En route between Fort Humboldt and the Weaverville Joss House, I stopped in Willow Creek, the self-proclaimed capital of Bigfoot Country, and apparently home to the largest Bigfoot Museum in the world, to trump even the Bigfoot Museum in Felton! I had a little spare time, so I decided to put it to good use! Bigfoot is my hero, after all. George would approve!
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The Willow Creek – China Flat Museum is pretty easy to spot from Highway 299. After all, the museum’s Bigfoot statue is over 20 feet tall and abuzz with carpenter bees! It sits in a town that was once a distribution center for mule trains, like Shasta, and hit its heyday with the lumber boom following World War II. This boom lasted until the late 70s when the industry began to peter out, but Willow Creek was quick to adapt! Its great central location now serves as a jumping off point for rafting, camping, fishing, and Bigfoot hunting!
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The Big Fellow has a long history in this area. The Hoopa people who still live here call him Oh Mah, which means “Boss of the Woods” and treat him as a formidable nuisance who raids their apple orchards. The European newcomers to the country didn’t learn about Oh Mah until 1818, when a respectable fellow in New York, of all places, reported an encounter with a tall, hairy Wild Man of the Woods! This was ten years before explorer Jedediah Smith stumbled into Hoopa territory and forty before both the founding of Willow Creek and the first reported West Coast Bigfoot sighting!
Inevitably, with the Gold Rush and the allure of California that ensued, more and more folks flocked to the state, which led, understandably, to more sightings! However, it wasn’t until 1958, following the discovery of tracks near two road construction sites that Andrew Genzoli of the Humboldt Times coined the new, cosmopolitan name of Bigfoot.
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Fast forward another nine years. Two fellows named Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin rode their horses up a creek called Bluff (without a paddle!), which had been completely cleared and rerouted by a catastrophic flood three years prior. When they returned to civilization, they brought back 30 feet of 16mm color film, which would become the second most analyzed film in world history! It depicts a hairy biped, who came to be known as Patty, startled from her place on the riverbank, hustling off into the trees. You’ve seen it; I promise!
The lady at the gift shop counter—the gift shop being, in many ways, larger than the museum itself—told me that Bluff Creek was less than an hour’s drive north of Willow Creek! All this time, I’d thought it was up against the Oregon border! I checked the clock. There was just enough time if I hurried! This was too good of an opportunity to pass up: the chance to visit the site that launched the Bigfoot cultural phenomenon! (Technically, there were movies about hairy bipeds before this, but they were all about yetis!)
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So, I traveled about 30 miles up the winding Bigfoot Scenic Byway, through the town of Hoopa to the confluence of Bluff Creek with the Klamath River. Unlike the Bigfoot Museum, there is no huge Bigfoot statue to draw attention, nor does this area show up in a GPS search. There is just one little sign to mark this spot, and an easy-to-miss trail leading down to the rocks on the river. However, the view from here is spectacular!
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I clambered down the trail, hoping for a chance to meet my hero face-to-face. This area sure looks suitable for a Sasquatch. There are so many densely wooded mountains here for hiding and sandbars for sunbathing! There’s a sense of immensity up here that makes me guffaw at the folks who say “How could something so big stay hidden for so long?” Easy! Compared to the rest of this area, they’re puny! Also, Bigfeet tend to be nocturnal. I was out of luck for that, and for a swim, because the blue current, though beautiful, was whipping far too fast for me!
You may wonder why I find Bigfoot so inspiring. Well, for one, he’s never let fame go to his head. You don’t see Bigfoot showing up to the Academy Awards in a Bugati and $3,000, custom-tailored Armani suit, do you? Of course not! For Bigfoot, it’s au natural or nothing at all! (Wait a second…) He’s stayed true to his wildness, and even though his likeness appears in dozens of pop culture references, he’s still one of those mysteries that humans, with all their worldly knowledge, just can’t pin down. I admire that. Walk on, Bigfoot! Walk on!
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It would have been a delight to camp here, or to hike up the creek to the actual site of the filming, but alas, my time for this detour has reached its max! I still have to get to the Weaverville Joss House before it closes! I hope I’ll be able to pass this way again. I hear the Bigfoot Field Research Organization sponsors four-day trips into Bigfoot Country every year. Someday, I may have to check one out!
Stay wild!
