that's making me feel this way. So she gets out of her tent and she begins packing up her campsite and she's looking out kind of scanning the tree line, not because she was looking for anything, but just because she happened to be looking out and she could have sworn that she saw a man standing you know 30-40 feet away behind a tree and she kind of did a double take and was staring at him. It's broad daylight, it's the morning and they're near a trail so what is it like unbelievable that there might be someone near her at that very moment, but she kind of did a double take and she looked at them again and this person was gone and she stood

there for a minute just kind of looking in the direction of where she had seen this guy wondering, you know, is my mind playing tricks on me? Did I really see someone there? You know, why aren't they showing themselves again? If there was someone there, they clearly must have just been looking at me. Why aren't they, you know, poking their heads out again to communicate with me in some way? We're out in the middle of nowhere. We should be talking to each other." But the guy never shows himself again and so as she's standing there wondering what she should do, she isn't ready to yell out to this person because there's part of her that's a little bit nervous about yelling out to some stranger in the middle of the woods, but she starts to get this really intense feeling that she's being watched and it feels an awful lot like the sense of dread she had

while she was in the tent. And she's starting to wonder, you know, are my instincts or is my sixth sense picking up that I'm being watched like there's some predator out there looking at me right now? And even though she has no way of knowing if that's actually true, she's alone in the middle of the woods and even though she's experienced, she can't help but feel really vulnerable. And because this guy is just not showing himself again, she feels a little bit threatened. And so she begins to panic and she starts packing up all of her stuff as quickly as she can.

And as soon as she can, she takes off down the trail away from that guy she saw in the woods. As she was walking down this trail, she couldn't help but think someone was right behind her. She kept turning around to see if this person or whoever it was was behind her and no one was ever there. But this visceral feeling that she was being watched, that sense of dread she had, it just was not going away. And so she started walking faster and faster before long she was running and she's realizing that she's in a section of the Appalachian Trail that's very remote. She's not near civilization. She's not near her next rendezvous point. And so she's thinking to herself, I need to get off this trail. I need to get to a road. I need to get away from here as soon as I possibly can. And so her options were

to continue on this trail for several miles and it would probably take her until well into the night before she was going to reach civilization or she could take a shortcut. Because she believed there was a road that was running parallel to her trail, but it was way down the mountain. It would require leaving the trail and basically cutting through the wilderness to get down to this road, but she was pretty confident it was right down there. And because this threat of this person or thing following her was so intense for her, she decided to leave the trail. She couldn't stand the idea of having to spend another night out in the middle

of the woods with this person stalking her. And so she walks off the trail and starts running down the mountain. It wasn't long before she started to hear audible sounds coming from what she believed to be this person that was following her. And she would turn around and there'd be no one there. And then she started to walk, you know, trying to listen as she's walking and she would hear footsteps far away from her and she'd turn and there'd be nobody there. But she was certain someone was following her. Someone was stalking her.

And the sounds that were coming out of this person, this animal, whatever it was, they sounded like, you know, a deep male voice, but she couldn't recognize if it was a language of some kind, it just sounded more like a grunt or a yell of some kind. And so her heart rate's elevated, she's panicking, and she's walking as fast as she can, just through the middle of the wilderness, hoping she's walking towards this road, but after walking and running for miles into the middle of nowhere, she has not come to a road. It's now completely dark out and she knows she's lost. And so she has to set up camp in the middle of nowhere and she knows somewhere out in the middle of the woods is some person or something that is stalking me. And she's all alone, she has no way to contact anyone, she doesn't have a cell phone, it's 1989,

and so she sets up her campsite and she gets in her tent, she zips it up, and she lays there hoping she doesn't hear any sounds. And sure enough, within minutes of being inside of that tent, she starts hearing those audible sounds coming from somewhere in the forest, and she hears what sounds like heavy footsteps walking around the perimeter of her campsite. All night long she hears this, but luckily they don't come up right to her tent, so there's some separation between her and whatever is making these sounds. And then finally, you know, the sun comes up, she is out of that tent, packs it up,

and continues running in the direction she hopes is the road. And of course, all day long she has that sense that someone is watching her, she's hearing footsteps coming from behind her, she would turn, she doesn't see anything, she would hear that audible grunting sound, that low voice coming from somewhere behind her, but again she would never see whoever it was or whatever it was that was making the sound. And then again the sun is starting to set and she has not found the road, she hasn't found a trail, and she's thinking to herself, I can't even backtrack because if I turn around and start walking backwards I'm bound to run into this very thing I'm trying to escape. And so once again she sets up her campsite in the middle of nowhere, she

gets inside and as soon as she's laying in her tent she starts hearing those heavy footsteps somewhere out in the woods, kind of walking around the perimeter of her campsite. She's hearing that low audible sound that she can't quite place and at some point she falls asleep, she gets up the next morning, she jumps out of her tent, packs it up and starts running hopefully in the direction that will bring her to civilization. A couple days later when Eloise was supposed to meet her friend on the trail at the seven-day mark and they were going to finish the hike together, well,

Eloise doesn't show up. But after several hours when Eloise did not show up, her friend left the trail and contacted authorities and filed a missing person report. And the police would launch this massive search for Eloise along the stretch of the Appalachian Trail where she had said she would be. And for the next 14 days, hundreds of police and volunteers and helicopters are scouring this area and there's no sign of Eloise. And so after 14 days from the time her friend filed the missing person report, the police had to turn the search off and they say, look, we can't find her. Two days after the search was terminated, so 23 days after Eloise had initially set off for her

trek through the Appalachian Trail, a hunter that was out in the middle of nowhere near the Appalachian Trail discovers Eloise perched up against a tree. She's totally emaciated, she's dehydrated, she's delirious, but she's alive. At first she was terrified of the hunter because she believed the hunter was this person that had been following her, but when she realized he was there to help she went with them. She was brought back and brought to a hospital and she was checked out and besides being dehydrated and you know emaciated, she was brought back and brought to a hospital and she was checked out and besides being dehydrated and you know emaciated she was okay and

she would detail in multiple interviews and in her official statement that she had been chased for the past almost three weeks in the middle of the woods and she doesn't know who it was or why they were chasing her and Then interestingly she said right before she was found And then interestingly, she said right before she was found, so a couple of days before this hunter finds her, this person, this thing, whatever it was that was following her got so close to her a couple different times that she was so scared she ditched her backpack that contained all of her life-saving equipment like her sleeping bag and her tent and it had some food and water in there. She ditched that so she could be lighter, so she could run faster away from this thing that is chasing her in the woods.

So you gotta figure, you gotta be at such a high level of fear that you're prepared to ditch the one thing you really require to survive out in the wilderness, which was her pack full of supplies. And then, after she's ditched her pack and she's run for some distance, she's got no supplies, no food, no water, she stumbles across this tree in the middle of nowhere that wedged inside the trunk is a cachet of donuts and pound cake. And so she takes the donuts and pound cake and between that and the stream water she had found, that's what kept her alive for the last few days before she was found.

Eloise says she has no idea what to make of her experience, and law enforcement were baffled by it as well. Some people think Eloise had a mental break and she effectively made this whole situation up, that she really was lost in the woods but no one was chasing her and she was just kind of paranoid and running around the wilderness for a couple of weeks. Other people, including park rangers that work that stretch of the Appalachian Trail, believe it's possible she could have been stalked by wildmen, which are basically people that live out in the mountains that are effectively feral,

that live off the land, and they've been known, according to local legend, they've been known to attack park rangers, and people that live out in that area have claimed to have seen these wildmen, and they kind of match the description of what she was describing. But as of right now, there's no official explanation for what happened to her, other than she got lost and was found again. Love winter? Then you'll fall in love with winter in Niagara-on-the-Lake. This charming and historic town is the perfect place to lace up your skates, cozy up by the fire after

a day of wine tours or beer sampling, or simply melt into a puddle with a luxurious spa day. Wander through one-of-a-kind boutiques and indulge in world-class dining where every meal is an experience to savor. Winter in Niagara-on-the-Lake is more than a season. to savor. Winter in Niagara-on-the-Lake is more than a season. It's magical. Come explore Niagara-on-the-Lake now or plan your adventure at niagra-on-the-lake.com. Have you ever gotten a message out of the blue?

Maybe you ignore them, or maybe you end up in conversation. Maybe they tell you about an amazing offer. I can really show you how to make some money. And maybe that gets you into a lot of trouble. But this isn't a story about people like you, the people receiving these messages. This is a story about the people behind the messages, on the other end of the line. Thousands of them, working in a micro city built for scammers.

From Wondery, the makers of Dr. Death and Kill List, comes Scam Factory, a new series about survival at the expense of others. Follow Scam Factory on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Scam Factory early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Scam Factory early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. On March 7th, 1975, 21-year-old Mark Hanson, along with two of his friends from college, Ben Fish and John Chidester, arrived at a parking lot on the eastern side of the Appalachian Trail.

All three of the young men were in incredible physical shape and were excited to spend their spring break challenging themselves on some of the trail's most rigorous hikes. The day before they were supposed to go, they almost cancelled the trip because there was this terrible weather system that was coming over the trail and they were thinking you know it's gonna be dangerous it's not such a good idea and then they started talking some more and they were like well we're already going to you know challenge ourselves it would be even more challenging to hike these really difficult trails with the inclusion of bad weather so this is

another way to you know test our abilities and so they kind of got pumped up at the idea of hiking the Appalachian Trail in terrible weather. So the guys arrive in the parking lot and the windshield wipers are furiously working to keep the pouring rain off. They hop out and they're getting soaked by the rain they put on their ponchos they grab their heavy packs and they make their way over to the trail. Their plan was to move west along the trail until they hit the Tri Corner Shelter where they would spend their first night. The Tri Corner Shelter is one of the many shelters along the Appalachian Trail. They are open to the public, there's no heating or electricity, but it provides shelter

from the storm. You can go in there and you know get in a sleeping bag and you'll be fine. but it provides shelter from the storm. You can go in there and you know get in a sleeping bag and you'll be fine. But to get to the Tri Corner Shelter they would need to hike 16 miles almost completely uphill walking right into the wind and it's raining on them and it's supposed to snow later on so it's just a treacherous treacherous first day. But they take off they start walking up this trail and after a couple of miles, John says, you know what guys, this is awful. I think we should probably turn around. I think we've underestimated how bad this is going to be.

Let's go back to the car and we'll do this another time. But Mark and Ben were like, oh no, we are committed. We are doing this. We are not turning around. And John's like, you know what, suit yourself. I'm not going to do that. And he turned around and he left and he went back to the car and he would pick them up when they were done. After John turned around, Mark and Ben, you know, they felt good, they felt tough,

they're going to stick this hike out. And so they take off again and Ben's in the lead and Ben seems to be handling the poor weather and difficult hike and heavy pack a lot better than Mark is. In fact, over the next several hours, Mark would drift farther and farther back and Ben would need to wait for him and Mark would be hunched over, you know, really just struggling with this hike. And then at some point, Mark yells to him and says, I got to take my pack off. I can't carry this much weight up this hill until we get to the shelter.

I'm not going to we get to the shelter. I'm not gonna make it to the shelter." Then Ben would say to him, you know, if we don't get to the shelter for some reason, you're gonna be stranded out here in the storm without any warm clothes, without your sleeping bag, without your tent, without your food, without your water. It's way too dangerous. You have to keep your pack on. And so finally Mark is convinced and he's like, oh alright, puts his pack back on and they continue moving. About an hour later at 7 p.m. they had reached the section of the trail where they knew they were getting closer, close-ish, to the tri-corner shelter. They

were certainly well beyond the halfway point, but it was dark out, the temperature had dropped significantly. At this point Ben is basically Mark's cheerleader kind of egging him on to keep moving and Mark's kind of staggering along this trail and Ben and Mark are just hoping that shelter just appears at some point here because they don't know how much farther they can go. Another hour and a half goes by, they still haven't made it to the shelter. Mark is groaning, he can barely move, it's pitch black, the rain has now completely shifted over to snow and it is just dumping snow on them. And Ben is concerned that, you know, somehow did we take a wrong turn, even though they were on a really well marked trail and he knew they hadn't. He figured they must be so close at this point. And it

was around this time that Mark yells out to Ben, I'm done. I can't go any farther. And he sits down right in the middle of the trail. He's sitting down with his pack and he's just laying there and Ben is like, come on, we're so close. You can't sit down now. And Mark's like, I'm not moving. I can't do anymore. I'm gonna sleep right here. Ben knows this is a bad idea. I mean, they did have warm clothes and sleeping bags and they probably would be just fine sleeping out in the middle of the trail, but it just seemed so unnecessarily risky

when there's probably a shelter, maybe a couple hundred meters away, and he would turn out to be right. And so he decides he's gonna walk ahead on the trail and he's gonna see if the shelters there but he only went about a hundred meters he was within maybe a hundred meters of the actual shelter but he never saw it and so after going ahead and feeling like man I don't want to drag Mark any farther you know if there's no shelter ahead for all we know we took a wrong turn and so he turns back around and he goes back near Mark, not next to him, but close

enough to him that he can see him, and he sits down on the trail too. He gets his sleeping bag out, he crawls inside, and he falls asleep. That night, Ben would have this vivid, horrible nightmare where he heard Mark screaming for help, yelling for Ben to come save him as he's being dragged off the trail into the forest. And it scared him so much that Ben woke up and he looks down the trail to where Mark is and he can see Mark's backpack is sitting right on the trail. And so he thinks, oh, Mark's still there and he's so tired. He's not about to get up and go check.

He's like, that was just a dream. And he goes back to sleep. The next morning when the sun comes up, Ben gets up again. And the first thing he does is he looks over at Mark and he sees the pack. But he realizes that Mark is not at Mark and he sees the pack, but he realizes that Mark is not there. It's just the backpack. And so Ben jumps up and he yells for Mark. He doesn't get a response. He's looking around thinking he's got to be around here, but he's not. It snowed that night, so any tracks Mark would have left to show where he went to were now covered up.

And that's when it dawns on Ben that that dream he had the night before, that might have been real. And he has this sinking feeling that something horrible has happened to Mark and that he didn't save him. And so he thinks, I gotta get authorities. He grabs his bag. He leaves Mark's there because he's thinking maybe he'll come back and he'll grab it. And Ben turns and runs down the trail in the direction he hopes is towards this tricorner

shelter. And he can't believe it when literally 200 meters away he finds the tricorner shelter they were that close. And inside are other hikers. He was able to get one of them to run down and get park services to know that they have a missing hiker on the trail. Searchers were dispatched to the area where Mark and Ben had been sleeping on the trail. The first thing they did is they went to his bag and inside were all the things he would need to survive out in the wild.

His tent, his warm clothes, his sleeping bag, his food, his water, everything. It was all left there. Over the next few days, hundreds of searchers combed the area, made helicopters overhead, and they made no significant discovery. However, one park ranger discovered this huge cave that was not that far away from where they had been sleeping. And inside of this cave, this ranger said a large mammal had been staying recently, it was not there now, and there was all these animal bones inside the cave. So it was obviously a predator of some kind. And so there was speculation that between this cave that probably held, you know, a bear or something like that, and Ben's dream that probably was reality of Mark being pulled off the trail screaming for help, that maybe Mark was attacked by some animal that dragged him away.

dragged him away. On the ninth day of the search, Mark's body was found. It was located three miles down the hill from where he and Ben had been sleeping up on that trail. Mark was positioned up against a tree. His jacket was open, his gloves were off and his boots were off and they were placed right next to him. An autopsy concluded he must have died within 24 to 36 hours of leaving that trail. So there's lots of questions with this one, namely, why did Mark in the middle of the night get up, not tell Ben where he was going, and then leave the trail and walk three miles away?

tell Ben where he was going and then leave the trail and walk three miles away. The trail they were on was very well worn that even at night in a snowstorm it would be very obvious if you were on the trail or if you were off the trail. So Mark had to have known he was leaving the trail. But even if Mark had a great reason for wanting to leave the trail, just hours earlier he couldn't even stand. That's why they were even laying on the trail to begin with, because he couldn't go any farther. So the idea that he can just jump up in the middle of the night and navigate this really difficult terrain for three miles in total darkness in the snow, that doesn't make sense

either. And then you have Ben's dream, where he hears Mark screaming for help, and he's yelling for Ben to come save him as he's getting dragged off the trail. There's a good chance what Ben was hearing and seeing in his dream was actually playing out just several feet away from him down the trail. The next and final story of today's episode is called Big Footprint. In early July of 1953, Mr. and Mrs. Huggins, along with their three young daughters, left their home in Winnipeg, Canada for a six-week summer vacation. They were headed to the girls' grandparents' summer cabin in Wade, Ontario, which is one of the more remote and wild sections of Ontario.

Their cabin was right in the middle of this huge swampy forest and they were not too far from one of the biggest lakes in Ontario called Fox Lake. The family arrived late on July 4th so they didn't do anything when they arrived they just hung out at the cabin and then early the next day all the adults decided they wanted to take the girls to Fox Lake for the day. So they began gathering all the supplies they would need while the three girls played outside the cabin. Now, there's no neighbors or anybody else anywhere near this cabin. And so it was totally normal to have the girls just play outside. They were not concerned about, you know, them getting taken or something.

And so the two older girls played in the front yard of the cabin and Geraldine, the five-year-old, was playing on the side of the cabin. So the two girls in front couldn't see Geraldine and the adults, they were keeping their eye on all three girls but they were mostly just kind of going in and out of the cabin getting their stuff together, periodically poking their head out, but the girls were fine. At 10 a.m. that morning the parents had finally packed up the car and they were ready to collect the girls to head over to the lake. And so they went outside, they got the two girls that were out front and they went to the side of the house and they couldn't find Geraldine. Now they weren't worried because where could she have gone?

And so they walked around the house, they're yelling for Geraldine and they asked the two girls, you know, have you seen Geraldine? Where'd she go? And they're like, oh, we don't know. She was just over on the side of the house a minute ago. And so they can't find her outside. And so they go in the cabin thinking she must have gone in there because that's the only place she could be. But after thoroughly looking through the cabin and not finding her, they started to get a little bit more worried.

At this point, the adults start talking to each other and they're saying, did anybody see Geraldine in the past couple of minutes? Anybody seen her? And they all said, yeah, I poked my head out the window and I saw her within the past 10 minutes right on the side of the cabin. And so they all agreed within the past 10 minutes they had seen her right outside the cabin.

So they're alarmed they can't find her, but they're thinking we're gonna find her. They go back outside and they're looking around and they're yelling for her. Now this is such a remote section of Ontario, but there's really no noise pollution and sound travels really, really well. And so when they were yelling her name, it was booming through the woods. And even if Geraldine had, you know, sprinted for 10 minutes away from the cabin,

she still easily would have been with an earshot and all she had to do was just yell back and they would see her, but she didn't yell back and there was no sign of her anywhere. And so at this point the family is panicking and so they call the police. The police show up and they're looking around thinking we're not going to be able to search this very effectively on our own. This is a huge, wild, remote section of Canada. And so they called in some professional trackers that were familiar with this area to come in and help them with their search. They also called the army in Winnipeg to send over some people to assist as well. But as soon as the search started, the skies opened

up and dumped rain all over the entire area, basically washing away any footprints that they could have used to potentially find her. As the day wore on and the sun was starting to set and there was still no sign of Geraldine, her father said something to the searchers that was intended to help them find his daughter, but it was just this incredibly heartbreaking comment. And what he told them was his daughter was afraid of the dark and that once it got dark out in the woods here, she's just going to sit down and cry. And so that will stop her from moving farther away from us, hopefully, and we should be able to find her. But they didn't. And for three days, they looked everywhere for her and there was no trace of her. And

to make matters even worse is the weather had been really rainy and cold, not below freezing temperatures, but close, like in the 40 degree Fahrenheit range. And she just had a light shirt and shorts on. She was not prepared for the weather. On the evening of the third day, they found footprints that they believed to be Geraldine's high up on this ledge in some moss overlooking Fox Lake. And the footprints indicated that this child, which was probably Geraldine, was looking out over the lake and then turned around and walked

away from the ledge down into the swamp where her footprints dissipate. And so the search effort was pushed to the swamp and then thousands of people that are combing through this mosquito infested bush to look for this girl and once again there's nothing. Then on the seventh day of the search they find another set of footprints in the swamp around the area where they were looking for Geraldine. But it wasn't Geraldine's footprints because they were these huge prints that if it was a human print they would need to be an enormous human being. Or these prints belong to some enormous animal, but they were unable to determine what animal it was. At this point, although there's not really any

real evidence connecting that print to Geraldine, people are starting to suspect that whoever left this print or whatever left this print has something to do with whatever happened to Geraldine. Two days later, so nine days after Geraldine has gone missing, some of the professional trackers were two and a half miles away from where that large print was found in that swamp and where Geraldine's footprints were found upon that ledge. They found a piece of her plaid shirt two and a half miles away on the eastern shore of another lake called Long Lake. And so they pushed the search effort over to that section of Long Lake and within 24 hours they would find Geraldine's remains. The scene where Geraldine was found was bizarre. There was very little left of

Geraldine and from what was left it was clear there had been significant animal predation. And so initial thoughts were you know she must have been attacked by wolves you know that that's what killed her but upon closer inspection they saw that her clothing had not been torn and there was no blood on her clothes so the animal predation had most likely occurred after she was deceased because they would have been able to pick around the clothing. Whereas if it had been a wolf attack they would have cut right through the clothes and there would be marks that obviously you know she was attacked by animals. But Geraldine's remains appeared

to have been dragged out of a nearby meadow to where she was ultimately located. And so they followed the drag line into nearby meadow to where she was ultimately located. And so they followed the drag line into this meadow and it led them to this opening where all the grass had been matted down. And investigators said it looked like something big had been laying there. And they speculated that that might have been the area

where Geraldine had been killed. And then afterwards animals had dragged her over to where she was found. And so investigators are like, well, we found that large footprint in the swamp on the seventh day in the same area where we had found Geraldine's footprints and we thought they might be connected and now we're finding a large what appears to be body print in this meadow that's right near where Geraldine's remains have been found. And so probably whoever or whatever left that print in the swamp is the same one that left this print here in the meadow and therefore is

probably Geraldine's killer. But this left investigators with two theories that didn't really make any sense. The first one was okay these prints, the swamp print and this body print, belonged to an enormous person, like a giant, who ran up to the cabin and abducted Geraldine and ran off and no one saw them or heard them. And for weeks they've managed to totally evade capture despite being, again, an enormous person lumbering through the forest. So that seemed really unlikely. One, that this giant person even existed and two, that if this giant person existed, how could they not get caught? They're so big running through the forest they would be easy to spot. But if you rule out the enormous person theory, you're left with the enormous predator theory,

which does make more sense on the surface because there are enormous predators that have attacked humans so that does happen. But when they looked at her remains they ruled out a wolf attack and really they ruled out animal attacks. But if this is an enormous predator, how did it kill Geraldie? The family was told that unfortunately because there wasn't enough left of her they weren't able to determine a cause of death and so their best guess is she was probably mauled by wild animals but they would even level with the family and say honestly we don't know what did this. A quick note about our stories they are all based on true events but we

sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved, and some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes. Thank you for listening to the Mr. Bolland Podcast. If you enjoyed today's stories and you're looking for more bone-chilling content, be sure to check out all of our studio's podcasts. This podcast, the Mr. Bollin Podcast, and also Mr. Bollin's Medical Mysteries, Bedtime Stories, Wartime Stories, Run Fool, and Redacted. Just search for Bollin Studios wherever you get your podcasts to find all of these shows. To watch hundreds more stories just like the ones you heard today, head over to our YouTube channel which is just called Mr. Ballin.

So that's gonna do it, I really appreciate your support, until next time, see ya. Hey Prime members, you can binge 8 new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. And before you go, please tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of the Strange Dark and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange Dark and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries. And as the name

suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years, and we finally decided to take the plunge and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre, unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music.