A Fresh Track Along the Little White Salmon River - April 26th, 2025

In the early hours before dawn on April 26, 2025, our team lay awake in camp along Oklahoma Road, where the Little White Salmon River meets Berry Creek in Washington’s Gifford Pinchot National Forest. The night had been far from quiet.

We heard repeated owl hoots that didn’t quite ring true—like an imperfect mimic trying to blend into the chorus of the woods. Then came something deeper and more unsettling: a guttural, rumbling sound, like a heavy engine struggling to turn over. It carried an extraordinary distance through the damp spring air, echoing off the steep, forested slopes.

As first light filtered through the canopy, we set out at approximately 0910 hours to walk the riverbank. Fresh elk tracks told a clear story—cows and calves had pushed through the area recently, leaving deep impressions in the soft soil near the water’s edge.

Running parallel to those elk tracks, we found something that stopped us cold.

A single, distinct humanoid footprint—13.5 inches long from heel to toe, and 7.5 inches wide at the toes. The impression was clean and well-defined, with a deep heel strike and no visible boot tread or claw marks. It appeared fresh, pressed into the same moist ground the elk had traversed. One lone print, walking the same path as the wildlife, in an area known for its rugged isolation.

That same weekend, our friends at Salish Sasquatch recorded unusual vocalizations near Moss Creek Campground—just 4.5 miles up Oklahoma Road from our location. The proximity of the events added another layer to an already compelling weekend in the forest.

We documented the track thoroughly with measurements, photographs, and casts. The 13.5-inch footprint now sits among our growing collection of physical evidence from the Pacific Northwest—part of over 200 reported incidents we’ve logged in more than five years of self-funded fieldwork.

Moments like this remind us why we return to these remote river corridors and ridgelines. They’re quiet, methodical reminders that the Pacific Northwest still holds unknowns—tracks left by something large, bipedal, and elusive, moving through the same wild places as the elk, deer, and the occasional researcher.

We don’t claim to have all the answers. But we keep looking, listening, and documenting with care.