Strange Points Just Take place to Me

We turned down a mysterious road and essentially uncovered… a mystery!

Supply: Manfred Antranias Zimmer / Pixabay

Not long ago a good friend of mine commented, following listening to one particular of my stories, “So many odd points have happened to you that you need to start off producing them down.”

When I think back on some of the strange conditions and encounters I’ve seasoned, I notice that most of them took place in my youth. Most likely some of them happened mainly because of a typical lack of know-how, knowledge, and nicely… typical feeling. In this article are two of them. What do you assume? I will share my analysis at the close.

When I was 18 decades previous, for the duration of the summer season between higher university and college or university, my buddy Billy and I went on a two-week camping trip in the mountains of Ga, North Carolina, and Tennessee. We camped in a various location each and every night time. We revisited previous favorites and found out new spots, some of which had been not official campgrounds.

A Woodland Chapel

A single working day, as we were being driving via the mountains of North Carolina, we observed a very small white clapboard church with its individual minimal steeple nestled in the woods. It was so valuable it would’ve manufactured a excellent photograph postcard. As we stopped to gaze at it, we believed that any church that lovely surely ought to inspire the most uplifting sermons we made the decision appropriate then and there to return on Sunday and attend their early morning service. There were no indications on the church almost nothing to suggest denomination or working several hours, so we assumed from our have churches back again in Atlanta that solutions would begin at 11:00 a.m.

We Thought We Were Early

On Sunday, pondering that we were being arriving early, we showed up at 10:30, but as we entered the building we observed the assistance experienced already begun, so we immediately and quietly slipped into a pew in the vicinity of the back again. The minister, who had been providing his sermon, immediately stopped speaking and stared at us. The two dozen or so people today in the congregation all turned around in their seats and stared at us, much too. No one reported a term, nor did the minister greet us. Right after a several moments, he gestured for anyone to stand, so we rose alongside with absolutely everyone else pondering that potentially it was time for a hymn, but then the minister left his pulpit and commenced strolling down the center aisle toward the front door. As he passed just about every row the pew would empty and the folks followed him as he walked to the doorway, opened it, and walked out.

Rejected by a Household of Worship

We adopted everybody outside but noticed that the congregation clustered tightly with each other in excess of to the still left of the building opposite the place all the autos have been parked. They ended up all staring at us, and again, no one particular claimed a term to us. We felt incredibly awkward so we resolved to go away and commenced strolling again to our automobile. As we did, the congregation, led by their minister, walked back again into the church the doorway shut and we read it audibly lock.

We were dumbfounded we arrived anticipating to satisfy friendly folks but left feeling shunned and baffled. We pondered that potentially they were venomous serpent handlers and our ill-timed arrival coincided just as they had been about to deliver out the rattlesnakes.

A Movie to Parody Our Experience

Later that 7 days, we went to see the film Race with the Satan, a horror motion picture about two partners who have been tenting in a recreational automobile when they accidentally came throughout a Satan-worshiping cult just as they were making a human sacrifice. Spotted by the cultists, they fled and the rest of the movie was a prolonged, terrifying chase scene.

Beware of Dead-Close Streets in the Middle of Nowhere

A few of times later, we have been driving in the mountains outside the house of Chattanooga, Tennessee. It was late in the afternoon and we hadn’t but picked a spot to camp for the evening when we noticed a grime highway that went off into the forest. On a lark, we turned down it and drove about 50 percent a mile by thick woods to the end.

A Likelihood Face with the Devil’s Playground

There we discovered a huge, very well-developed stone staircase with at least 20 actions that rose up a steep hill into the trees. Curious, we climbed to the major. At the summit, a broad, stage industry opened up in advance of us specifically guiding it was the sheer cliff of a carved rock wall that was formed like a curved panoramic motion picture display. At the best of every close of the cliff was a substantial 6-to-eight-foot tall sculpted stone eagle with wide-spread wings, substantially like all those noticed on the reverse of a traditional U.S. quarter.

In the center of the subject was a sunken circle, roughly 12 feet in diameter and 3 ft deep. It was lined by a masonry stone wall with four sets of two-step stairs primary down into the pit. The methods were being spaced at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o’clock. In the centre of the circle were being various large, flat boulders pressed close together on which numerous fires experienced been burnt. It appeared like an Outdated Testomony altar for burning sacrifices. As we gazed upon this mysterious website, the film we’d viewed came flooding again into our minds.

“This area is creepy!”

“Yeah, looks like a little something out of that film we noticed.”

“Satanic cults almost certainly practice their rituals out here.”

“Or the KKK holds their cross burnings.”

“Wanna get out in this article?”

“Sorta, but I dunna know it is now too late to locate a further area, and it’s wonderful and amount for pitching our tent.”

The Irony of Getting a Area as Awful as the Movie

We stayed, pitched our tent close to the prime of the stairs, designed a small fire (not on the altar), and cooked some meal. Later on, we went for a walk down the road we came in on. At the conclusion of the road by the highway, we ran into a pair walking their doggy. We questioned them what they knew about the position. They claimed they didn’t know a great deal, but that occasionally they’d find goat heads nailed to trees alongside the dirt street.

We Acted Like Goofy Teenagers—Which We Ended up

Maybe it’s needless to say, but that creeped us out even additional. We talked once more about leaving, but it was almost dark and we experienced no plan where by to go, so we stayed. Then, in the course of the night time, we teased each individual other by urgently stating factors like, “What was that?” or, “Did you listen to that?” just to enjoy the other bounce, and then chortle at him. But we were being actually fearful and barely slept that evening. As quickly as the dawn broke, we packed up our things and got out of there.

Seeking back on those occasions, I figure out that in my youth I lacked a proper sense of boundaries, including an comprehension of trespassing legal guidelines. Much less peculiar incidences have arrive my way as I have gotten more mature. Today, I would be wary of a church—or any building for that matter—with no signage ahead of I would enter it.

Now, even I am astonished that I was not far more fearful immediately after hearing about goat heads nailed to trees. Which helps make me think my temerity may possibly have been indicative of the prefrontal cortex of my brain—the location which provides us our feeling of mortality—not however becoming completely shaped (and the reason car or truck insurance is a lot more pricey for people less than age 25). You will find an old declaring, “Age and wisdom trump youth and attractiveness” which makes me take pleasure in (inspite of some of my youthful foolhardiness) however becoming alive in my 60s.

What bizarre issues have happened to you?