 tent site from a gravel path leading from the road to the tent site and parallel the asphalt main road. Surrounding the tent site are some large conifer trees and heavy understory. From the tent site to the lake there are as much as three game trails traversing the slope. There is also a grassy understory on the slope directly in front on the tent site that deer like to use. In this case we had seven members of our family in the tent (my parents and 5 of the 6 brothers and sisters).
I recall waking up on occasion to hear heavy footsteps on the gravel near our tent. I recall them being the same cadence of a bipedal creature. I also recall telling my mother, but she dismissed it as a dream or a small creature scurrying around the site. I am sure that was her attempt to keep the situation from getting out of hand and to keep her emotions in check. She certainly did not think about any large animals hanging around and did not want us kids thinking about it either.
On another night the entire family heard. Again in the middle of the night we were all awakened by the footfalls and I recall the confused discussion of what it could be. I recall the puzzlement of my father and brother as they weren’t sure how to categorize what they were hearing. The discussion discounted all four legged creatures – wrong cadence and weight to the footsteps. They were left with the unlikely and unconvincing theory that it was one of my older brother’s friends from years past trying to wonder through the night to find them. This was proposed as the solution even though no one had contact with any friend from the area for years.
I do not recall any follow up investigation or any results of one if there was an investigation. I do know, however, that there are a couple of trails through the trees and up the gravel embankment that would provide access to the road not far from the tent site.
During this same visit I was touched through the tent. Even though I was the youngest (or perhaps I was the youngest and too innocent to know better) I slept up against the far back corner of the tent. This corner would have been the farthest corner from any of our day time activity, the tent door and trail. Anything approaching or exiting from that side would have had moss covered ground and forest floor light duff to conceal any sound.
During the night I must have rolled over so my left side (especially butt and upper thigh were pressed firmly up against the fabric of the tent. I recall waking up to what felt like a large open hand with flat and extended fingers pressing and sliding down part of my left butt cheek. Pressure was applied similar to how you would wake up someone to get them out of bed. It was not a nudge from the snout of an animal. You would expect that to be more abrupt and applied in an upward motion. The touch was more like something was curious and gave a pet or rub investigating what was pushing up against the tent.
I remember telling this to my mother and she was concerned. We found no evidence of anything, but she did mention it to my dad and both of them dismissed it (probably in an attempt to allay their and my fears).
As teenagers my brother, three friends and I went camping near the summit of Sumas Mountain on the shore of Chadsey Lake (Lost Lake to the locals), Sumas Mountain Regional Park. All of us were Army Cadets at that time. At that time the park area included the lake and the land surrounding the lake. Outside the boundary of the park it was an active timber license area. We were dropped off at the road and hiked down to the lake. It was to be a three night trip. We ranged in age from 12 to 15. The first day and night was uneventful.
The first full day we heard ‘samurai chatter’ from across the lake. I only learned that it was called samurai chatter was from the BFRO web site and listening to the recordings provided there that I first recalled and then was able to identify the noises I heard back then.  We all heard it. It was a confusing language to us because we could not place the accent. The inflections in the voice were correct, but no known language was discernable. As kids we rationalized it as some foreigner yelling at another member of their hiking group. In hindsight I believe it was talking to us from the safety of the other side of the lake. The sheer volume and tenor of the voice was impressive. The lung capacity made a loud enough sound to make us think someone was yelling, but the tone of the voice remained calm and routine. This contradiction made categorizing who or what making the noise hard to determine. We had no point of reference known to any of us to compare the sounds to. As a result we simply thought it was some foreign hikers. We first called out to them in answer to their calls (I say their, but we really were unsure of how many were there. In retrospect I suspect it was just one). We had no recognizable response as I recall, but the lack of response piqued our interest and deepened the mystery. We did call out a questioning “hey” or something similar and there was further chatter, but the response (if it was a response to us) did not fit our call. It was then as it is now reasonable to expect people to respond directly to our calls. We felt it was time to take further action. As army cadets we quickly came up with the approach of a two pronged reconnaissance with each group approaching the sounds from opposite sides of the small lake. We quickly closed on the vicinity of the sounds and discovered nothing. It was gone. To our surprise the opposite bank had a clear understory once you got away from the immediate edge of the lake. We could see a fair distance and would easily be able to see someone you had hiked or jogged from that spot. We thought that a little odd and ran a little farther into the forest to recon the area. The forest remained relatively clear, but nothing was to be found. A couple of us remained near where we thought the noise was coming from. I was ‘creeped out’ by the feel of the area.
The second night something had visited and moved around some of the camping equipment. I personally did not hear anything, but I recall someone mentioning hearing something in the night the next morning. At breakfast that morning we had small rocks thrown at us, but we blamed it on one of the other guys in the group. We did not believe him when he denied it and we ‘knew’ that nothing else could have thrown the rocks – I know differently now. Again we had no point of reference. Nothing in the forest is supposed to throw rocks. So it was a lot easier to blame it on someone from the group. I say thrown at us, but it would be more accurate to say lobbed at us since little force was behind the rock other than gravity. The rocks came from the forest behind us. The rocks came from the same area described below.
After we had eaten breakfast we decided to play some war games. We split into two teams. One team was to defend the camp the other attack. I was on the defensive side and in charge of the flank with the rest of my team moving off some distance from me perpendicular the lake. I took up a position upwards to fifty feet from the camp and kneeled down in the thick fern understory with my head down. In hindsight this must have been near where the rocks were thrown from.
After about a half minute or so I raised my head up to scan the area. I scanned the forest directly in front of me and was surprised to see the head, shoulders and portion of torso of a black hair covered creature no more than 30 feet away. At that time I thought it was some guy in the forest in an ape suit or one of the guys in camouflage trying to outflank us. This really confused me. The wheels of my internal dialog were spinning very fast. Questions like what the hell is this guy doing here in an ape suit anyway? What’s with the gorilla suit? That is really lame camouflage to wear in the forest! Then I took note of a few details and what I first thought was a suit was clearly not a suit. The Sasquatch was looking directly into my eyes with a curious expression on its face while the hair pattern on its face also made it look mad or scornful (what I mean by that is the hair was quite long for the eyebrows and were in a distinct ‘V’ pattern). Again more confusion of what I was seeing and experiencing – now their expressions were contradictory. I did not notice any pronounced sagittal crest. I did however take note of the relatively beady dark brown or black eyes. The eyes were beady in comparison to the head and relatively close together. The skin was black under jet black hair which covered all the body I could see, but it was thinner than on the face. The hair would have had to be longer on the body as well. It could have been about four inches long. The facial hair would have been shorter or closer knit to the face. The eyebrows were significantly longer and were distinctly shaped as though it was angry with me. In combination with the slightly lighter hair in mirrored patches of hair below the eye the effect was intense. Yet I felt no threat, but it seemed more curios than anything. All these thoughts and observations came within a couple of minutes.
Almost robotically I raised my rifle (it was just a stick I was pretending was a rifle) and aimed at the Sasquatch and said ‘gotcha’ with little confidence and a slight note of questioning in my voice. I did this simply because I was still conflicted as to what it was. I still thought that it