Trinidad was our home base for a few days. We had been mostly camping and the weather was warm and dry. When the rains did come, thankfully we were staying at a friend’s house in Westhaven, south of Trinidad.
Our next commitment, another family gathering, was not for another two weeks. With no plan, we thought we’d drive to the Bluff Creek area as our possible next stop.
Trinidad to Tish Tang
From Trinidad, we drove north toward Orick to gas up and then to Bald Hills. We went from Yurok to Hoopa tribal lands. At one point, we were stopped for roadworks. While waiting, a worker pointed to a baby bear climbing down a tree, just off the highway. It was only a few feet away and then he hopped onto the road, walking past us toward another construction worker behind us. He seemed comfortable being so close to people and then he ran back into the trees.
The first spot to check out was Bluff Creek Campground. We were close to where the Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot footage was captured. About nine miles from Highway 96 aka The Bigfoot Byway.
As we drove by, we trusted our gut that it wasn’t the place to stay. So we continued on and headed for Tish Tang Campground. Wade’s driven by it many times before. It was a place that remained on his mind.
Tish Tang
Making a right turn from the highway, we followed the road toward the river, passing a beautiful mural on our right. Later the campground host, Inker McCovey, shared that the mural is living art. The images shift as you pass by, depending on which direction you were walking.
We drove through the Tish Tang campground gate, which was near a fork in the road. The other one goes to the river. We continued following the road, looping past campsites and several playgrounds on lush grounds. It was so peaceful, and empty. We lost cellular data a while back and didn’t have any information about Tish Tang. Thinking we’d drive back up to the office, we continued on the loop until we saw a couple of trucks near a yurt.
Meeting Inker McCovey
That’s when Inker came over to greet us. His warm welcome was the invitation to stay.
As we started to set up camp, I wondered if he was the same Inker in David Paulides’ book The Hoopa Project that I was reading. Wade and I tried to figure it out by looking at the photos in the book. Published in 2008, the photo was too old to make a positive ID. It definitely could be. So when Inker came by our campsite the next time, I asked him and he confirmed it.
Before our camping trip, I rummaged through our storage locker for Wade’s copy of The Hoopa Project. David Paulides also wrote a series of Missing 411 books which are about mysterious disappearances in national parks and the wilderness of Canada and the US. I haven’t read the books, though I have seen some of his Missing 411 documentaries. He’s a former police officer who’s involved with the Missing 411 project and with investigating Bigfoot.
I thought it perfect to read The Hoopa Project for this road trip into Bigfoot country. I read it aloud when Wade was driving or when we were sitting at the campfire. Wade’s read it before – still, it’d been years.
Inker himself had personal encounters with Bigfoot and he helped David Paulides to connect with many tribal members who too shared their stories. There are over fifty pages of references to Inker in the book. Over our next several days at Tish Tang, Inker dropped by a few times. He shared a lot of information and stories with us, including UFO sightings, a boy seeing his ancestors walking through the field near where we camped, and how people have been called to visit Tish Tang.
These grounds are special and sacred to Inker, who spent a lot of time clearing out the poison oak. He aimed to offer a safe and welcoming place to Hoopa, local, and everyone else. Some of the changes at Tish Tang include the yurt. This will be a school for the tribe’s children so they can be immersed in their language and culture for their first years of life. They also just started construction on the bathing and sauna facilities which were completed shortly after our departure.
On our last day, Inker also graciously sat down with us for an interview. Here’s the link to our interview with Inker, Part 1.
Camping at Tish Tang
The campground at Tish Tang was empty until our last night. It was wonderful to have the place to ourselves. There was plenty of firewood already stacked up at our campsite, and along with our stove, we were warm and well-fed. We took in the sun, listened to the birds, watched the clouds, walked down to the river…I continued with my reading and Wade played his guitar. We also popped into Hoopa for grocery runs.
With the bathing facilities still being built and the river too early to get into, we took short and refreshing “showers” at a campsite tap. The water at Tish Tang is sourced from the springs in the mountains. Another reason we enjoyed being just by ourselves – we freely stripped down to wash at the tap which was close to the campsite road. I had brought Acure’s dry shampoo to try. Not a big fan of dry shampoo, this was a just-in-case. With such warm weather, I was able to wash my hair and let it naturally dry in the sun. For the past few years, I’ve been growing my hair which now reaches past my waist. It was easy in Kaua’i, where the sun and humidity kept my hair healthy and bright. For years I didn’t like having my hair so long and now, it felt freeing.
Trinity River
Tish Tang is located along the Trinity, a major river in northern California. It is also a tributary of the Klammath River, joining it at Weitchpec. Its rich resources in fish were the life blood for indigenous tribes for thousands of years. The discovery of gold at the Trinity in 1850 brought settlers to the area and with them, disease and conflict.
As the Trinity is mostly rain-fed, its flows are seasonal. Inker reminded us that the river was too dangerous to enter at this time, as snow-melt also impacts the levels. There is a vortex near the “Deer head” rock that can pull swimmers down thirty feet at times. It’s very powerful and something to be aware of. Shortly before our arrival, a young life was claimed, with another nearly taken as well. We had been wondering about the police boats in the river. Inker cautioned to wait until we can see the river’s bottom.
The Hoopa tribe believes – though not widely shared – a serpent called Kamoss lives in the Trinity/Klammath river system. It even goes out to tidal areas and the ocean. While Inker didn’t say too much about Kamoss to us, he did tell David Paulides that it is “a snake-like creature that has a head the size of a horse and presumably eats fish”. He also shared for the book that people in the community have seen this creature, which makes a high-pitched motor sound at night and can be heard from very far away.
Officer Chance Carpenter of the Hoopa Tribal Police and Leslie Abbot, both interviewed for The Hoopa Project, confirmed they have seen Kamoss. Many others also approached David Paulides about this creature said to reach 18 feet long. Moore’s Rock is where Leslie had her encounter.
Willow Creek
Our last night at Tish Tang was eventful. The light rain that we had when we went to bed became a rainstorm. Feeling drops leaking into my tent, I stuffed everything into my sleeping bag and ran to the car, the only casualty a towel. Though I still can’t find my Kindle so if anyone sees one with an orange Aloha sticker, let me know.
I settled into the driver’s seat, relatively dry, and fell into a light sleep. Until someone banged on the window, startling me awake. Without contacts and confused, I didn’t immediately realize it was Wade outside the car. It was dark. His tent had collapsed.
In the morning, we saw that the weight of the rainwater had bent some of the poles, pouring water into his tent. His sleeping bag, blanket, clothing, and the mats he used for extra cushion were all soaked.
After packing up our very wet camp, we left Tish Tang and drove to Willow Creek for a bite to eat at Osprey Café.
State Route 299 (Trinity River National Scenic Highway) runs east-west through northern California. Where it intersects State Route 96 (Bigfoot Scenic Highway) is Willow Creek. This small town of maybe 2,000, located inside Six Rivers National Forest, is known as the “Gateway to Bigfoot Country” and the “Bigfoot Capital of the World”. Just an hour’s drive from the Pacific Coast, the forests are dense here, a wonderful habitat for wildlife. And Bigfoot.
Each year, Willow Creek hosts an annual Bigfoot Daze event, this year on July 13. It used to be held during Labour Day weekend. However, in recent years with the forest fires around that time, the park for the event is used for fire camps.
I’m not sure how Willow Creek became known as the Bigfoot Capital of the World. They do have a Bigfoot museum in town. In The Hoopa Project, David Paulides writes “I couldn’t find one witness to a sighting or incident inside of the Willow Creek limit or vicinity. The closest witness I could find was a Hoopa teacher who saw a Bigfoot in the Trinity River outside of Willow Creek.”
Over the years, there has been hundreds of sightings in this part of California. The most famous one was about an hour north of Willow Creek. In October, 1967, Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin travelled by horseback down into the Bluff Creek area. Patterson had a 35mm Kodak movie camera and captured what came to be known as the Patterson-Gimlin film. To this day this short film of a female Bigfoot crossing the creek has not been debunked.
Bigfoot
Bigfoot is known by other names – Sasquatch, Yowie, Yeti, or metoh kangmi (“wild man of the snow”). The indigenous tribes in North America know the Sasquatch by different names. Bigfoot also is part of stories and verbal history, and known as brothers, “old man in the forest”, “the big people”, and guardians. Generally, when you look into Bigfoot, they are described as a bipedal primate. I hesitate to call them a primate. What I’ve heard points to much more, and so much we actually do not know.
According to The Hoopa Project, there have been sightings in all of the American states, aside from Rhode Island and Hawai’i. In California, Del Norte, Humboldt, and Siskiyou counties account for the most reported Bigfoot/Sasquatch sightings. I’d heard stories prior to meeting Wade, who shared even more with me.
David Paulides’ book provides some very interesting data, which had led him to decide on Humboldt County, and specifically the Hoopa Valley, for his research. Hoopa is just 14 miles north of Willow Creek. Up in Canada, my home province of British Columbia is also well-known Bigfoot territory.
Tish Tang was returned to the Hoopa Tribe in 2000, after these ancestral lands were claimed by settlers and then managed by the US Forest Service. Since campground host Inker took over stewardship, Tish Tang has been transformed. He worked diligently to remove poison oak which was widespread in the area, making it an undesirable place to camp despite the natural beauty and spiritual energy.
Tish Tang Campground
Highway 96
Hoopa, California 95546
(530) 625-4284
LAT / LONG: 41.022852, -123.638743
Located by Trinity River in Northern California, Tish Tang is opened year-round, with 12-acres and thirty-eight campsites of varying size and configuration. Vault bathrooms and newly-built bathing and sauna facilities are available. Construction of the shower and sauna began when we were camping there and so we didn’t get to enjoy them. Other amenities include spring-fed water. There are also fire pits, BBQ grills, picnic tables, trash collection, playgrounds, and firewood. Cell service is not great and we went into town for calls and getting online. Tish Tang is owned and managed by the Hoopa Tribe.
All the previous campsites we stayed at had flush toilets. Tish Tang was my introduction to vault toilets. With no lights inside, I brought one of our lanterns and made sure I took everything out of my pockets so I wouldn’t drop anything down into the void. We had toilet paper which we did need to use.