About 32 kilometres North of Chilliwack, British Columbia – lies the semi-small town of Harrison Hot Springs – Population of 1,632.
Labelled as the Bigfoot Capital of the World – If you are in the area and a fan of this hairy hominid, I highly recommend stopping in and checking out the sights, hiking trails, and especially the Bigfoot Museum. They are currently in a smaller building of the visitors centre but come 2023 the museum will be re-opening in a newly constructed building 3 times the size of its previous location.
The Harrison Hot Springs area has been subject to countless sightings over the course of the last 200 years – all with documented reports via word of mouth, and newspaper clippings. The museum itself has a ton of awesome components to catch your eye. Including several foot castings that I have attached below for your viewing.
To start we have the Bossburg Cripplefoot Tracks – 1969.
These tracks were found on November 24th, and showcase what appears to be a crippled-looking right foot. Located near the Bossburg town dump, reports came to the police the year prior of a Sasquatch nearby, whether its the same Sasquatch is not confirmed, but the locals have taken to calling this “injured” Bigfoot the Cripplefoot, or the Bossburg Cripple.
On November 27th, a Bigfoot searcher by the name of Rene Dahinden appeared at the site to investigate, but the tracks were since gone from tourists walking about. Rene was able to cast and photograph the best prints still intact, however, another searcher by the name of Bob Titmus also joined Rene in this hunt.
After 2 weeks of constant exploration, Rene and a local Bossburg resident Ivan Marx managed to acquire it. On December 13th, 1969 they found giant human-like tracks in the snow leading from across a river near Lake Roosevelt. Once these were found, anthropologist Grover Krantz joined the group and took photos, and made castings, all of which were studied by primatologist John Napier and anthropologist Jeff Meldrum. Both scientists became convinced and confirmed the track’s authenticity.
The Bossburg Cripple foot’s deformity was due to the congenital condition that we call Metatarsus Adductus or Skew Foot.
The next casting is of the Terrace Sasquatch Foot Cast – 1974.
At this point in time, the new highway bridge into Terrace finally reached a point of its construction where it was deemed safe for the public to access after construction working hours ceased.
Taking advantage of this timeframe, two friends made the trek to cross towards Ferry Island from Terrace and explore the area. On the river bank, they ended up finding large fresh footprints. This yielded an immediate return to town to acquire plaster and a camera – after they made a bunch of castings and photographs, they explored the area further to find the creature – but it was not sighted anywhere.
This third casting was taken from Merritt, British Columbia in 2016 – and submitted by Thomas Steenburg.
Cherylle Douglas and her Grandson Hunter Pollard (age 12 at the time) stumbled upon it along the bank of Coldwater River in Merritt. Ms. Douglas made the casting and gave it to Thomas Steenburg.
And now we have the Graysons Harbor Heryford Bigfoot casts – April 22, 1982.
Having been collected in that year by Deputy Dennis Heryford of the Graysons Harbor County Sheriff’s department in Washington State. These 2 tracks are regarded as some of the best casts ever made, especially because of the officer’s position and credibility. But looking at the specifics of the casting, we can see the “mushrooming” of the toes, this is a difficult thing to hoax, and the texture/bulging features shown in these tracks also demonstrates that these were created by a very real foot instead of a wooden/practical effect.
Our next casting is the Bluff Creek cast of 1958.
In California, a gentleman named Jerry Crew cast a footprint 17.5 inches long. Now this cast it’s worth noting is a replica of the original casting that was taken to the newspaper back in the day, that newspaper published an article itself that garnered much attention to the term “Bigfoot”.
As we conclude, we have the Chilliwack River Foot Cast – August 1986.
While passing through Chilliwack from the town of Hope, researcher Thomas Steenburg learned of a sighting up near the Chilliwack River called Cow’s Creek.
When he arrived at the campsite, he interviewed the two Americans that witnessed the creature. The couple was fishing and eventually throughout their day, they saw an 8-foot tall, man-like, hairy creature removing the trout from their cache.
Thomas explored the scene and managed to pick up the cryptid’s trail in a creek bed. From the creek bed, Thomas was able to extract 2 impressions, whilst the first one did not take, he was successful with the second casting.
Now just like we discussed before…
There is more to Bluff Creek than the Jerry Crew casting. The attached photos in the blog are from the Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot sighting also in Bluff Creek, California – on October 20th, 1967.
The famous footage is also attached for your convenience on the blog to view.
My next favourite part of the Harrison Hot Springs Bigfoot Museum…
Is the massive map they have on the wall, with a plethora of numbered locations that reference specific sightings. I have recreated this map with an up-to-date account of more recent local sightings. Note – this is a recreated map, as photographs of the museum map did not take very well.
Encounters are available to listen to via the podcast episode below and on our media feeds.
Like I had mentioned at the start, this place is definitely worth visiting should you have the chance. Not only is the curator (who doubles as the visitor centre informant) very knowledgeable on Bigfoot and the sightings, you can purchase several fun pieces of memorabilia as well as some very interesting novels on Sasquatch and other cryptids from around the world.
