Sightings - Alexa Haunting: Michigan, 2024

Episode Date: December 16, 2024

Is something evil haunting the electronic devices in a Michigan house? Does a terrifying entity lurk in the remote mountains of Colorado? And what chased a frightened sailor through dark waters of the... Caribbean? Find out as we bring to life three listener stories that left us chilled. Help keep Sightings free by trying this episode's sponsor HelloFresh! Get 10 FREE meals at HelloFresh.com/freesightings. Applied across 7 boxes, new subscribers only, varies by plan. That's 10 free HelloFresh meals exclusively for SIGHTINGS listeners! Sightings is a REVERB and QCODE Original. Find us on instagram @sightingspod Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:01:15 Rubble. Come on. Compare to beef burgers on McDonald's current menu at participating restaurants in Canada. MUSIC MUSIC Have you ever experienced the supernatural for yourself? It might be subtle, like noticing an unusual light in the sky, or hearing something strange in the night that sends chills down your spine, or having the unplaceable feeling that perhaps you aren't alone in your quiet bedroom.
Starting point is 00:01:51 Big or small, these feelings are often more than just hunches or sightings. They're very, very real. And maybe with a bit of luck and one podcast that reaches all the way around the world, these stories of the supernatural may come to captivate an entire generation. Welcome to Sightings, the series that takes you inside the world's most mysterious supernatural events. I'm McLeod. And I am Brian.
Starting point is 00:02:20 And since this is our final episode of the year before our holiday break, we're doing something a little bit different. We're taking you inside your stories. That's right. You've probably heard us asking for your tales of up-close and personal encounters with the supernatural, and we've had an outpouring of incredible stories, far too many to share in one episode. So we're going to bring your stories to life right here on Sightings, starting right now.
Starting point is 00:02:47 Anything and everything is game. Will we encounter ghosts, aliens, creatures, or bumps in the night that will haunt us for the rest of our lives? Find out on this episode of Sightings. Alright, we have got three amazing stories that you guys sent in. McCloud, you have not seen these stories before. I have not. Anything I should know ahead of time before I dive in?
Starting point is 00:03:32 Well, we're going to kind of bring these to life in real time here. So we're going to have some music going, a little bit of atmosphere. You know, you can bring in different accents. You know, just have fun with it. I'm nervous now. You're putting me on the hot seat here. But on the other hand, it's a glimpse behind the curtain for our listeners. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Starting point is 00:03:50 They can see how we approach these every day for every episode of Sightings. For our first story though, we are going to head to Michigan for a story from Eileen. All I'm going to say about this one is it is a haunted house story unlike anything I think you're gonna have seen before. So McCloud, before we go, do you have any kind of midwesterny kind of twang you can put on this just to give it a little bit of flavor or?
Starting point is 00:04:15 Oh man, I feel like I'm gonna get in such trouble if I like mess this up. So I'll go light, I guess. And obviously I won't do a female voice because no one needs that. No, no. So you're going to give us that little bit of voice. I'm going to put on some nice atmospheric creepy music.
Starting point is 00:04:31 Here we go. Oh, okay. All right. I'm getting in the mood. Here we go. My name's Eileen and I have a story about the worst house I ever bought. And it's kind of funny. Oh, well, not funny.
Starting point is 00:04:50 It's terrifying, actually. That's funny. It's a funny line, Eileen. It's great. Okay. Okay. But when we bought it, we thought we were so smart for getting the house at such a great price.
Starting point is 00:05:08 The real estate agent kept going on about how the market in Grand Rapids was adjusting, and my husband, Mark, was just thrilled we could afford a four-bedroom in such a nice neighborhood. That should have been our first warning sign, of course. We moved in last September just in time for the kids to start at their new school. Amy's eight and Jack had just turned five and they were actually excited about the move, if you can believe it. The house had this big wooden staircase that they thought was like a castle and this window seat in Amy's room, she said it made her feel like a princess. But she stopped saying that after a while.
Starting point is 00:05:45 The first three weeks were totally normal, just figuring out where everything should go, setting up all the boxes and light switches and stuff. Mark's kind of a tech geek, so we had the whole place rigged up with smart lights, smart thermostats, cameras, you name it. And of course, we had too many Alexasas because I used to love having them around for cooking or laundry or music or whatever So the weird stuff started with the lights Just little things at first like the kitchen lights would dim for no reason then come back up Or the living room lights would turn on in the middle of the night Then the TV started acting weird it would turn on itself, usually late at night and always too static.
Starting point is 00:06:26 Gah! That's the poltergeist right there. That's so poltergeist. Woof. Okay. Gah. So we'd wake up most mornings to find it on, just hissing away. Mark called the cable company, but they couldn't find anything wrong. And then one night, I was helping Amy with her homework in a room,
Starting point is 00:06:46 and her tablet started playing this old music. Like really old. Like the kind of scratchy recordings you hear in documentaries about the 1920s. We hadn't even been using the tablet, not even touching it. And the weird thing was, when I checked her tablet's history later, there was nothing there. No record of any music playing at all. That's when other things started happening too.
Starting point is 00:07:09 The garage door would open and close on its own, and the security cameras started showing static for exactly 7 minutes and 18 seconds at random times each night. Mark spent hours trying to figure out the problem, but he couldn't find anything wrong. And then it started up with the Alexis. I knew they were coming into this. And then it started up with the Alexis, and that's when things got really messed up. Wait, wait, pause. Eileen, you have the highest threshold for messed up in the world.
Starting point is 00:07:38 This is when things got messed up for you. Oh, I would have been gone. I would have been in the... I would have been gone. I love it. Okay. Let's take a quick second though to thank our sponsor, HelloFresh, who's helping keep this episode free for all of you listeners. That's right. We know the holidays are coming up,
Starting point is 00:07:53 and you're probably stressed out. And if you're anything like me, maybe you've got little monsters running around your house, and of course, they're hungry, as monsters are. But, I mean, who are we kidding? You're hungry. You're famished. You're so hungry. So let HelloFresh take the stress out of mealtime, saving you from searching for recipes or doing endless grocery shopping. Just pick your meals and everything you need is delivered right to your door. I've used HelloFresh for years and I love their high quality, sustainably sourced ingredients.
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Starting point is 00:08:39 using our exclusive sightings link at hellofresh.com slash free sightings. Ten free meals from America's number one meal kit? Oh, count me in. Again, get ten free meals at HelloFresh.com slash free sightings. Applied across seven boxes, new subscribers only. That's ten free HelloFresh meals. Just go to HelloFresh.com slash free sightings.
Starting point is 00:09:04 Thanks HelloFresh for keeping this episode of Incredible Stories free. And speaking of stories, let's get back at it. You ready, McCloud? I don't know. I'm kind of afraid to, but here we go. Okay. Yeah. I started hearing these sounds coming from them.
Starting point is 00:09:22 Not like normal glitchy electronic sounds. These were different. At first I thought maybe it was just picking up interference or something, but then one night I was in the kitchen alone cleaning up after dinner and I heard it. Clear as day. A whisper. You got this. I'll try to keep it together so that you can just enjoy the story. And yeah, I thought I was losing my mind. I mean, who wouldn't? So I didn't tell Mark at first. I didn't tell anyone.
Starting point is 00:09:48 I just kept listening. And the whispers started getting more frequent. Always when I was alone. Never when Mark was around. Never when the kids were in the room. Then Jack started talking about his new friend that would talk to him on his tablet at night. Which was impossible because we have those parental lock things and the tablet won't even turn on after six. But yeah, I took the kids' tablets away for good after that and of course Mark thought I was a lunatic, so
Starting point is 00:10:15 I told my friend Rachel about what was happening. She's always been into that paranormal stuff, you know, she does tarot readings, has a million crystals, that kind of thing, and I used to think, that kind of thing. And I used to think it was kind of silly, but at that point I was willing to try anything. So she came over with her sage and her crystals and said she wanted to do a cleansing or something. And I don't think whatever was in our house liked that very much because while Rachel was walking through the house with her burning sage, every single electronic device we owned went crazy. The TV started flipping through channels by itself, all the Alexis started playing different songs at full volume.
Starting point is 00:10:53 Even our phones started calling each other. Rachel's phone, which had been at 100% battery, completely died, just went black. Needless to say, she left pretty quickly after that, told me she'd never felt anything that angry before. So I guess right then was when I was feeling most alone. And that night, after I put the kids to bed, I decided to do a little experiment to see if this was all really something, or if someone had hacked into our house, or I don't know, something explainable, you know?
Starting point is 00:11:22 So I turned off our internet router, completely unplugged it. Then I set up my phone to record near the Alexa in the kitchen. And then I just waited. It took about 20 minutes before the whispering started. And since I was right there listening for it, I was close enough to hear the words.
Starting point is 00:11:40 And I swear it, swear to God, the Alexa said to me, I see you you okay McLeod you got to be kidding me this came in from a listener holy and that freaked me out of course and I played back the recording from my phone and the voice was there this raspy horrible whisper that said, I see you, clear as day, with no internet connection. But that wasn't even the worst part. When I played the recording for Mark later, we heard something in the background we hadn't
Starting point is 00:12:14 noticed before. Behind the whisper there was a sound, like children laughing. It sounded exactly like Amy and Jack, but they'd been asleep in their rooms when I made the recording. And I think after that, Mark finally believed me that something was wrong with that house. And maybe it'll sound silly to people who haven't gone through something like this, but... Yeah, we took the kids and stayed with Mark's parents. And the next day we started looking for a new place. It's not supposed to be funny, McLeod.
Starting point is 00:12:49 No, it's not that kind of funny. The kids were confused, but kids are resilient, you know? Oh God. They adjusted. They are resilient. I have three. They're very resilient. Oh, and Mark sold all our smart home devices.
Starting point is 00:13:07 Yeah. Uh, we don't have any Alexis anymore. Good on ya. Just a regular old alarm clock by the bed. Sometimes simple is better. Oh. No way. Oh. Oh my gosh. I even read this story before when she first sent it and I'm still have goosebumps. This is... I think I'm crying a little.
Starting point is 00:13:37 Okay. So we aren't going to like dive into these stories in the way that we do our own. You know, this is not a skeptical gecko moment because Eileen, you deserve all the belief you can get on these because this is insane. You know what? If it's not true, then you need to come work for us because you are a good storyteller. Absolutely. Any thoughts beyond sheer terror, McCloud? No. No, this is just the worst. This is just the worst, the worst, the worst. Um...
Starting point is 00:14:05 What I found really cool about it was so many haunted house stories, or so many people who report experiencing hauntings are like, oh, I saw a weird thing out of the corner of my eye, or the floorboards were creaking. But like, this seems to have been your entire house was possessed by something in the electrical wires or something. Yeah. I don't know much. I just am aware of electronics being a conduit for
Starting point is 00:14:35 supernatural activity and ghosts. It's that whole the old ghost in the machine thing, I guess. But the kids in the background laughing is too much. It's like it captured them or something, and I just can't deal with it. Well, thank you for sharing this story, Eileen. I hope we did it justice, and I hope that all of you listening at home
Starting point is 00:14:57 don't go looking for that house in what city was this? Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids. Yeah, sorry for my accent, Eileen. I think I started swerving into like Jersey or something. I don't know. But thank you for sharing, and we're going to be back with another one in just a moment.
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Starting point is 00:16:19 not nearly long enough. Well, we're heading right into story number two, McCloud. I wish I could say I was looking forward to this. This next one's different, but it's also terrifying. So this one comes from Kyle from Oregon. And the story takes place in Colorado, though. I don't know if that matters. So I think this is just, I'm from Colorado.
Starting point is 00:16:39 This is what we talk like. Oh, OK. So I'll do my best Brian accent. Hello, I'm from Colorado. Exactly that. And... Sorry. And Kyle, again, thank you for sending in this amazing story.
Starting point is 00:16:53 And let's just... Go for it. We gotta get the music going. Oh, the music going. All right, yeah. I have to say, I've been hesitant to share this story. Oh, quick question. right off the bat. How old is Kyle? Do we know?
Starting point is 00:17:09 We don't, but from the stuff he wrote around the actual story, I think he said that he'd been doing this for a few decades. So I'm guessing he's at least 40 or 50. Oh, okay. All right. Let's get the music here, guys. I have to say I've been hesitant to share this story, because as a scientist you learn to question everything, to look for rational explanations.
Starting point is 00:17:30 But what happened during my research trip to Colorado last winter, I still can't explain it. I'm an ecologist specializing in vertebrate adaptations to winter environments. My work focuses on how different species survive under snow cover, so last January I rented a cabin near the Continental Divide to conduct field research. It was remote, the nearest town was about 40 miles away, and my closest neighbors were probably the lynx and elk I'd occasionally spot from my window. The cabin itself was basic but comfortable. One main room with a kitchenette, a small bedroom, and a window. The cabin itself was basic but comfortable.
Starting point is 00:18:05 One main room with a kitchenette, a small bedroom, and a bathroom. The owner had installed a reliable heating system and satellite internet, which was great for uploading my data. In the first few weeks, things went great. I'd wake up before dawn, have my coffee, then trek out to my research sites, measuring snow depth, tracking animal movements and collecting samples. I'd spend hours documenting how different species, from tiny voles to massive elk, adapted to the harsh conditions.
Starting point is 00:18:33 Sometimes I'd come across mountain lion tracks and marvel at how these predators managed to move so efficiently through deep snow. While the intellectual part of me was fascinated by this, the human part of me was grateful I never encountered one face to face. I'll say. Oh, uh, uh, he spoke too soon, McLeod. Okay, okay. I spoke too soon.
Starting point is 00:18:58 That changed about three weeks into my stay. It must have been around 11 p.m. I was sitting in bed reading through some papers. I remember reaching for the bedside lamp when movement caught my eye through the window and there about 10 yards from the cabin stood an elk. Which I will say this elk doesn't sound like a very scary thing but these things are huge. They're gigantic I've seen one yeah. My brother ended up near one sort of on like the back of a ski slope once and then there was just a, it was a moose, not an elk, but he was like, oh.
Starting point is 00:19:29 Oh, they're both huge. They're both enormous. Yeah. So that's actually pretty freaky. Now elk aren't unusual in Colorado, but what unsettled me was its behavior. It was just, it was just standing there, perfectly still, staring directly at my window. I'm used to observing wildlife. I've spent countless hours watching animals in their natural habitat, including elk. But this was different. The elk's stance was unnaturally
Starting point is 00:19:59 rigid like a taxidermy mount. Its eyes, I could see them clearly in the moonlight, were fixed and unblinking. Steam rose from its nostrils in the cold air, the only sign it was even alive. Five, maybe ten minutes passed and the animal didn't move a muscle, didn't even twitch an ear and I found myself holding my breath, afraid to move, caught in this bizarre standoff. Then suddenly the animal's whole body shuddered like it was coming out of some kind of trance. It blinked rapidly, looked around as if confused and bolted into the darkness.
Starting point is 00:20:38 I barely slept that night and the next day I tried to rationalize it. Maybe the animal was sick, or maybe it had been startled by a predator and frozen in fear. But deep down I knew this wasn't normal behavior for any wild animal I'd ever studied, especially not for an elk. In all my years of field research, I'd never seen one behave like this. A few days later I was out taking measurements at one of my study sites. I usually tried to finish before dark, but the winter days are short and I needed to complete my data set.
Starting point is 00:21:10 The sun had set about an hour earlier and I was working by headlamp, recording snow depths near a stand of lodgepole pines. That's when I heard it. A rustle in the woods behind me and not the normal sounds of nighttime forest creatures. This was different. Heavier. Deliberate. I turned slowly, my headlamp beam hit the trees and the light caught a shadow moving
Starting point is 00:21:37 between the trunks. My first thought was moose, but no, this was much, much bigger. Easily fifteen feet tall, and it moved with an eerie fluidity for something its size, almost like it was gliding. I'd love to say I stayed to investigate, to get a better look, but I left my equipment behind and rushed back to the cabin as quietly as I could, and it's hard to describe but the whole way I could feel something watching me, following me, just outside my headlamp's beam. But that wasn't even the worst of it.
Starting point is 00:22:12 That came about a week later. Around midnight I was getting ready for bed and I heard a strange sound again, like something heavy moving through the snow outside. Not the light crunching of deer or elk, but something that made the snow creak and compress under its weight. That's the 15 foot thing you just saw. Clearly. What?
Starting point is 00:22:33 There's nothing that big in Colorado. Hmm. So I killed the lights and moved to the window. And even though the moon was behind clouds, there was just enough ambient light reflecting off the snow to make out shapes. And at first I saw nothing unusual. Then I noticed how some shadows around the tree line seemed wrong,
Starting point is 00:22:55 like they were shifting in a way that didn't match the wind in the branches. Then I heard that sound again, that heavy movement in the snow, and much closer now. And before I could move, bam! The entire cabin shuddered as something rammed the north wall. Then it came again, bam! This time against the east wall, and whatever was doing it was big. The attacks continued, like whatever was out there was testing the walls looking for a weak spot. Oh my gosh, I'm thinking of Jurassic Park right now where the Raptors are testing the fences.
Starting point is 00:23:31 That sounds bigger than a Raptor. No, this is the T-Rex testing the fences. Exactly, T-Rex for... I've got no clue. I'm just gonna keep reading because I am like... I've got nothing. The attacks continued like whatever was out there was testing the walls looking for a weak spot and it was chaos inside with me. Books fell from shelves, mugs broke and the entire cabin felt like it might cave in at any moment. And I ran for my computer to try and send a message for help but of course the internet
Starting point is 00:24:01 was out. So I grabbed my hunting knife. What else could I do, and I stood there waiting as the attack continued for another ten minutes. Then it just stopped, and the night went silent. I obviously didn't sleep that night, and as soon as dawn broke I went outside to check the damage. And it's crazy there were no marks on the walls, nor scratches, and the snow around the cabin was undisturbed except for my own footprints. I'm serious, whatever
Starting point is 00:24:30 had attacked hadn't left a single track. Now that I'm home, I've gone over that winter countless times in my mind trying to find logical explanations. Maybe the elk was sick or injured. Maybe the shadow in the woods was a trick of the light. Maybe the attack was some kind of weather phenomenon I can't understand. But deep down I know that what I experienced wasn't natural. And maybe it sounds silly, but some nights when I'm lying in bed I still think about that elk's empty stare and I wonder, was it really watching me or was something else watching me through its eyes?
Starting point is 00:25:07 Probably. Yeah, that sounds like a good explanation. It's an unsettling thought though that there's something in this forest that is manifesting itself in all these different, like through the elk, and then through this 15 foot thing that's gliding through the forest, and then whatever attacked without leaving footprints. I mean, the- I didn't think about it that way, like almost like a forest spirit that can like manifest all the creatures of the,
Starting point is 00:25:38 or not manifest, but like go and like see through and live through all of this creatures of the forest. I mean, that's one potential explanation, I guess. I've got no analog for it. It's strange. The thing that most comes to mind, and we'll do an episode on this eventually, I'm sure, is the Wendigo. Uh, but that's kind of, and I guess that's kind of a shape-shifting thing too, but, you know, just the fact that there's no footprints,
Starting point is 00:26:00 that there's weird behavior among these animals, tells me that there's some kind of entity or supernatural thing going on here that's just beyond our understanding. It's not, it can't be a creature because like you said, no footprints. Maybe it was just really good how to like the perfectly shaped tail to swish up the snow after. Swish it away? Yeah, that's interesting. I'm, that was in jest. But I don't, I don't know,
Starting point is 00:26:27 but this was a decidedly unsettling, where the first story was kind of really frightening because it was our house. Yeah. This one was a little removed and I like, you know, I mean. That didn't scare me as much as the ghost one, if only because I'm not going out into Colorado in the snow to be around this thing. That's valid.
Starting point is 00:26:49 The poltergeist one, I'm like, OK, I've got kids. I've got a house. That could happen to me. Oh, great story, though, Kyle. Thank you for sending that in. And we are excited to do one more. And we will be back right after this. As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, do one more and we will be back right after this. any way you like them. Three strips of naturally smoked bacon and a side of toast. Only $6 at A&W's in Ontario.
Starting point is 00:27:27 Experience A&W's classic breakfast on now. Dine in only until 11 AM. OK, everybody, we're back from break, and we've got one more in us. I've only got one more in me because these are kicking my butt. I don't know about you, Brian. I don't have to do the work here, so.
Starting point is 00:27:48 I feel like your guys' experiences are far more scary than any of the things we've done on this show. These are good. Yeah, well, our last one is perplexing, I'll put it that way. It is from Mark from Boston, but we aren't gonna be in Boston. We are going to the Caribbean here.
Starting point is 00:28:03 Ooh. But he's from Boston, so you can give it a slight Boston. Can I though? That's the question. That's like the story of my life is can I? The slightest, slightest, the slightest little bit, um, slightly older, uh, gentleman it seems.
Starting point is 00:28:24 So, because the story was happening back in the late nineties when I'm assuming he was in his 40s, 30s. So, yeah. So give it a little bit of gravity. Oh man, it's weird talking about this. It's wicked weird talking about this. Let's kill that pack maybe just a smidge. Let's go like 10% Boston. All right, all right. Man, it's weird talking about this unexplainable thing
Starting point is 00:28:52 that happened to me in the Caribbean after all these years. Hang on. Yep. This is feeling a little bit too much like Barney and Betty Hill, what you're doing for Barney Hill. He kind of had that New England-y.
Starting point is 00:29:03 Interesting. So maybe just change the timbre, give that New England-y. Hmm, interesting. So maybe just change the timbre, give him a little more resonance. Okay, like deeper? A little more pensive, a little more, yeah, a little deeper, a little more pensive maybe. Okay, all right.
Starting point is 00:29:16 Man, it's weird talking about this unexplainable thing that happened to me in the Caribbean after all these years. I've probably told this story maybe three times in the last 25 years, and every time I do, I get that look, you know, as if they're trying to figure out if I'm crazy or lying or what, but yeah, it is what it is. And look, I was a mess back then, I'll admit it. My wife had just walked out after 15 years of marriage,
Starting point is 00:29:43 and I was having a midlife crisis moment, I guess. So I needed to get away. Like really away. So I chartered a boat and decided to sail around the Caribbean by myself. Yeah, it's crazy, I know. To put that in perspective, I'd been sailing my whole life. My old man had this sweet 13-footer that was basically my second home growing up. But going solo, that was new. Still those first couple weeks were exactly what I needed. Island hopping, meeting random people, getting drunk in beach bars, then moving on. Gosh, I can't even remember everywhere now. I started in Puerto Rico, worked my way down to St. Thomas, but it was cleansing the sailing.
Starting point is 00:30:27 It made me feel like myself again, like maybe life wasn't completely over just because my marriage was. But this story is about weird stuff, not my ex-wife, so let's do it. Let's bring on the weird. It started between the British Virgin Islands and, Brian, and Brian, how do we pronounce this? Anguilla? Anguilla? Anguilla, apparently, is the correct pronunciation of this island. Okay. It started between the British Virgin Islands and Anguilla. That was easy sailing,
Starting point is 00:30:59 nothing fancy. Real postcard perfect Caribbean weather. Steady trade winds, clear skies, and I'm kicked back in the cockpit with a beer, just watching the stars like I'd done a million times before. Then I spotted it. This, I guess it was just a light, but something wasn't right about it, if that makes any sense. You spend enough time on the water, you get to know what belongs out there and what doesn't. Things like aircraft, satellites, planets, etc. etc. And this
Starting point is 00:31:33 definitely didn't fit any of those. It was too bright for a satellite, too stationary for a plane, too low for a star. So at first I figured maybe I was seeing things. You know how your eyes play tricks on you at night, especially when you're drunk? I added that in, sorry folks. Especially out on the water where there's no light pollution and the stars are so bright they almost hurt to look at. But then this thing started moving, doing these crazy zigzags, stopping dead in the air, then shooting off in another direction before disappearing altogether, and I remember thinking, well, shit, I finally lost it.
Starting point is 00:32:16 But it got even weirder the next night when the thing showed up again, and this time it was closer, as in close enough that I could tell it was something solid, something real. And I swear it on my father's grave, this thing was following me. I'd change course a little and it would adjust to keep the same distance. I even tried cutting the running lights to see if it would lose track of me, but nope, it knew exactly where I was. So let me tell you something, being alone in the middle of the ocean is already pretty intense.
Starting point is 00:32:47 Add a UFO to the mix. Pretty cuckoo, right? And I couldn't even radio anybody because, first of all, who's gonna believe me? And second, what are they gonna do about it? And this was 98, did I say this already? Anyway, no cell phones, or at least I didn't have one yet. Not yet. So, uh, on night three, when the light appeared again, I had enough.
Starting point is 00:33:12 I was either going to figure out what this thing was or go nuts trying. So I came about and headed straight for it. Dumbest thing I've ever done, probably, but there you go. And of course it just kept backing off, keeping its distance, but I chased that thing for nearly two hours, burning fuel until I realized I couldn't lose any more before the next port. And I swear it, as soon as I came about and raised the sails again, the light vanished. So by then it was late and I was off course, but there was this tiny island. More of a sandbar, really. No one else for 20 miles, so I dropped anchor and got ready to pack it in.
Starting point is 00:33:51 But then I made my second dumb decision of the night. I broke out the rum. Not my proudest moment, but hey, if aliens were gonna abduct me, I figured I might as well be nice and relaxed about it, right? I remember sitting drinking straight from the bottle trying to write down everything that happened so I'd have some kind of record. My handwriting got worse and worse as the rum started hitting me, and the last clear thing I remember is the water getting really choppy out of nowhere. So I stumbled up on deck to check things out, but there was nothing. No waves, no wind. The calmest I've ever seen the water, I swear it. And that's the last thing I remember before
Starting point is 00:34:32 waking up the next morning. Buck naked in the dinghy. That's a great phrase, buck naked in the dinghy. For our listeners who don't, maybe no sailing, the dinghy is like the little motorboat that you trail behind a sailboat. Oh, all right. My head felt like I'd been drinking for a week straight and I thought that was it. I'd hit rock bottom. But once I got back in the boat, I realized I wasn't anchored off that tiny island anymore. In fact, my GPS said I was 15 miles from there. 15, with the anchor down, and that is
Starting point is 00:35:06 something I don't think I'll ever be able to explain. Not now, not ever. I finished my trip after that, went home, got my life back together, never saw anything like it again. But late at night, when I'm out on my porch and the stars are out, I still catch myself looking up, wondering what really happened that night. Wow. Hmm. I really liked this story because there's so much weird intrigue and uncertainty, kind of, I think, because we've got this guy being stalked basically by a UFO,
Starting point is 00:35:45 which I thought was pretty cool. Yeah. And then he's chasing it the next night. And the thing was basically playing games with him, I felt like. Yeah. Then he loses time, which as we know from the Barney and Betty Hill abduction story
Starting point is 00:35:59 and certainly others that we're going to do in the future, when you lose, when you see the UFO and you don't remember what happens all of a sudden, that's a point to be concerned, right? Yeah. So. Yeah, I mean, he mentions the booze. Even if you're drunk, I feel like that is a lift to sail yourself in the night.
Starting point is 00:36:19 You know? Yeah, because I mean, sailing's no joke. It's a pretty active endeavor. Yeah, so I don't know. I mean, sailing's no joke. It's a pretty active endeavor. Yeah. So, I don't know. What I found really cool and compelling about this story was that, you know, this guy was just alone in the sea with this thing chasing him and then something might have happened and he doesn't know what it is.
Starting point is 00:36:35 And I think that's scary in and of itself is never knowing if something actually happened to him and maybe he'll never know. Yeah. No, that's heavy. Yeah, and this just came to mind, but I do wonder if that stretch, I have to look at what island he said, I mean, he was sailing, it started when he was between the British Virgin Islands
Starting point is 00:36:56 and- Anguilla. Anguilla, thank you. And he could have been anywhere after that, but that's where the Bermuda Triangle kind of is. Right. That came to mind earlier. I forgot about that. So I wonder if, you know, we've got our first Bermuda Triangle story on the show with this one.
Starting point is 00:37:16 And this, you know, we don't even know it. So that's pretty cool. Yeah. So Mark, thanks for sharing this story. This was certainly a compelling and cool and unique take on an alien story. Yeah. So, Mark, thanks for sharing this story. This was certainly a compelling and cool and unique take on an alien story. Yeah. I guess listeners, if any of you have had similar Bermuda Triangle-esque Caribbean or anywhere boat abduction stories, send them to us.
Starting point is 00:37:38 And if you just have any supernatural stories, send them our way. We're looking for these cool, unique, really fun and interesting and terrifying stories of what might have happened to you that we can share with the world. Yeah, but they don't have to be like big, huge, like knock you on your socks stories either. We want to hear about the simple stuff too. Absolutely. Absolutely. In a perfect world, you world, we'd love it if your story takes more than a few minutes to read.
Starting point is 00:38:07 But. Maybe we could embellish it. I guess we could talk to the author and juice it up a little bit for everyone here. Right. But absolutely. We'd love to keep doing these kind of listener story episodes.
Starting point is 00:38:20 Like we said, we've already gotten so many from you guys. Keep them coming because we love sharing these unique things that to our knowledge have never been shared before with anyone. So, or on a podcast at least, so please keep them coming. So that you can continue emotionally draining me. Well, good news for you, McCloud, is you're going to have a couple weeks to recuperate because we're taking two weeks off for the holidays. Woohoo! But we will be back with new episodes every week of 2025, starting on Monday, January 6th.
Starting point is 00:38:51 We cannot wait to see you, but until then, happy holidays. Hoo hoo hoo! Was that Santa? Yeah. Boy, I've got little kids. I've got to do better. Hahaha! Hoo hoo hoo! There you go! That was a good one. Nice job. Nice job. Sightings is hosted by McLeod, Andrews and Brian Sigley. Produced by Brian Sigley, Chase Kinzer and McLeod, Andrews.
Starting point is 00:39:18 Series music by Mitch Bain. Mixing and mastering by Pat Kickleiter of Sundial Media. Artwork by Nuno Cernatus. Sightings is presented by Reverb and Q-Code. If you like the show, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so you're first to hear new episodes every week. And if you know other Supernatural fans, tell them about us. We'd really appreciate it.

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