These are always fun to share.

I was with my buddy and we came into Angleworm late one night. Good thing I had my GPS. We wouldn't have found the trail to the lake or hiking trail without it. We were new to this area. Dumb young 20-something year olds. We found the lake in the dark and paddled to the far site by Home Lake in the little bay.

We heard a lot of weird noises throughout the night. I am an avid hunter, and I have never heard these sounds. Cross between an elk bulging and a big growl. Maybe a cougar? In the morning we scouted the area. Tons of scrap metal, old bed frames, pots and pans behind the site. Never saw anything, but really weird feeling in that area. Any other stories from the northwoods?

My story isn't very spooky..

My dad and I could not figure out what this mechanical sound was during our first several trips to the BWCA. We were too embarrassed to ask, too. Eventually, we swallowed our pride and discovered the 'mechanical' sound is really a ruffed grouse.

Not sure if this rates as spooky, but it sure got our attention. We were camping on Lake Four with a group of 6 guys. After dark three of us set out our lighted slip bobbers and returned to the fire ring. We were sitting around the fire talking and having a few drinks. It was very quiet out and pitch dark. Our bobbers were shining like mini lighthouses on the lake. All of a sudden a huge splash out in the lake, Ker-splash sounding. By the time we got down to the lake all that we could see is rings in the water with our headlamps. It sounded like someone threw something at our bobbers. Most in our group had heard beavers hit their tails before and this was way louder. Like a kid doing a cannonball off the high dive loud.

No more good stories?

Three years ago a buddy and I were camping on site #628 on Gaskin. It was September and the lake was empty. About 2 hours after dark we see 4 people with lights walking around on the island to NW. There are no campsites on the island so we couldn't figure out what they were doing or who it was. A few minutes after they reached the island one of the lights disappeared and the other 3 were close together in a cluster for about 30 minutes. We thought that maybe they were digging a hole to bury #4. We sat down by the shore in the dark putting together a plan on what to do if they came into our camp. About 30 minutes later we saw several lights over at site 629 so we figured it was the same group. The next morning they paddled past our site and there were 4 guys in the two canoes so we didn't go look for a body.

Not my story but my friends story. So my friend's name lets call him Jim. Jim is a now late 60s something guy who's lived in Cottage Grove basically forever. Jim and my dad go WAYYY back, they were in Korea together during the Vietnam war. My family is from the west coast, I moved out here about a decade ago on a whim in search of a better job (found it), Jim had nothing to do with that decision, it was just coincidence he lives here. Jim used to go to the BWCA every year, he's gettin too be old and frail and his friends that he used to always go with seem to be getting up there in the years too. Jim and his friends and his daughters, and whoever else they could cram into a cabin, are creatures of habit and always rented a cabin on Lake One, and they'd go on various day trips around Ely, and fish Lake One, Snowbank and neighbors, etc. The very first time I met the BWCA, was with Jim, on one of his trips to this cabin. I brought a friend who's my age, we'll call him Bill. Bill is a level headed fellow who always shoots you straight when you talk, and has very little sarcasm built in, but still has a sense of humor, Bill's been to the BWCA since he was a little kid, and prides himself on going every year.

One evening 3 canoes worth of us are paddling around on Lake One, not very far from the little narrow river back to the cabins. Not quite into the main body of water, and we're just poking around fishing when Jim's brother Larry says "That's the spot right there", I assumed he was talking about fishing because we had all been talking like "oh yea that's the spot I'm going to catch a giant walleye (as you cast your bobber)" so I didn't really follow up what the spot was. Later that night Jim, Larry, Bill, myself and my girlfriend are hanging out outside, everyone else is inside the cabin. We were all on our first or second beer when we started talking about Bigfoot, and scary stories. Bill pokes fun at me for believing in Bigfoot, then Larry starts about his scary story of his in the BWCA.

Larry goes on to tell us that he and Jim were fishing one night just down the lake one inlet river "years ago" and it started to get dark. They slowly paddled back and just as they got their bearings straight on where to go, as it was dark by this point, there was a dim red light in the sky above them. Larry says "It was like a dim red light bulb that didn't move", they begin to paddle back knowing where to go, when Larry says "and then we were just right in front of the opening before you could see the dock", Larry points out to the opening of the river area, just beyond the dock of the Cabin we rented. "It was like time skipped, I don't remember anything in the middle, I just remember figuring out which way to go, we noticed the light and tried to figure out what it was for a while, and then once we put the rods away and started paddling, we were 100 yards in front of the dock". Now the whole time Jim is standing in the same 5' social circle we had going on around the campfire, and he had ZERO comment on the story. Jim's the type of guy that CANNOT stop talking. If you're in a car of 5 people, Jim is always talking, you can turn and have a completely different conversation with someone else, right in front of Jim, and he won't miss a beat in what he was talking about, he just goes on and on and on and takes no offense if you're not actually paying attention. My dad's an antagonist jack wagon, he's constantly joking around and poking fun at people, and when he's with Jim, Jim's quick to shut down the BS with his own jokes. I give you that backstory because I want you to know that Jim is the type of guy that if a BS story was being told that involved him, he'd give you his version and then wouldn't shut up about it either. As Larry's telling his story, Jim is damn near defensive about it, like he was just hands-down not willing to contribute to the story or squash it as BS. The only thing Jim said during the story was "It as just right above us behind the trees". At the end, Jim wouldn't say a thing about what his take on it was, he wouldn't provide any information. I look at Bill and Bill looks at me and we're kinda both puzzled by Jim's response cause Jim's just so transparent in what his thoughts are (his mouth is open and it's spilling his thoughts like a waterfall). But with this, Jim had shown a weird defensiveness that really made the story have a "what if" feel. Bill and I were rolling our eyes during the story like "Yea I remember this from the discovery channel, guys paddling a canoe, light behind them, and then memory lapse" It was Jim's reaction to the story being told that was most weird. Jim was physically uncomfortable when Larry was telling the story. I wonder what made him so uncomfortable about it, I've poked him to tell me about it since and he completely avoids the subject.