British Columbia is Canada's westernmost region and the only one that faces the Pacific Ocean. Of its over 944 thousand square kilometers, over 600 thousand are occupied by forests, and most of them are old forests, which still remember the times when there were no Europeans here.
British Columbia has 16 mountain ranges, including the Canadian Rockies, seven national parks, and two of North America's deepest lakes, Quesnel (506 meters) and Adams (457 meters). All this makes British Columbia a very attractive tourist destination, but British Columbia is also an ideal home for a variety of monsters.
Ogopogo
The most famous Canadian lake monster lives in Lake Okanagan (135 km long, 5 km wide), which is next to Kelowna, the third largest city in British Columbia. The deepest of this lake is 232 meters and there is plenty of place where a medium-sized monster can safely hide.
Sculpture of Ogopogo in Kelowna Park.
Native American legends described Ogopogo as a 15-meter snake, which by description most resembled an ancient extinct whale from the genus Basilosaurus. Basilosaurs could be over 20 meters long.
Basilosaurus.
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Despite the fact that legends about Ogopogo have been circulating among the local population for hundreds of years, the very name of the monster was given by Western settlers. Among the Indians, this creature was called N'ha-a-tik, which roughly translates as "sacred water."
Official records of sightings of the monster in Lake Okanagan have been going on since 1872. And nowhere did the monster attack a person. In the 1880s, witnesses saw something dragging an entire group of horses under the water.
And in 1926, the authorities were so worried about the existence of this monster that there was debate that it could interfere with the movement of ferries on the lake and that it was necessary to arm the ferrymen to shoot at it.
Ogopogo's more recent observations include an incident in 1986 when fisherman Lionel Edmond saw this monster and described it colorfully in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, especially about its sheer size.
“I turned around and saw a strange dark thing floating underwater. It looked like a submarine and was heading towards my boat … I saw six humps sticking out of the water to a height of about 10 inches (25 cm) and each of them left a mark on the water … There was no head or tail, but in it was at least 50-60 feet (15-18 meters) long."
Since 2005, photographs of Ogopogo, taken with a mobile phone camera, began to arrive, but most often they were cloudy and indistinct. For example, this picture is dated 2010. On it you can see only strange ripples on the water.
Cadborosaurus
The Indians of British Columbia also talked about this sea serpent with a horse's head in their legends and its image can even be found in the petroglyphs carved by them on the rocks.
In 1791, the crew of the ship Columbia observed a mysterious sea serpent off the coast of British Columbia. A similar animal over 7 meters long was observed in 1897 near the Queen Charlotte Islands. Moreover, only one neck was 3 meters long. There are also reports of a strange sea monster sighting in the early 1900s.
But the most popular story about the Cadborosaurus, or, as the locals call it, simply "Cuddy", took place in 1937 in Neiden Harbor. From the stomach of a sperm whale, they removed the remains of an unidentified animal, which had a long serpentine body, and its head looked like the head of a horse or camel. With these remains was lucky, a photo of this creature was taken.
Sketches of what this creature might have looked like initially.
Further, the sailors continued to meet with unusual creatures in the area. In 1947, the remains of a 14-meter long carcass were seen on the coast of Vancouver Island and it was difficult to identify which animal they belonged to. And in 1962, a strange carcass with a "head like an elephant" was allegedly found in the Vkluelet region.
In 1967, a fisherman claimed that he caught a 40 cm long Cuddy cub. The creature had scales. two flippers and a long flat tail. The fisherman put it in a bucket to show it to scientists, but then for some unknown reason decided to release the creature back into the ocean.
Devil Monkey
The devil monkey was called an unusual primate that looks a little like a baboon, but walks on two legs, has powerful hind legs like a kangaroo, a fluffy tail and only three toes on each paw. The devil monkey attacked livestock, and also showed aggression towards humans.
Despite the fact that the story about her came from the Appalachian mountains from the United States, she was most often observed in British Columbia. One of the most famous cases was in 1969, when a bipedal ape-like animal was observed by eyewitness Gordon Ferrier.
He saw a strange monkey standing on two legs, whose height barely reached a meter, in the area of the Mamquam River. The creature looked tense and on each paw it had only three fingers.
Sasquatch
Sasquatch is the local analogue of the Yeti or Bigfoot, and in British Columbia it is a real expanse of dense forests and sparsely populated areas. A lot of bigfoot / sasquatch encounters take place in British Columbia.
The most famous story without a doubt is the kidnapping by the Sasquatch family of gold digger Albert Ostman in 1924. He was sleeping in his camp when one night something huge grabbed him right in his sleeping bag, threw him over his shoulder and carried him away.
After three hours of continuous journey, the man was finally lowered to the ground and he saw in amazement that he was on some kind of plateau, and four hairy creatures were standing around him. There were three adults over 2.5 meters tall and one calf.
For six days, Ostman was held captive by the family of these Sasquatch. He was not harmed in any way and believed that he was brought as a toy or "companion" for a female cub.
On the sixth day, Ostman got tired of sitting here. He showed one of the creatures a packet of tobacco and it sniffed it with curiosity. While Sasquatch sneezed and coughed, Ostman managed to escape.
Lake Tethys Monster
Lake Tethys is Canada's first national reserve. There are many dense forests and it is a very popular destination for fishing, boating and hiking. But in 1972, this place also became famous as the home of a creepy monster.
It all started with a message from two teenagers, they ran to the local department of the Canadian Mounted Police and said that they were attacked by a 1.5-meter lizard man who had membranes on his arms and legs and many thorns on his skin.
According to the description of its appearance, the creature very much resembled a monster from the black and white Hollywood horror movie “ Creature from the Black Lagoon ” (1954).
The monster cut the hand of one of the boys, but then ran away. Four days after this report, two men saw a scaly, silvery-colored humanoid in the water of Lake Tethys. The creature was floating somewhere.
This creature had many other sightings and descriptions, but overall, everything was very close to the description of the Lizard Man from South Carolina, as well as other lizard-like monsters from other states. It is also possible that this monster is completely fake, since one of the first witnesses later recanted his words.