A Ghostly Encounter in the Cascades by Wade Spenader of spenader@206.213.167.130. When I was in college, I liked to visit Lassen National Park in Northern California. I still often visit the park, and I am always reminded of an incident that occurred a few years ago. A buddy of mine and I spent a weekend hiking and camping around the park. We decided to spend some time at the Cinder Cone volcanoe at Butte Lake. To get to this enchanted place, we had to drive out of the park, onto a highway, get behind the park, and then take a dirt road in. A real secluded spot. We spent the day hiking up the cinder cone volcanoe and swimming in the lake. We had a very relaxing and fulfilling day after a long semester of studying. The day ended with dinner in front of the campfire. Since we didn't have a tent, we thought we would try sleeping in the car (bears were around). As imagined, sleeping in a little car is not comfortable. Around 2 AM I woke up, fed up with the conditions, and determined to sleep outside by the fire (bears or not!). I lifted up my head to check if the fire was still going. I could tell that it was and that the smoke from the fire was flowing up and off to my left (I should mention that the car was parked about 15 yards from the fire). What I found odd was the smoke next to the fire, to the right, that was not dissipating. It was standing still. I slipped on my glasses to get a better focus. What I thought was smoke, was not smoke. It appeared to be a hologramic figure. It was very tall, as there was a lawn chair in front of it to judge it by. I would say it was in the 7 foot range. This figure did not move, it just stood in front of the fire- it seemed to be comforted by the fire. Now I consider myself a rational person. I have had an interest in ghosts all my life, but before I concluded what this thing was, I went through a "mental checklist" of the possibilites. Was it a bear? No, I told myself, it's kind of white in color. Was it a ranger writing us a citation for leaving our fire going? No, because I can see through it. Was it a reflection off the fire, of the moon, or something? No. What made it more interesting, was that the site of our camp was fairly wide open; there were not a bunch of trees or shrubs to obstruct my view. Just when I was about to tell myself it might be a ghost, my friend in the front seat woke up. He told me later that he wasn't sure why he woke up. But, as soon as he did, he looked at me in the back seat and asked what I was doing. "Jeff," I muttered, "do you see that thing out there?" Jeff looked and immediately began to freak out. "Oh my God, what is that?" As soon as he said that, I knew I wasn't crazy. We watched this figure for a good ten minutes. At times it seemed to turn towards our car and look at us. Mostly, it seemed to look at the fire. The figure was very broad shouldered, and at times, it looked as if it were wearing a wide brimmed hat. The detail was never really in focus, and as I have mentioned, it was hologramic, so it seemed to fade in and out. Eventually, I said to my friend that if we went back to sleep and left it alone, it probably wouldn't be there in the morning. We layed back down, but we weren't going to sleep. I suggested that, since we were going to leave early in the morning anyways, that we depart now and let spirit have the fire. We did not bother to retrieve the lawn chair. We started the car and went out on the dirt road a lot faster than when we came in. We said nothing to each other until we got on a major highway. Then, we began to brainstorm. We concluded that if it wasn't a ghost, we didn't know what it was. What ever it was, it made us leave a remote camp site at 2 in the morning. Of course, our friends laughed at us. Some of them beleived us. A few of them said they would have left the car to check it out. But, Jeff and I disagreed. There was a definite feeling that this thing just wanted to be left alone. Some intersting notes: It's possible that the figure was some sort of Native American spirt. The area that we were in was very spiritual and surely sacred to the local tribes. Another possiblity is that it was a fellow from the 1840's on his way to Oregon who never made it. Our campsite was less than a hundred yards from the old migrant trail that went to Oregon. When I called Lassen National Park to report this, they did not sound, at all, like I was being silly. They took the report. I'm wondering if anyone else has seen anything weird at Lassen? I've also been to Gettysburg a few times and have seen some weird stuff.