Darkest Mysteries Online — The Strange and Unusual Podcast 2026
Some Michigan Horror To Keep You Up At Night
07 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello, I'm welcome to stories all the time. Glad you are here. Let's get into it. I was 28 when I ended up hiking the porcupine mountains alone. That wasn't the original plan. My friend Rory was supposed to come with me, but he bailed the night before. He sent me a half-hearted text about work piling up and how, next time for sure. We both knew that meant never.
I already had the permits, the gear was packed, and I'd been looking forward to getting out there for weeks. So I figured screw it.
Chapter 2: What inspired the solo hike in the Porcupine Mountains?
I'll go anyway. It wasn't my first solo trip. I'd done a few in the Smokies, and even a short winter loop-up in the Adyne decks. I like the solitude. There's something grounding about not hearing your own voice for a couple of days. Just walking. Listening to your breath, your boots hitting the ground, the occasional snap of a twig. Everything slows down. It clears your head.
The porcupines were in Everest. Sure, they are remote, and the terrain can get rough in spots, but nothing unmanageable. Michigan's Upper Peninsula's beautiful dense forests seep ridges, waterfalls, and in late September, the fall colors were peaking. Rads and oranges everywhere, like the trees were on fire. The whole place felt untouched.
I rolled into a tiny town coal pine hollow the afternoon before I hit the trail. Just one gas station, a diner, and a dusty gear shop wedged between a closed down barber shop and a post office with one of those old crank windows. I stopped in for a fuel canister and some extra cord. The guy behind the counter looked like fifties. Weathered face.
Bright orange knit cap, even though it was fifty degrees out. We chatted a bit, trail talk, nothing deep. But when I mentioned I'd be heading out in the Eastern Loop, planning to camp near Government Peak that night, he gave me a look. Not scared exactly. More like uncomfortable. Which trail? He asked again, like he hadn't heard me.
Eastern Loop, I repeated, hoping to make it near the bluff before dark. He nodded once, slow, handed me my change, then said almost under his breath, watch for split jaw up there. I laughed, thinking he was joking, at a bear or one of your local legends. He didn't dance here, didn't smile, just stared past me like I wasn't even there. I left without pushing in. People say weird things sometimes.
Everyone's got a ghost story or a backwards superstition. I figured it was just regional flavor. The trailhead was 30 minutes past town. I parked in the empty lot, signed the logbook, and hit the path. Leeds had already started falling, so the trail was a soft carpet of orange and yellow. I didn't see another person all day. Honestly, it was perfect. The silence was deep. Not creepy, not yet.
Just peaceful. Like the forest was giving me space. I made good time and set up camp around Duscona Ridge with a view of the valley. There was a rock outcrop nearby, flat and cleared, with a ring of old stones from some long-dead fire. I skipped building one myself. Too windy up on the ridge, and I wasn't feeling theatrical.
I boiled water for a pouched meal, filtered some stream water, and climbed into my bag before it was even dark. Around midnight, I woke up. Typical middle-of-the-night bladder issue. I unzipped the tent, grabbed my headlamp, and stepped into the dark. The air was colder than I'd expected. My breath puffed out in small clouds. I walked maybe fifteen feet from the tent. That's when I heard it.
A voice. Thought. Almost behind the wind. But clear enough to catch. Hey, come here. I froze. Spun around with the light, scanning the trees. Nothing. Just woods. Silent. Still. Even the insects had gone quiet. No crickets, no rustling leaves. Just a heavy, pressed-in silence, like the forest was bracing for something. I waited a long minute, heart pounding. Then back slowly toward the tent.
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Chapter 3: What unusual encounter happened at the gas station?
One. Like someone crawling on all fours, dragging long fingers through the dirt. I told myself raccoons. Maybe two, maybe they fought. Whatever. I packed fast and hit the trail without eating. That day I pushed harder than planned. Around midday I came across something strange. Flat rocks stacked neatly in little towers, each one facing the woods, at least twenty of them. Non-mandum.
All deliberate. Like a boundary. I stared for a while, snapped a photo, then knocked them over with my boot. I don't know why. Impulse, maybe. Felt like they didn't belong there. Or maybe I didn't. That night, I camped near a bend in the river, used a top instead of the tent.
Fast out lighter, kept the light dim, but the whole evening I couldn't shake the feeling I was being watched, not paranoia, just constant awareness, like something else was out there. Then I saw it, a rock, a rock, perfectly round, jet black, sitting right next to my bag. It hadn't been there when I laid down. I was sure of that. I picked it up.
It was warm, weirdly warm, not from the sun, like it was generating its own heat, like it had a pulse. I didn't think. I just hurled it into the trees. It disappeared into the dark without sound. I sat up the rest of the night, and I felt heart racing, no more sleep, just waiting. Around four in the morning, I heard the voice again. Hey, come here, closer this time. And then my name. Micah.
Hey, Micah. That froze me to the bone. I hadn't told anyone my route. The permit only had my first name. I hadn't spoken to anyone in two days. I didn't answer. Didn't move. Just sat there in the dark, barely breathing, knife gripped tight. Then came a dragging sound. Something heavy, wet, deliberate, moving just beyond the top. It circled me once. Then again. Then silence.
At dawn, I was already walking. Didn't eat. Didn't drink. Didn't drink. Just moved. And that's when things got worse. The trail didn't match anymore. Trees I remembered weren't there. Rocks and streams out of place. Distances stretched. Turns I knew never came. My GPS died. Bad hurry full the night before, just gone. Compass spawn in lazy circles. I started carving slashes in the trees.
Every 20 minutes I'd check. But at one point, they weren't behind me. They were ahead. Same slash. Same tree. I was walking in circles without turning once. That broke me. I stopped, tried to reason it out. Nothing made sense. I wasn't just lost. I was somewhere I didn't belong. I collapsed in a clearing. Didn't bother with the tub. Just sat against a tree laid out as wide.
Then came the clicking. Slow, measured, like knuckles cracking, one by one, right behind the tree. Click. Pause. Click. Closer. I turned slowly, every muscle screaming. Nothing. But I smelled it. Sweet. Thick. Like rot under wet leaves. And then I felt breath. Warm.
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Chapter 4: What eerie events occurred during the night in the woods?
Lit. Right against my face. Then the whisper. Micah come here. A human. Its jaw was split like a beetle's mandibles. It opened sideways and down too far, the teeth tiny, sharp, endless. Then it was gone. I must have blacked out, don't remember running, just waking face down in the dirt, knees bleeding, hands raw, pack torn, branches broken, I'd run hard. But I didn't remember it.
Eventually, I found a fire road and collapsed near an old hunting blind. I stayed there for hours, curled up and shaking, until two hikers came by. They told me I was whispering when they found me. Kept saying it knew my name. At the clinic in Pine Hollow, a ranger came to talk. You got off the trail, he said. I didn't, I told him. He just looked at me a long time.
Then asked, you hear anything talk to you? I nodded. He looked down, said quietly, split jaw doesn't talk to everyone. If it knew your name, that means it was watching you before it spoke. I asked him what I should do. How do I stop it? You don't, he said. You just don't go back. This pack country was as remote as you could get without climbing gear or permits.
My boots were worn in, my pack was light, and the air felt timeless and touch. Like it belonged to another world. I didn't have a schedule. Just a goal to get off the grid for a few days. The plan, if you could even call it that, was to follow the older trails, the ones that barely show up on maps anymore. Not marked, not maintained, but still there if you knew what to look for.
Faint blazes, worn ground, chips in the trees. Most people never bothered. I locked the truck and started walking. Ravel crunched under my boots for the first stretch. Then the ground turned packed out as I hit the old logging road. The air was cold and still. No signal, no hikers. No buzzing alerts or reminders. Just me, the forest, and the miles before sundown. It was exactly what I needed.
The logging road stretched wide and straight, big enough for timber trucks that hadn't passed in years. Pines crowded from both sides, reaching to reclaim the bath. Eventually, the road narrowed. It broke into switchbacks. A climb for an hour then dropped into a basin. The canopy thickened. The ground softened with pine needles and moss.
I heard nothing but a squirre of rustling or a bird taking off unseen. That night, I made camp on a flat rock ledge overlooking the valley. I boiled water, ate a quick meal, and settled in.
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Chapter 5: What strange tracks were found near the campsite?
It was peaceful. No highways. No porch lights. Just quiet. Until I checked my compass. I pulled it out of habit. I hadn't needed it so far, but the second I looked, something was wrong. The needle wouldn't settle. It twitched left, then right, like something unseen was nudging it. I tapped the glass, still twitching, set it down on a rock, same thing. I told myself it was mineral interference.
Iron in the rock, maybe. That happens, right? I tucked it away and tried to sleep. Still, it stuck with me. The next morning, I broke camp and went deeper into the basin. Trail thin, but I wasn't worried. I kept seeing footprints, fresh ones, the fine treadmark leading in the same direction I was heading. I figured someone else had passed through recently, but the prints kept going.
Chapter 6: What unsettling discoveries were made on the trail?
Same stride, same direction. Mile after mile, never veering off, never turning back, just leading. Then I reached a stream, narrow, only a few feet wide. I crouched to refill my bottle. That's when I saw them. The second set of prints, they came from the trees behind me, angled straight toward where I was kneeling, and then they stopped. Right at the water's edge. No return path.
No tracks downstream. Nothing across the bank. It was like someone had walked up behind me, gotten within a few feet, and vanished. I stood quickly, scanned the trees, nothing, just forest. That night, I kept the fire small, just a flicker. I tried to ignore the unease, but sleep didn't come. Sometime after midnight, I snapped awake. No dream. No noise. Just awareness.
The fire had burned to faint coals, and in the dirt around my tent I saw them. Footprints. Dozens. Fresh. Circling the camp. Pausing. Pacing. Watching. I hadn't heard a thing. Nothing was touched. But the prints hadn't been there when I zipped the tin shut. I sat awake until dawn. Never closed my eyes again. At first light, I packed in record time and started back.
I wasn't finishing the hike anymore. I just wanted out, but the trail wouldn't cooperate. Landmarks were out of order. Trees I'd passed in the morning were suddenly behind me. A ridge that should have sloped westly and east. My internal compass, usually reliable, was scrambled. The map was no help, and the real compass. Still spinning.
Chapter 7: How did the group react to the growing sense of unease?
I was past. Walking. Checking. Doubting. Then I stumbled into a clearing. Wide. Circular. Silent. At the center, a ring of stones. Too neat for a campfire.
Chapter 8: What happened when the group encountered a mysterious figure?
Too deliberate. And in the middle, a wooden post. Five feet tall. Off. Act together. Faces carved into it. Stacked on top of each other. My mouth's open, eyes gouged so deep the wood splinter, something in my stomach turned cold. It wasn't just the carving, it was the feeling. Like I wasn't supposed to be there, like I'd cross a line.
I remembered a whisper of a story back in town, a local legend, the Watcher of the Ridge. People laughed about it, said it was just a scare tactic for kids and tourists. But standing there, staring at that post, it didn't feel like folklore. It felt like I'd broken a rule. I turned and left. Fast. I didn't run, but I didn't slow down either.
I kept my eyes forward and refused to look back, even though I could feel it. The hum in the air, like something was paying attention. The woods pressed in. Branches reached across the trail. Roots caught at my boots. I tripped but never stopped. When I finally hit the logging road, I almost laughed. The first familiar thing I'd seen in Io's.
I followed it back to gravel, and there it was, my truck, still waiting. I climbed in, handshaking, took three tries to get the key in. When the engine turned, I didn't hesitate. I drove, didn't check the map, didn't care where. As long as it was out, eventually, the land flattened, pavement returned. I made it to a small town and checked into a roadside motel.
I didn't unpack, just lay on the bed staring at the ceiling, flinching in every sound outside. A car door. A floorboard creak. A dripping faucet. All of it sounded like footsteps. I never went back. I never reported it. What would I even say? A guy I knew back in college, Jonah, used to talk about the trails up there.
So one Friday in early October, I packed the basics tent, sleeping bag, some meals. The leaves were turning by then. I figured, if nothing else, at least I'd get some fall colors. I didn't even tell anyone exactly where I was going. I left a note with a rough outline of the trail route in case something went wrong. Otherwise, I just left.
The first weird moment happened before I even reached the trailhead. There's a little diner outside Ironbale, a squat white building with a peeling sign that just says grub. I stopped there for dinner before heading into the woods, figured I'd want something hot before switching to packets of dehydrated beef stew.
The place was almost empty, just me and two guys in flannel hunched over a chessboard. The woman behind the counter looked like someone's grandmother, short, wiry, and not interested in small talk. She poured me a mug of coffee and asked where I was headed. I told her one of the ridge trails may be overnighting in Berger Hollow if the weather held. As soon as I said Berger, she froze.
She actually paused mid-step, coffee pot halfway back to the burner. Then she turned, faced me directly, and said, very quietly, don't stay out there after dark. I thought maybe she misheard me. Where? Berger, she repeated, saw this time. You don't want to be there at night. She didn't explain. Just set my coffee down harder than necessary. I was sloshing into the saucer and turned away.
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