New Nessie Sighting
Posted by: Craig Woolheater on June 21st, 2011
Cryptomundian samthemonsterman tipped us off to this report, thanks!
Is this the first Nessie sighting of 2011?
Loch Ness Monster sighting reported by locals
FOYERS shop and cafe owner Jan Hargreaves and her husband Simon believe they caught a glimpse of Loch Ness’s most elusive resident — Nessie.
It was while taking a break on the store’s front decking — looking out to the loch — when Mrs Hargreaves and kitchen worker Graham Baine spotted an unusual figure cutting a strange shape through the water.
“We were standing looking out and saw something that looked bizarre,” said Mrs Hargreaves.
“I said to my husband to come and have a look.
“We stand here all the time and look out and we see boats and kayaks but it didn’t look like anything we have seen here before.”
Despite the unidentified creature being quite a distance from their vantage point, 51-year-old Mrs Hargreaves said it had a long neck which was too long to be that of a seal and it was black in appearance.
“It went under the water and disappeared for probably 30 to 40 seconds and then came back up again,” said Mrs Hargreaves.
“It was around for a good four to five minutes. It was just so strange.”
Keen to stress she is not seeking publicity, Mrs Hargreaves does firmly believe what she saw was the Loch Ness Monster.
“It was so exciting,” she declared.
Since August last year, The Waterfall Cafe and Foyers Stores with post office, opposite the village’s famous Falls of Foyers, has been run by Mr and Mrs Hargreaves.
Nessie hunter Steve Feltham, who lives in a former mobile library turned research centre on Dores beach, said he heard about the possible sighting when he popped into the store last week and believes because it was from residents rather than tourists, it is more credible.
“I’m excited by the fact it was locals who had seen it,” said Mr Feltham.
“It’s quite a distance from the shop to the water and they watch everything that goes on there.
“For them to be impressed then there is a possibility it could have been Nessie.”
What particularly excited Mr Feltham was that it was from the exact same vantage point where Tim Binsdale shot the best footage of the legendary creature back in 1960.
“I’ll put the sightings with the other sightings,” said Mr Feltham. “I will also continue to carry out surface observations.”
The sighting was recorded on Wednesday afternoon between 2.30pm and 3pm,Inverness Courier
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.
Sounds like a cormorant.
Interesting report but I tend to disagree with Mr. Feltham that “because it was from residents” it is more credible. Especially when those residents operate a business that can be impacted in a positive way by TOURIST dollars. It is known that tourism had dropped off along with “Nessie sightings”.
The only OTHER reason to go there is to gaze admiringly on Boleskine House where Aleister Crowley used tohave fun doing sex magick and raising the devil (one time they had him about ten feet off the floor and did he look PISSED…wow!).
ANYWAY, I’m not saying they didn’t see Nessie only that I would be more likely to look closer at any claims from business owners in the area…that’s all.
Hrmmm… I think it is safe to say that Nessie is just misidentifications. As any biologist will tell you, for a population to sustain itself, there needs to be a certain number of the species for non-relation breeding. As heavily traveled the loch is between residents and tourists, more would have seen a creature such as this. As it is believed to be a very large lizard/dinosaur, then one would also think that there would be the rare occasion of human attacks/predation….just like with alligators and crocodiles, etc.
Hasn’t it been a while since they have had a Nessie sighting? They had a Monster Quest show called “Death of Nessie” which talked about a lack of sightings and the possible death of Nessie (assuming it is a lone animal).
Its funny how they have sonar pinged the Loch on several occasions: sometimes they find nothing, other times they find large biological “Unknowns” there. Perhaps, if there is a Nessie or Nessies, Nessie/Nessies don’t live in the Loch er say, but in the ocean or in an underwater cavern connected to the Loch?
Would be very nice if something concrete and Biological, a specimen, dead or alive, were found.
““It’s quite a distance from the shop to the water and they watch everything that goes on there.”
“We stand here all the time and look out and we see…”
“…it was from the exact same vantage point where Tim Binsdale shot the best footage of the legendary creature back in 1960.”
“It was around for a good four to five minutes. It was just so strange.”
GRRR-R-R-R… These folks live and work at a vantage point overlooking the possible habitation of one of the world’s last zoological mysteries, but they apparently never thought of having a tripod-mounted, zoom-lensed digital camera and/or camcorder handy to capture historic events like this???
Had they never considered making digital prints and DVDs of the photos and videos to autograph and SELL when tourists “pop in” ??? Had they never fantasized having their (properly spelt) names going on into the historical record?
It’s no wonder Nessie is still a cryptid!
Sounds interesting. People familiar with the loch and local wildlife, same area as previous sightings, no attention seeking (although, granted, their livelihood depends on tourists), no crazy claims of the creature doing something odd or out of character from previous sightings.
Wonder what the weather was like since the sighting was in the middle of the afternoon. Was the loch calm or choppy? Was there a lot of reflection on the water? And it was a long sighting, very long. Most are only seconds in duration, however that does beg one question. Didn’t anyone have a cell or camera to take even a snapshot or video with?
Sounds like a bird of some sort. I’ve always loved Nessie though. I do hope some day they could find out it’s real! LOL until then…. Gotta be a bird.
Artist said:
“GRRR-R-R-R… These folks live and work at a vantage point overlooking the possible habitation of one of the world’s last zoological mysteries, but they apparently never thought of having a tripod-mounted, zoom-lensed digital camera and/or camcorder handy to capture historic events like this???”
I was thinking the same thing, but use a web cam instead. If I owned a place with a good view I’d have a web cam aimed on it and let it run 24/7. Might even get fancy and add a low light or IR one too. Then port the feed to a website so everyone can see.
Really, how hard is it?
Ragnar, I think if you had a webcam then after a few months you’d run an advert in the local newspaper:
“To those who know I have a webcam, and have used the opportunity to pass by its lense in myriad forms of costume, mask, boat wake, rubber-suited frogmen and tyre-pulling divers, Please Desist. My webcam is now turned off.”
Good to hear. Haven’t heard much for Loch Ness as of late, leading some to speculate that the monster(s) were all dead and/or gone, or if the whole thing wasn’t real to begin with.
Artist, I think you answered your own question. When you live and work somewhere you tend to be more concerned with the day-to-day problems of life rather than Nessie hunting 24/7. And tripod mounted digital cameras with decent zoom lenses don’t come for free.
Personally, I think the sighting sounds more plausible coming from someone who hasn’t been gazing breathlessly at the loch, constantly expecting to see Nessie.
I’m also more inclined to accept a story from someone who has experience of watching the loch, local wildlife etc, than a trigger-happy tourist, and it’s a fairly typical Nessie sighting which also lends credibility.
Unfortunately in the absence of further evidence, there’s not much more than can be said about it than “potentially interesting”, though.
I was thinking the same thing, but use a web cam instead. If I owned a place with a good view I’d have a web cam aimed on it and let it run 24/7 … then port the feed to a website so everyone can see.
This one has been running for years and is only 20 feet from the water. The cafe / shop people were at least a mile from their Nessie – check it out on StreetView.
I am quite familiar with the area of this sighting, but don’t think in anyway that what is described could be a bird. The post office/cafe is about 1/2 mile from water’s edge and at an elevation. Whatever they saw must have been much bigger than a bird even at that distance. Also much of the village of Foyers doesn’t have a good view of the loch because of surrounding trees. In fact, long stretches of the road around Loch Ness don’t offer clear views. I know from driving around the loch, that the roads are so narrow in places, you cannot take your eye of the road for a second if you want to avoid a head on crash or end up in loch itself!
I am in that area on holiday in a few weeks and will perhaps pay a visit to the cafe if I have time and take a few pictures of the view from that spot.
fmurphy1970,
Just log on to Google Street View and you can see the cafe, decking and the view of the loch in the distance. And the cafe owner waving to the Google car…
I think it could be real. Don’t forget, just because they don’t report it doesn’t mean that they don’t see it. What they need is some well-publicized way to report ‘weird things,’ even if it’s just a speck that ‘moves funny.’ I’m sure that there have been plenty of far-off sightings that people won’t take the trouble to find out where they report it because they aren’t sure.
“I am in that area on holiday in a few weeks and will perhaps pay a visit to the cafe if I have time and take a few pictures of the view from that spot.”
And, that could be the very reason for the sighting. See where the cafe is, maybe grab some tea and a pastry. I’d feel better if the report didn’t come from folks with a monetary interest in sightings. Maybe I’m just too cynical.
Why is Drudge Report scooping Cryptomundo on a 55 foot Chinese Sea Creature?
Excuse me Cryptoraptor?
I believe that Cryptomundo scooped the Drudge Report by 50 days on this story and photo as we posted it on May 2, 2011.
See the original post here on Cryptomundo: New Chinese Globster?
“Excuse me Cryptoraptor?”
Take it easy there Mr. Sensitive
I’m an Internet passerby, but I’d like to throw in my two cents.
I do believe that there are something to cryptids, but I also believe that the majority of the reports are nothing. I don’t think they’re usually hoaxes, but oftentimes, you can make a mistake.
As for the Loch Ness Monster, I turned a disbeliever some time back after observing footage of wake trails. For a long time, I always thought that the wake trail explanation was ridiculous – a wake trail looks nothing like a long sea serpent and seems to dissipate very quickly. But a friend showed me footage from, of all places, Loch Ness itself. What happens is that the wake from the boat creates two ripples, looking like waves, that head away from one another. If, for whatever reason, the two ripples are reflected off hard surfaces at the edge of the water, they may meet each other with considerable strength in the middle. Think like a ripple spreading outwards from the middle of your bathtub, bouncing off the walls and meeting together again, pushing the water upwards.
The effect? Looks kind of like a sine curve, undulating up and down.
My friend’s footage was shot facing towards the sun. So as the water goes up, it creates a shadow, whereas the rest of the flat lake was sparkling blue. And I have to say, it looked extremely similar to a thick dark-colored band undulating through the water, like some sort of curving snake.
The wake must have been created by a very heavy or very fast moving boat. And this effect was created quite a bit after the boat had passed.
If I had seen this personally, I wouldn’t quite know what it was. I’m not sure I would’ve automatically thought it was a giant serpent, but I certainly wouldn’t have thought it was just the wake of a boat. I would’ve seen a thick black streak skipping through the water, about 20 yards long, and would’ve at least been extremely confused.
My friend pointed out that many of these stories about serpentine lake monsters originate from long, narrow lakes with deep, relatively still waters, often with high rock walls or cliffs along the sides. Such stories are common in northern Europe, such as Scandinavia, where the fjords fit that description quite nicely. And once the story becomes embedded in local myth, then people start becoming willing to believe. It can be hard to judge size and distance on the water, and a strange bird or large fish can be confused with something else. And in some cases, there are legitimate “monsters” – large fish like sturgeon or pike that can grow to a surprising size and can look even bigger from a distance.
So, my two cents. Long, I know, I apologize. But while I still think there’s cryptids out there, I admit I’m disinclined to believe Nessie stories.
I think this is too far away to be mistaken for a bird. Of course at a mile away, anything blob like can be mistaken but I have more confidence about a long neck sighting as they have less misidentification candidates.
Is it possible that anyone else saw it? After all, if it was visible a mile away from the shore, surely someone closer to the water would have seen it. Plenty of kids have summer vacation now, wouldn’t there be lots of people around?
You’re excused. Cryptoraptor stands corrected. Is there an update?
SCARYEYES – “And tripod mounted digital cameras with decent zoom lenses don’t come for free.”
Of course – nothing is cheap, but how about this beauty:
Kodak EasyShare Z981 14MP Digital Camera with Schneider-Kreuznach Variogon 26x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom Lens and 3.0 Inch LCD…
Only 252 bucks, NEW IN THE BOX, as they say! 14 Megapixels! 26 Power Zoom! 3 Inch LCD, plus Digital Viewfinder! All the bells and whistles!
That’s what I shoot with… and my very stable Tripod cost me under 90 bucks more. I recommend any Cryptomundian pick up one of these $350 setups, put it together, get familiar with its operation, and then collect the extended tripod legs into a monopod and stand it in a corner near the door, ready and waiting for the next opportunity to CAPTURE A CRYPTID!!
I mean, this is NOT rocket surgery!
The name is Tim Dinsdale not ‘Binsdale’.
And yes the reported sighting is in the exact same spot Tim filmed a six foot object swimming across the Loch in April 1960. How do we know it was so large? Tim had the film examined by JARIC (look it up!) who calculated the distance, size, and speed. It’s amazing stuff. Have a look at the interview Tim did in 1980 for Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World program.
Enjoy.
But what could a local resident, foyers shop and café owner possibly have as an ulterior motive in inventing such a story? It’s a mystery, wrapped in an enigma. As local loon says, if the gombeens in the nearby businesses say they saw Nessie in a downturn for the Scottish Tourist Board, then it simply has to be true.
I appreciate that you can see this location on google. However, google is no substitute for being there, taking photos and speaking to locals. It’s one thing being an armchair cryptozoologist and another thing getting out into the field.
@Gusat40 – I think you will find the Dinsdale Film was shot approx 1/2 mile from the shop, and that the JARIC report suggests the object could have been about 14 ft long, 5 1/2 feet wide and 3 feet high – the same size as a typical angler’s boat with an angler sitting in it.
@fmurphy1970 – you wrote “It’s one thing being an armchair cryptozoologist…”
I have spoken at length with two people who have separately interviewed the witnesses, and a third who lives in Foyers and shops there, but I don’t claim to be a cryptozoologist of any ilk – armchair, couch, field or garden. I hope you enjoy your visit.