In the mid-1970s, a geology student named Alexander and his partner Carol chartered a boat to drop them off for a week-long backcountry expedition up the Nellie Juan River drainage toward Wolverine Creek at Kings Bay on the Kenai Peninsula. On their third day, following heavy storms, they paused on a river gravel bar to construct a small spike camp behind an old tree stump to shield their campfire from the heavy valley winds. While Carol cooked a pot of beans, Alexander moved 50 yards up the slough to survey rock strata. After moving the pot to cool on a tripod of stones, Carol walked to join him, at which point a loud metallic clanking sound rang out from the camp. Returning down the game trail, the couple discovered a massive, red-and-cinnamon-colored hair-covered entity standing directly over their fire pit.
The creature held a stick and was actively dipping it into the pot of beans to smell it. Carol instantly collapsed to the gravel in shock, assuming defensive bear position, while Alexander froze in awe, observing the creature's human-like face, weathered leathery skin, and wide jaw. The entity dropped the stick and crossed a 12-foot-wide river channel in a single bipedal bound, vanishing into the brush. Rushing back to their main beach camp, the couple constructed a protective timber barrier behind their tent. Seeking to locate the entity under a humanitarian assumption that it was a marooned wild human, they left food blankets on the gravel bars while shouting offerings of assistance, but were countered by an incredibly sharp, crisp whistling pattern that trailed them through the slough.
Upon letting their two collie-mix dogs loose as a warning system, the terrified animals instantly bolted into the timber, returning hours later hyperventilating and refusing to leave the tent. While Alexander was chopping firewood down the beach, Carol observed the giant dark form rise up directly out of the alder willows just 25 yards away—its height clearly towering over the tall brush—prompting her to fire a warning shot from her rifle. Alexander ran back and fired a 12-gauge shotgun blast at a shadow, which was met by a piercing, deafening whistle and heavy thrashing across the river channel. The next morning, Alexander discovered a distinct perimeter of large tracks wrapping around their tent and fire pit, revealing that at least two different-sized creatures had silently circled them multiple times while they slept by the embers.
