The Bigfoot tradition lives in North Carolina Bigfoot Festival: NPR

People from across the country came together this weekend in a small manufacturing town in Carolina to celebrate Bigfoot.

The first annual Bigfoot festival in Marion, North Carolina, brought together the full range of participants, from sasquatch skeptics to complete non-believers, to Bigfoot explorers who quickly shared stories of sightings and stories. howls.

The director of the McDowell County Chamber of Commerce, Steve Bush, is ambivalent about Bigfoot.

"I'll say it until I see it – I want to believe, but until I see it physically – I'll say no at this point," Bush said.

But aside from personal skepticism, Bush says he quickly supported the Bigfoot festival. It's a city in transition, with old furniture factories and downtown textile buildings transformed into trendy retail outlets and microbreweries.

"We find a lot of life in these old buildings, and that's what's exciting about Marion," Bush said. "So, if you really want to see a little of the old mixed with the new, then Marion, NC is where you want to be."

At first glance, it's pretty much what you expect from a cute Bigfoot festival. There are Bigfoot T-shirt stands, yard signs – but there is also the Bigfoot Juice stand run by Allie Webb. She claims that the concoction of wood and wood odor is both an insect repellent and an attractive Bigfoot.

"I think Bigfoot juice works," says Webb. "We say that's good for a mile and a half away.This is not because you do not see Bigfoot that he did not see you and decided to turn around." and run. "

Webb does not hesitate to report that she has a witness. Festival organizer John Bruner has been leading the Bigfoot 911 explorers team for years. He says that they used the juice about a year ago and finally touched the dirt.

"We were doing an expedition and there was one that was crossing the forest service road about 30 meters from where I was, and I had a very good overview," says Bruner. "I've been hunting the Bigfoot for 40 years and doing research – and it was just exhilarating for me. I finally could see one after all that I went through and all the time spent in the woods. "

It's a feeling shared by many other festival researchers, like Lee Woods.

"The female we probably saw between 11:30 and 11:45 at night, and we saw her with night vision, and it was the first time I saw her," Woods said. Years later, he claims to have seen a male sasquatch, measuring about 9 feet.

"And once you see it, it's rooted in your brain." Trust me [laughs]. Yeah, you do not forget it. The reason I say that, is the guy who saw it with me – he calls Sam, and he's a former sailor – and he said he's n & # 39; He had never been so frightened of all his life when he had seen it. And he never came back. Yeah, it's like that that he was scared. "

Woods stands behind a booth with other experts, answering festival-goers' questions, posting photos of Bigfoot, casts and even recordings of strange sounds in the woods.

According to Bob Trent, a Bigfoot researcher, this may be the sound of a sasquatch that screams or not, but he says it was not possible to classify them otherwise. He and his team, The Dirty South Squatchers, use digital recorders modified with durable batteries. They are carefully hidden, recording forest sounds up to 15 days at a time.

For many people attending the festival, the Bigfoot Calling Competition will be the culmination for seasoned fans like Woods and beginners like Irys Frankon. She and her family left Clarkesville, Georgia.

"Because we always try to find out if it's real or not," says Frankon. "And there are possible observations everywhere to be totally honest, and we just keep believing in him, and we can possibly have one."

At the Bigfoot call contest, Frankon, along with dozens of other people, approached the microphone in front of City Hall, one at a time. They shout their best cry of sasquatch in the hope of attracting a Bigfoot out of the forest and joining the main street.

The champions who called Bigfoot were finally announced and the festival lasted all day. There were no comments from Bigfoot, but stories were shared, thousands and thousands were shown for the occasion, and more than one skeptical sasquatch was converted. The tradition continues.