1. A man murdered a cow in front of me

“I used to run bread for a big bread company and started at 3am. I had to drive to a few remote stores in little towns surrounding my town. I was about half way through the 50 mile drive to the next town it was dark out and there are no houses around for a long way any direction.

I look on the side of the road ahead of me and see a backhoe which was odd in itself. Then I notice his bucket is super high and as I am getting closer I realize he is gutting a cow that is hanging from the bucket.

Now I happen to have grown up around ranching so I wasn’t to freaked out. So for some reason I decided to slow down and see if this guy needs help… I cant explain this decision… When I stopped next to him he just smiles and waves so I do the same thing and ask “Need a hand?” he just cracks up laughing like hysterical knee slapping laughing. For some reason I start laughing to now we are 2 guys cracking up laughing one covered in blood the other with a truck full of bread. The reality of this situation makes its way into my sleep deprived brain and I hit the gas and get out of there.

I thought about it and realized this guy drove a tractor into the middle of nowhere to kill someone else’s cow he was probably poaching this thing and he was just going to load the thing into the front bucket and drive this shit back to his house at fucking 3 am. Who knows how far away he has to drive this thing. No idea what the hell was happening but the whole thing was pretty creepy thinking back.” — executive313

2. There were hundreds of doll heads hanging from trees

“I was hiking deep in a forest, sticking to the path. It was evening, sun low over the horizon. Making my way back out of the woods when I see something hanging in a nearby tree so I went to take a look for curiosity sake. It was a baby doll head. Looked up and there were hundreds of baby doll heads in the tree. The few I could see clearly seemed old with dirt smudged on them but a few seemed clean and new. I heard rapid footsteps approaching and I hightailed it out of there. Why someone hung up hundreds of doll heads in a tree deep in the forest, I have no idea.” — _coyotes_

3. I found a human tongue on the ground

“I once found a small very pink slab of meat when I was walking in the woods about 20 minutes off trail. It seemed torn. I picked it up and realized it was a tongue. A human tongue.” — mrfourtwenty

4. A man threatened to murder me

“I live by the Adriatic Coast of Italy. One summer night of 2013 I was with some friends on the beach, having a party, when at around 01:00 am I climbed the rocks to find a place to piss. There was a full moon and I could see very clearly. I walked away from the beach until I saw a small cove, a small sandy bay, invisible from the inland but easily reachable from the rocks. I thought it was the best spot to relieve my bladder and went there. As I neared, I distinctly saw that there was a man, a fat, very big man in his 50s, sitting in the sand doing absolutely nothing, his head tucked in his arms. I should have known better, but I closed and asked if he needed anything, thinking he might have been feeling unwell. He raised this bull-like head and started screaming madly to get away from him lest he killed me by “cracking your head on the rocks”. I scrambled and ran like crazy back to my friends. I turned backwards and I was relieved to find that he wasn’t following me. We called the police, who came and discovered that he was a mentally ill person who hadn’t taken his medications and his family had declared missing in the afternoon. They managed to reassure him without resorting to violence and escorted him back to his habitation. It was the only time that I really feared for my life…” — CaptainNemo95

5. We found animal carcasses everywhere

“A girlfriend and I took a 2 week road trip last year and backwoods camped/hiked the whole time. (Insight: I am also a girl. Two 20some year olds out on the road.) We got to one free campsite in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico and we were the only people there (not unusual) so we just take the first spot and set up. As we make dinner, a couple pulls in, drives by and heads to the back of the camp grounds (no idea how far it went back). About 20 minutes later, they come back by and flag me down. Girl: “Have you guys been back there?” Me: “No..?” Girl: “It’s like a massacre back there” Me: “What do you mean?” Girl: “There’s bones, everywhere! Mind if we take the spot next to you?” Me: “Not at all.” Now we’re happy to have neighbors.

They stay maybe 2 minutes, look around, get back in their car and leave.

Friend: “What was all that about?”

I explain to my friend what the girl said and at that moment, we look down and see a huge femur bone under our feet. Possibly a cow. Well, us being a little cryptic, decide to go check out what they were talking about. We get about 100 yards back through the windy camp and there it is. Full blown animal carcasses everywhere! Some scattered, some still whole, one pile of what looked like Fox fur and another deer body still in a trash bag. Our theory is that it’s where they dump all the road kill they scrape up off the highway, but we didn’t figure this until a few days later. None the less, if there’s that many bodies here, from whatever cause, then other predatory animals know they’re here too. I don’t want to be around when they come by for dinner.

We decide to pack up and find a different camp.

Free campsite #2 of the night: We drive for about an hour or so, still in the middle of nowhere, haven’t seen a single car this entire time. No houses, just old country roads and pastures. Mind you, the sun is starting to set. The road turns to dirt for a bit, we cross a cattle guard and see the National Park sign. Sweet. It’s a National Park and it’s free, it can’t be too bad. My friend thinks it looks a little sketchy but we’re ready to relax and get some grub. So I hit a left and start up the hill to the National Park. Looks like it’s only about 2 miles from the map. Start going up this road, go around a few curves, the brush on the side starts getting thicker and thicker and the road starts getting rough. Now, to put this in perspective, we’re in my fairly new Chevy Cruze, manual transmission, that is less than a foot clearance from the ground. About a quarter mile in and we high center on a huge rock. Okay, as long as this doesn’t get any worse, I think we can manage. There’s no possible way to turn around or back out anyway, so let’s keep going. Of course… It gets worse. Every rock and trench we hear the car just scraaapppeee and stutter and stall. I’m clinching the wheel, she’s clinching the handle, all the brush on the sides of us is now dead and eerie looking and the sun is almost gone behind us. Thirty terrifying minutes later, we finally make it to the top flat that is supposed to be a campsite…. It is about a 10 square foot clearing in the dead brush and in front of us, a cliff!

We’re still freaked out about the dead animals and now we feel like we’re in the plot of some low budget horror film literally trapped on top of this hill. It’s dark and neither of us even want to get out of the car. We decide we cannot in our right minds stay here. Even from this cliff top we can’t see a single house or car light. We make a 10 point turn between the brush and boulders and the cliff, manage to get back on the path and very slowly and carefully, crap ourselves all the way back down that damned hill! We and the car miraculously survive and we head another 2 hours back to the closest town and sleep in the Walmart parking lot.” — arachelrhino

6. We found a cop’s hidden stash of child porn

“So as a kid around 11-12 I had the world on my fucking plate. We had these woods around us that I never ever came close to finding the edge of. I would wake up in the morning early when school was out and my friend Alex and I would spend the hole day out muckin round those woods. We would pack sandwiches and sodas and just go nuts. Play army and war, Cowboys n Indians, you name it. This being the 80s and Alex and I being smart enough kids, my parents had no problem with this and enjoyed taking us to the army surplus store to buy stuff like MREs and survival knives and camping gear. It was pretty regular that we would be allowed to stay out overnight if my dad was there to help us set up camp close to the property.

So not on an overnight, but out n about one day we find a treehouse in a part of the woods we have never been to before. Probably bout a 2 hour trek from the edge of the neighborhood. Maybe 2 miles or 3, it was hilly and rocky. Seriously, a kids dream. This treehouse is probably 30 feet off the ground but it looks solid. We are so stoked to find out new castle. We hightail it back home to get some rope and my pops takes us down to the surplus store and over dinner Alex and I can’t shut up about it.

Next day comes and we hike out at almost dawn. We got a backpack full of rope and sandwiches and our knives on our hips and excitement that’s so thick we could chew on it. We make it out there and start attaching rungs made from big sticks onto one end of the rope. It took us a good few hours but we get one side finished and the rope tossed over the branch that’s where the little deck and door are. We finally climb up and are sitting on the deck looking out and rock, paper, scissors for who gets to go in first. Alex wins and goes in and comes right out. He’s white as a sheet and wants to go home. So curious as I am I go inside. This treehouse is probably 8×8 and about 7-8 high inside. The inside walls are covered, every single inch, of naked girls. Not awesome found playboy porn, but kiddy porn. I think the oldest kids were about my age, but it was Polaroids and glossy magazine pages, stuck perfectly up with staples and filling the walls up.

Exit Alex and I getting back home as quick as we could. We informed my pops about it and he calls the cops. The officer shows up and asks us a few questions like where it is, how did we get up there, where did we buy the rope, did we take any pictures off the wall. He got increasingly rude about it and my pops put an end to it. He left with our statement and said he would be in touch. We were no longer allowed to take overnights in the woods or be out there for more than an hour without checking in. We actually built a really long tin can phone with the permission of my parents which allowed us a bit more of our freedom but we were pretty cut off from the deep exploring.

Bout a year or two later that same cop stopped me when I was hanging out in a different park. Saw me smoking and caught me with a joint. Alex asked him what ever happened with the treehouse. The cop told us to not do drugs and left us alone.

In college many many moons later, Alex sent me an email saying how he read in the big state paper (towns that are say, the county seat have their own papers, but the capital city has the big paper) that that officer shot himself with his service revolver after his wife found out he was circulating CP.

So it comes to my mind like it came to Alex’s that we had found his little CP stash/ cave. The creepy part came a few months later when Alex sent me another email saying that he went to the estate auction and one of the items for sale was a rope ladder with a bag.

Creepiest story of found in the woods I have folks. Still grosses me out and sends chills.”  — youmusthailallah

7. We found a huge pile of animal bones

“Hundreds of bones from different animals up the mountains in rural Ireland. It is obviously normal to see a skeleton in the wilderness but this huge pile of bones was just odd. Some were from sheep but others looked like cats, dogs, rodents. It was bizarre as we don’t have predatory animals in Ireland the only ‘thing’ that could have gathered/put them there was a person.” — Lemai

8. We found needles with dried blood on them

“While studying abroad a friend of mine wanted help on doing a photo shoot on a derelict building in the outskirts of the city. The building was a small run down office building with most of the outer walls covered in brick, all the entrances as well. Anyways, she had the idea of just wanting to walk around with the camera and explore and I went with her.

Upon arrival shortly I noticed that on the ground there were a lot of used needles. Really gross ones with brown dried blood etc. this shady place must’ve been popular shooting up place with the local junkies. Then we found that on one of the brick-laden walls an entrance had been made in to the stairway of the building. Somebody had just tore a hole in the wall. In some surge of bravery we decided to go in to get some pictures.

The stairway was dark because all the windows were covered. The building had been stripped of most valuable material so it was just a concrete stairway. We started to make our way to the second floor when we heard a loud shuffling sound upstairs, like somebody rising up from the floor. We immediately turned around and practically jumped through the hole and ran out as fast as we can.” — BasedPepe

9. We accidentally stumbled into a snake den

“Well, I have a few of these. First: I was driving to my friend’s ranch for a new year’s eve party. This was down in Eagle Pass, near the Texas/Mexico border. It was pouring rain and I was creeping down a backroad, high beams on. Something jumped in front of my truck, stopped for a second, then darted back into the woods. It was about three feet tall, white and briefly stood on two legs. Pretty sure Gollum lives in South Texas. Freaked me out.

Two: an abandoned and torn tent in the Outback of Australia. On a road trip up the West Coast, we took a little detour inland near Carnarvon, see the red sands and such. Went down a dirt road, nothing for miles, and found a tent. We hesitantly approached it and saw that it had been torn open on one side. There was a filthy pillow and some scattered clothes inside of it but it was still firmly staked down. Looked like it had been there a while.

Third: back in Texas, out near Enchanted Rock. Walking around the woods with some friends when we nearly stumbled into a pit. Full of rattlesnakes. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a snake den but they tend to ball up into a horrifying Lovecraftian nightmare. I have pictures of this somewhere, I’ll see if I can find them when I get home.” — irritabletom

10. We found a shallow grave

“When I was about 11, we lived in an apartment complex with woods in the back that went straight uphill. A neighbor that we would talk to occasionally told us there was a cool playhouse or abandoned house and he pointed in the direction.

A few days later my little brother and I walked and walked in that direction. We came upon what really looked like a shallow grave and an old kid’s sleeping bag.

The “grave” was a patch of ground which seemed indented about 3 inches, like sunken in from the rest of the dirt around it in a very deliberate rectangle. The sleeping bag was off to the side of the clearing and it was old and tattered. My gut told me to get the fuck out of there ASAP. I wish I would have told someone. Hope it was nothing.” — creatingforfun

11. We saw bullet holes and blood

“When I was a kid, my family and I were hiking in the mountains. We got to a small clearing at the dead end of a dirt road and saw a red convertible with its doors open. My Dad said, “Wait, guys, lets check this out.” He walked around the car for a few seconds and then immediately turned and started speed walking back to us. He didn’t even look at us, just said “Let’s go, now.” I was curious so I started to walk over to car and saw several bullet holes in the doors and blood on the seats. I ran back and said, “Dad, what happened?” And he said, “I don’t know, but the hood was still warm.” That still gives me chills!” — saharawinter

12. I noticed strange orbs of light

“One night I was walking to my friend’s house from my grandpa’s. The fastest route was actually to cut through a trailer park surrounded by woods; there was a path if you knew the correct yard to trespass. Sneaking through a family’s yard, I finally came to the edge of the woods…only to see three very distinct orbs of light about the size of softballs hovering in front of me. I froze and stared at them for some time, kind of squinting, cocking my head, etc., to see what the hell they were. I decided to approach them, and they flew away. I don’t believe in ghosts or anything particularly supernatural, so I honestly have no idea what I saw that night.” — ChildofValhalla

13. I found a severed deer head

“A perfectly severed baby deer head on the side of a trail during a run. On the run back it had moved a quarter mile further up the trail.” — PeanutButterHolyFuck

14. We saw poop and claw marks on the walls

“Was exploring an abandoned farm in the midwest. Upstairs, there was poop everywhere and claw marks on the walls. At one point I found a fleetfarm bag, it looked like there was hair in it and when I went to check it out my girlfriend at the time stepped on a nail and screamed. We hurried out to get her foot all bandaged up before I could find out if there was a dead body in that bag.” — ephemeradio

15. We found a disappearing bunker

“Okay, I got one for you guys. I live in a rural area about 30 minutes west of Palm Spring in Southern California. My cousin and I decided to go hike in some hills that are about 20 minutes north in an area called Oak Glen. There was no trail to get back into the hills, we actually had to tresspass on a fire camp and follow a stream up toward the hills. We start climbing the hills and reach the peak of a paeticularly steep hill. I realize we are wayyy away from where I parked the car, and I dont even know where the road is. On top of all that there is heavy fog rolling in and we only have about 35 minutes of light left. We attempt to take a shortcut down the hill by sliding on our butts down a steep slope, and to our dismay we end up on the side of a 30 ft rock wall. Long story short we manage to scale down the rock wall but not before a football sized rock falls on my cousin’s head and he starts bleeding pretty heavily and seems a bit disoriented.

We start walking the direction we think the car is in, the fog is heavy all around us now, we’re not sure we’re going the right way my cousin is bleeding from his head and all the sudden we come across this long 40ft building with thick concrete walls set mostly below ground level like a bunker. In the middle of a forest? The windows had bars on them and the door was heavy steel. My cousin wanted to check it out but I was getting a total bad vibe.from it. He was saying something was drawing him to it. I dont really believe in the supernatural but I wouldnt let him go in, just a super eerie feeling. Shortly after we passed the house the fog let up a bit and we luckily stumbled on a little foot trail.

Weird note : We went back a couple weeks later during full daylight and looked for the place but seriously could not find it again. We hiked around there for hours.

2nd weird note, my wallet fell out of my back pocket when we were sliding down the hill, back when we were far from any trails, my ID showed up in the mail a week later in an envelope with no note, or sending address.” — Warcrow999

16. Someone stepped on a dead body

“This reminds me of the story about someone hiking a trail at night and they stepped on something that felt strange and they ran away.

Later someone interviewed Ted Bundy and asked him, ‘What’s the closest you have been to being caught?’ And he replied with something like, ‘When I was dragging a body across a trail and I heard someone coming so I left the body and hid in the bushes and they stepped on the body!'” — isthatGuest

17. I saw someone hiding in a boarded up store

“I was driving across country alone on the 10, and was in the middle of the desert. My car said I only had about twenty miles left in gas, so I pulled off to the first place I’d seen for the last hour. Since I was young, sick, and a woman, I made the rule that anytime I stopped for gas I would only pay at the pump and would never leave my car or go inside anywhere aside from the hotels I stayed at. So I swipe my card and as it’s processing the transaction cancels and it prompts me to see the cashier. I try again and halfway through typing in my zip code it cancels and tells me again to see the cashier. I look towards the convenience store and see it has broken windows, is boarded up, and is completely abandoned. Even the tall station sign is torn apart. I spot someone inside peering at me from between the boards, and the second I see them they jump away. They clearly didn’t want to be seen, but kept trying to get me to come into the abandoned station by canceling the transaction. Uh-uh. Nope. Got back in my car and by some miracle made it to the next station thirty miles away.” — spinal_jellyfish

18. Hikers asked us bizarre questions

“Hikers. For me hikers.

We backpacked to a lake about 8 miles from the trailhead. First night it’s us and another family. No big, they leave the next day and we have the lake to ourself. This trail is part of an extremely long loop in the cascades. From where we were at the next trailhead was 50ish miles. On the second day we’re all alone taking it in when my dog starts barking. Up the trail, from the opposite direction we came, were two men. Their clothes were incredibly clean for having hiked at least 50 miles (and thus camped a few days) and they had nothing with them but a small fanny pack. No walking sticks, no water, nothing.

My dog (who was admittedly an asshole but extremely shy of strangers) went absolutely ape shit. I had never seen him freak out about a stranger like that. Ever. That instantly put me on edge. We exchanged small talk with them but they were asking questions that seemed normal but were just….off ever so slightly. “Is it just you two?” “How long are you guys going to be camping at this spot?” “Doing any shooting or anything?” “Did you bring an axe to cut your own firewood?” Etc.

Now my first thought would be that they had grow fields nearby and were scoping out how curious we were. But I grew up in the boonies where grow ops were common enough that I knew they wouldn’t be stupid enough to have one near a busy trail. So the creepy vibe they gave off had me totally unsettled.

They swam in the lake for two hours near our campsite (which didn’t make sense since the lake is long and winding and there were plenty of private beaches with no one near by) and they watched us the whole time. Then they just wandered back into the forest. That night we saw a lantern at the far end of the lake walk up the trail, turn around, and walk back.

By coincidence we left the next day. But damn that stuck with me.” — retroverted_uterus

19. A man snuck up on us

“Last summer a few friends and I were sitting in a car out in the middle of no where just listening to music and talking. There were absolutely no houses for a few miles at least, but all of a sudden a man just stuck his head into the front passenger window. The two of us in the back seat screamed and my friend in the passenger seat turned his head to look and almost jacked the guy in the face. He told us to leave and we have not been back to that spot.” — RyanB313

20. A group of strangers stood around the fire

“I was driving to visit my sister who lives in Missouri. It’s late and I admit, I was a bit tired but not bad enough where I should have pulled over to a hotel.

I get to this stretch of road where it’s just cornfield on either side of me. I have directions to drive straight and take the next left. I drive, and drive, and drive, and drive. No lefts, but multiple rights. Every now and again there might be a left, but its a small man made “road” that wasn’t big enough for my car.

I start getting a bit confused on where I was supposed to turn because I’d been driving straight for like 45 minutes and still no turn in sight. I pass a left turn that was big enough for my car but was a dirt road. I figure hell, that’s probably it. I take the next right and end up driving around a fucking corn field paved road maze. I ended up lost for about two hours before I finally found the small dirt road. I drive up it and find myself at a house. This was obviously not the right left, so I threw it in reverse and went to leave when I saw light from my field of view and movement. I look over and it’s just a large group of people, over ten, standing around a fire and coming my way.

It was like 3am, I was lost, I’d been driving in a maze for about 2 hours. I was tired and I’d had enough for one night so I drove off. I got lost again and ended up driving about 2 hours in the wrong direction, found a gas station, waited for morning and rang my sister to help me find where the hell she lived.

As you can tell, this was before cell phones and GPS became super prevalent.” — RedditWhileWorking23

21. I stumbled across an abandoned school

“An abandoned elementary school in the middle of the woods. I found it when I was around 10 years old while exploring at my dad’s hunting club (in the backwoods of Alabama). The odd thing about it was that it didn’t seem to have a road leading to it or even a place to park cars, but everything inside was from the 60’s and 70’s. It also seemed to be abandoned quickly. Books were still opened on desks, shoes still in the cubbies, and papers still on the teacher’s desks. I actually took a lot of the books that weren’t weather damaged and brought them home with me.

I remember asking my dad about it a few years later, and he knew about it but said it gave him the creeps so he never went near it. My dad left that hunting club a year later so I never had the chance to check it out a second time.” — MsHorrorHound

22. I found an abandoned campsite

“My job is conducting various types of environmental surveys and those are frequently in isolated areas of wilderness. The creepiest thing we’ve seen is the remains of an abandoned camp site. It was clearly several years old but everything was still there, (tent, sleeping bag, pillow, cooking utensils, firewood pile, etc.) It’s like they decided to walk away and never went back for their things. It was about an hour walk from civilization so probably a little too far for a hobo camp although we’ve come across several of those too.” — Brewski32

23. We found a car on an empty mountain road

“Car with emergency lights on, in the middle of the night, on a empty mountain road. I feel kinda bad, but there was 0% chance of me stopping for that.” — fish024

24. We found child pornography

25. I witnessed a massive fire

“Was DJing a wedding in a little prairie village about 100km from my city. Packed everything up once things wound down and was the last one out of the venue at 3am. Started to drive toward the highway and saw a big orange glow emanating from the other side of a ridge on the other side of the railway tracks. Decided to check it out as it was so even and smooth – I had never seen a light like that before. Was thinking it might be some huge bonfire for the weddings after party. Had to drive up one or two km to cross the tracks and crest the ridge, and once I did the light was still off on the horizon. Drove toward it for a few km but it didn’t seem to be getting any nearer. Decided it wasn’t a bonfire and I didn’t want to get myself into trouble so I turned around and headed back to the city. 50 km later I got to the main highway so I decided to look back and the light was just as big in the sky as it was back in the village.

Looked at the news the next day and found out what had happened. A few underground natural gas storage tanks had ruptured and combusted, which caused an absolutely massive fire where there was no option but to let burn until it ran out of fuel. Ended up burning for three or four days.

Would have been okay had I drove on to see the fire but probably just as well that I didn’t. It was very weird and ethereal seeing that light, it had such a quiet might to it and it was drawing me to it like a moth.” — new__boots

26. A man chased me through the forest

“When I was a weird teenager I had this strange thing that I would just take night walks in areas with no lights mostly forest walking paths.

My logic then was facing fears and feel awesome after.

On one night it was pitch black, could really not see far. So was doing my thing and I just bumped into someone els. Saw him at the very last moment.

I just screamed and started running back only to hear him chasing me, I could hear the sound of his footsteps. Then after a while they became more distant. I did a forrest gump and just kept running.

Never went for a night forest walk again.

Thinking back my guess would be that he was perhaps a forest ranger or something. Back then, I figured serial killer.” — Mixmaster_25