Fear of the dark

[gloomhound]

Man this is some creepy weird stuff, I've never heard of the like.
Still it's quite the mystery isn't it.
I think someone pulling that kind of nonsense around here might come to a bad end.

 

[Barn Owl]

Just stick the earphones in and take on all comers..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28GaKoCuobU&feature=related

 

[comeonbabylightmyfire]

This thread is chilling and gripping in equal measures. I have only ever actually been camping twice: Reading Festival 1976 and Glastonbury 1983, both experiences marred only by asthma.

My intention to put my newly practised bushcraft skills into operation with a solo night out in some Kentish woodland is now looking less likely, especially after reading about Jonathan's unsettling experiences. I don't believe in anything spiritual or supernatural, but I've encountered some very scary people, and, as evidenced by some of the stories on here I'm not alone. The thought of some malevolent wingnut lurking about the campsite is enough to give me the screaming abdabs, quite why anyone would return to a campsite after such a bizarre experience is beyond me. Full credit to you Jonathan, you're a braver man than me.

 

[horsevad]

This thread is chilling and gripping in equal measures. I have only ever actually been camping twice: Reading Festival 1976 and Glastonbury 1983, both experiences marred only by asthma.

My intention to put my newly practised bushcraft skills into operation with a solo night out in some Kentish woodland is now looking less likely, especially after reading about Jonathan's unsettling experiences. I don't believe in anything spiritual or supernatural, but I've encountered some very scary people, and, as evidenced by some of the stories on here I'm not alone. The thought of some malevolent wingnut lurking about the campsite is enough to give me the screaming abdabs, quite why anyone would return to a campsite after such a bizarre experience is beyond me. Full credit to you Jonathan, you're a braver man than me.

Please don't let such few examples control you or your life. Statistically speaking you should be safer out in the woods than in your own house!

Learning good fieldcraft will further enchance your experience in the woods. For a naturalist good fieldcraft is just as essential and important as for a military sniper or similar. Both are totally depending on their fieldcraft skills to achieve their goals.

With practice you will be able to select campsites where it will be impossible to sneak up on you without making considerable noise.

Learning tracking will enable you to read the signs of the terrain and establish with quite certainty whether the area is frequented by others.

But first - and foremost - please don't let fear control your desicions. Especially as such fear is statistically unfounded. The number of people who are violently attacked in their home is larger than the number of people who are violently attacked in the woods - by several orders of magnitude. (I assume that the statistics for your contry would be similar to the statistics for the scandinavian contries, of which I am more familiar)


//Kim Horsevad

 

[JonathanD]

Statistically speaking you should be safer out in the woods than in your own house!

Spot on. And even in my extreme and very very rare case, I never felt threatened by the individual. It was just fear of the unknown at the time. Woods and churchyards are possibly the safest places we have as people are afraid to go there after dark.

 

[bert333]

never fear the dark again- simple solution here !!

 

[Dormouse]

@comeonbabylightmyfire - encountering nutjobs in the woods is really rare! And those who have/may have had such encounters have merely been alarmed, nothing more, and much of that has more to do with being taken by surprise than anything else.

Camping out is very enjoyable so get out there and have fun!

 

[nigel heffernan]

I suppose its just the fear of what we cant see in the darkness and an over active imagination, i brought my son to the woods a few nights ago to see if we could spot any deer or foxes, on the way back through the woods he kept lookin back and asking if there was something behind us, even i got nervous then lol

 

[leealanr]

I was a police officer for 30 years and walked alone on many occassions in the dark in cities and the country and in general felt very comfortable and "safe", sometimes though it was not like that!

One night in the 80's my colleague and I working nights in a very large rural section took a radio call that lots of strange lights and movement of cars had been seen on a very remote marsh adjacent to the River Waveney on the Norfolk and Suffolk border.

We had recently had lots of church burglaries in our area and there was a very remote round towered unlocked church on that particular marsh, so off we went.

We ended up driving down a soft drove and as we got close to the church there were quite a few cars and a number of people weirdly dressed. As soon as they saw us many of them took off in their cars but some stayed to speak.

"What are you doing here?"

"Well officer there is a story that every 300 years or so, just when the moon planets etc are in the right alignment, if you go around the church three times anti clockwise, then enter the church and worship, the devil will appear".

Oh yes I wanted to check out that church now................ NOT.

But I did, on my own, with my trusty 5 cell Maglite (Which I still have to this day). I entered the church and searched it..... thouroughly.

It was completely black inside, no electricity, no lights and so quiet. The hair on the back of my neck was standing up I can tell you.

I wanted to leave, to run away but this was my duty, so I forced myself to check the whole place out.

I went down the central aisle to the altar fully expecting to see the cross up side down and so on, but there was nothing and all the silver salvers etc, and the cross were all still there.

I checked around the outside of the church while my partner kept talking to the worshippers!

We then escorted them away and resumed............

I did not see anything other than that made my man and nature, thank goodness!

However I can still "see" in my minds eye and remember how I felt throughout, fear of the unknown is the worst fear of all and it stays with you.

I have never felt anything like that in many years of hill walking climbing, canoeing etc, although I did get windy at night on Ben Macdui, and yes I did know about the "Grey Man" at that time.

Overall however I am also of the "Darkness is your friend" camp!

Stay safe.

Alan L.

 

[Rumi]

Alan, Great yarn that! theres some very freaky people about..

 

[lovely_stuff]

Absolutely scared of the dark when i'm camping - best nights so far have been in the scottish outer hebrides last summer where it never got dark at all!!

But then a few weeks later we were in France, just 2 of us and the motorhorse in the loire valley on a deserted campsite - i woke up at about 3 am to hear quiet rustling and grunting in the tent porch...i prodded the boyfriend awake who shook the tent about and went to investigate...we found our new camembert wheel a good few meters away with big bites out of it! Reckon a french fox smelt us a mile off and snuck into our zipped up porch for a midnight snack!!

 

[Barn Owl]

Absolutely scared of the dark when i'm camping - best nights so far have been in the scottish outer hebrides last summer where it never got dark at all!!

But then a few weeks later we were in France, just 2 of us and the motorhorse in the loire valley on a deserted campsite - i woke up at about 3 am to hear quiet rustling and grunting in the tent porch...i prodded the boyfriend awake who shook the tent about and went to investigate...we found our new camembert wheel a good few meters away with big bites out of it! Reckon a french fox smelt us a mile off and snuck into our zipped up porch for a midnight snack!!

Enjoy the fear like a good horror flick or book.
In reality there's nothing there that's not more scared of you..

Unless you're where the bears are...
Or Vampires..

Don't worry about the Werewolves, throw them your pal and they'll be happy.

 

[Rumi]

it was -5 (5 December 2010, 11pm) last night, and the ground was crisp with frost.. I was out by the frozen lake in the silvery semi darkness, warm in my thermals and looking for otters.. not a soul about.. why, cos its dark and very cold and theres people like me dressed to look like a bush!

 

[red devil]

im soo glad im not the only bushcrafter with this weakness or is it a strength to keep you on you guard.

when i come home from school in winter i constantly look over my shoulder and check in bushes for uknown monsters.
childish i know but i cant help it

Fascinating thread this, even if I've not understood some of it.. some of those tangents have been w-a-a-a-y out there!!
Anyway, when I was a kid I read a book - I think it was by Baden Powell or someone similar - which talked about the need for constant vigilance wherever you are.
For some reason that notion stuck with me and even now, forty-something years later, I always want to know who or what is behind me whether I'm in a busy high street, quiet country lane or wherever.
I've never shaken off the habit of regularly looking over my shoulder.
Probably makes me look like a paranoid loon, but it's not a bad habit to get into.
Steve

 

[Rumi]

right on Steve, keeping aware is never a bad thing.

 

[JonathanD]

right on Steve, keeping aware is never a bad thing.

Yeah, we used to call it 'professional paranoia'.

 

[Rumi]

Yeah, we used to call it 'professional paranoia'.

I am a fruitloop too!!

 

[brumstar123]

When i was growing up i lived in a small welsh village called llangrannog, at the edge of the valley their was a ski centre where we all used to hang out and look cool. One saturday evening after a long day looking cool to all of the tourists me and my mates headed home back down into the valley on our skate boards. Little did i realise that i had left my bag on the side of the kerb outside the ski centre.

In sheer panic i realised and headed back up the 3 mile hill to the ski slope, alone. I didn't want to say anything to my dad as he had just bought me a new personal stereo that was in the bag. So i headed off with my skate board to make short work of the return journey. The village is more like a hamlet really so any roads going in and out of the village are very quite and dark after night fall.
I was S****ing it! Walking briskly i began to sing to myself to drown out any unusual noises, i was used to camping out but walking alone up a dark overgrown track was scary. After about 1 mile a started to hear a noise over the otherside of the left hedge row that ran parallell to the track, what ever it was was following me, i tried to drown out the noise with song but to no avail my mind was going mad.

There was a tale that circuated our village (backed by local evidence of slaughtered sheep) of a black cat loose in the area, all the kids raved about it and we used to regularly **** each other up about it on camping trips....anyway.

I was about 3/4 to the top of the valley track when my blood chilled as i saw a low lyign tree branch start to bend back in the hedgerow next to me as something pushed through it, as the tree sapling flung back i threw my skateboard at the hedgerow to try to scare off this 'black cat' only to cause the animal to boom out of the foliage and loom over me by about 8ft tall, i p***ed my pants and ran off screaming back to my house as fast as i could!!!!!!!

I returned later with my dad, he said i was a gibbering wreck and pale as a sheet when i burst through the door, turns out running parrallel to the track was a farmers field, a bloody horse had been curiose and had followed me up the hill, when i turned on him he was startelled and reered up, thus causing me to soil myslef!

I hate horses!!

 

[JonathanD]

Cracking story brumstar, and welcome to BcUK Daniel.

 

[Tadpole]

I am a newbie here and just wanna say Hi to everyone. I am Daniel from Pennsylvania, US.


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