Utah: The Bear Lake Monster

Deep beneath the turquoise waters of Bear Lake, a mysterious creature has reportedly lurked for more than 150 years. Stretching across the Utah–Idaho border, this beautiful mountain lake is home to one of America's oldest and most fascinating lake monster legends. But the terrifying encounters don't end at the shoreline. Beyond the water, Utah's rugged mountains hold their own secrets, including decades of chilling Sasquatch sightings. The Backwoods Cryptid Road Trip heads to Utah, where we investigate the legendary Bear Lake Monster and a collection of frightening Bigfoot encounters from across the Beehive State. Our journey begins in 1868, when Joseph C. Rich published sensational eyewitness accounts of an enormous serpent-like creature swimming through Bear Lake. Witnesses described a monster nearly 90 feet long, moving faster than a galloping horse. The reports ignited a nationwide fascination, but in 1894, Rich admitted the original story was a fabrication. That should have ended the legend. Instead, reports of something unexplained in the lake continued for generations. We explore a series of eerie accounts spanning more than a century, including a terrified wagon driver whose horses refused to approach the shoreline, a family watching an enormous dark shape cut through the water in 1974, fishermen witnessing bizarre disturbances during the winter cisco run, and a sailboat encounter involving a mysterious wake with no visible source. We also examine tour boat operator Brian Hirschi's reported close encounter in 2002 and investigate possible explanations ranging from unusual wave activity to enormous fish and misidentified wildlife. Then we leave Bear Lake behind and venture deep into Utah's Sasquatch country, where the Bear River Range, Wasatch Mountains, and Uinta wilderness have produced some truly unsettling encounter stories. A young sheepherder watches 1,500 frightened sheep bunch together as an enormous upright figure emerges from the trees. A teenager in North Ogden sees something massive moving along a fence line before it turns toward a floodlight. An elk hunter spots an unidentified creature stalking a herd through the remote Uintas. And a mountain biker encounters something standing just below a mountain road, close enough to see its hand resting against the pavement. From a twelve-year-old girl's terrifying encounter on Boulder Mountain to an unexpected face-to-face sighting near Tony Grove Lake, these stories take us into some of Utah's most remote and beautiful wilderness. Is the Bear Lake Monster simply a pioneer-era hoax that evolved into enduring folklore? And what explains the generations of reported Sasquatch encounters in Utah's mountains? Join us for another journey into the unexplained as the Backwoods Cryptid Road Trip explores the legends, eyewitness stories, and mysteries of Utah. Email Brian Join Our FREE Newsletter Get Brian's Books Leave Us A Voicemail Visit Our Website Have you experienced a Bigfoot sighting, Sasquatch encounter, Dogman experience, UFO sighting, or any unexplained cryptid or paranormal event deep in the woods? We want to hear your story. Email your encounter to [email protected] for a chance to be featured on a future episode of Backwoods Bigfoot Stories. Backwoods Bigfoot Stories is a paranormal storytelling podcast featuring real Bigfoot encounters, Sasquatch sightings, Dogman reports, cryptid experiences, and true scary stories from the backwoods. Follow the show and turn on automatic downloads so you never miss a chilling encounter from the forest. Listen with the lights off… if you dare.