Sorry for the length, but I’ve always wanted a venue to tell this story…
Once upon a time I was a Boy Scout, and went to a summer camp in northern Minnesota called Many Point, which was actually a collection of several sub-camps which they periodically closed to let the flora and fauna recover from years of tromping Boy Scouts.
That year, as part of a merit badge requirement, I had to take a hike and count the number of animals i saw, so I decided to walk to one of the closed camps, thinking there would be more animals. As I walked further into the camp, it got progressively more quiet, creepy, and Friday-the-13thish. Then, as a was walking, I heard the sound of raspy breathing:
“Unnhhh-huhhhh” “Unnhhh-huuhh”
Scared, I looked across the road to discover the source of the noise was a very large and ancient turtle, looking at me with the most amazingly intelligent and HATEFUL eyes I have ever seen on an animal.
So, I did the usual Boy Scout thing and picked up a stick with which to poke it.
As I bent down to poke it, the bastard LEAPT at me, and bit onto the stick I had in my hand! When I say he lept, he jumped forwards maybe two inches, but it was so totally unexpected that I froze in terror. As I stood there, the turtle fixed its eyes on mine and started moving swiftly towards me, making “Unnhhh-huhhhh” “Unnhhh-huuhh” noises. That, coupled with its bizarre angry human eyes, was enough to make me run for my life out of that camp.
…I told no one about my adventure. That night the troop was gathered around the campfire, where the Scoutmaster was telling the campfire story of the “Yeti”, or Bigfoot, which supposedly lived in the woods around the camp and which was responsible for the disappearance of several naughty Boy Scouts over the decades.
As the Scoutmaster finished the story, this weird kid sitting next to me looks up and says: “You know, I always thought the Yeti was a turtle!”
Totally random; totally freaked me out.