lake monster – Museum of the Weird

Posted on October 30, 2013 by MOTW Admin

PLESIOSAUR PHOTOGRAPHED OFF AUSTRALIAN COAST?

David “Crusty” Herron snapped this photo of what he dubbed "Lost Nessie" from a distance of about 600 feet from shore. — David “Crusty” Herron snapped this photo of what he dubbed “Lost Nessie” from a distance of about 600 feet from shore.

Last Friday, the scene from Magnetic Island off the northern coast of Australia must have looked like something straight out of The Lost World. Beachgoers were treated to the sight of what appeared to be a long-necked sea going creature straight out of our prehistoric past.

The strange looking object moving in the water was extraordinary enough to get the attention of numerous eyewitnesses, many wondering just what it could be.

Plesiosaur? Sea serpent? Or could it be something more mundane and explainable, like a piece of driftwood or a sunken boat? You decide.

From The Australian:

The strange sea sighting has created quite a buzz on the island, with locals desperate to know: just what is lurking in the water?

One of them is marriage celebrant David “Crusty” Herron, who photographed it from a beach about 200 metres away.

“It was bobbing up and down in the water and at first I thought, what’s that?” Mr Herron told AAP.

“Someone yelled out ‘it looks like a Loch Ness monster’.

“I’ve never seen anything like it – it could be anything. We are all wanting to know what it is.”

James Cook University biology professor Glen Chilton says while new and old creatures are constantly being discovered, even near the Great Barrier Reef, it’s unlikely to be a strange aquatic beast.

“It’s probably a piece of a tree or piece of a boat which has somehow broken away,” he told AAP.

Australian cryptozoologist and self-proclaimed “yowie man” Rex Gilroy is keeping an open mind. “It’s hard to say from the photo,” he said.

Mr Gilroy, who has authored books on mythical creatures, says he’s aware of about 800 sightings of reptilian creatures with long necks and football shaped heads.

Some of those were from the Magnetic Island and Townsville area, he said.

The most recent was in October last year when a fisherman saw a creature with a large grey coloured body protruding from waters off Magnetic Island, he said.

When asked if it could have been the remains of a dragon boat that supposedly sunk there in the recent past, the man who photographed the creature, David Herron, refuted it and compared the beast to a plesiosaur. Here’s “Crusty” being interviewed by News 7:

SOURCE: http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/19578903/has-loch-ness-monster-migrated-to-nth-qld/

Posted on January 25, 2013 by MOTW Admin

SATURDAY, 1/26/13: CRYPTOMUNDO NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM!

This event is going on this weekend at the Museum of the Weird in downtown Austin. We’re going to have several famous cryptozoologists and authors as well as maybe a surprise appearance by Bigfoot himself! It’s going to be an awesome event!

UPDATE: all advance tickets are sold out, but we’ll still be selling regular admission to the Museum. Even though our advance tickets to the lectures and the movie screening are already sold out, we will still have the museum open for general admission, and you’ll still be able to meet the guests and get some signed books and swag, as well as attend dinner and drinks with the group afterwards at the Chupacabra Cantina and The Jackalope Bar next door. Hope to see you here!

Saturday, January 26th, 2013

3:00pm to 10:00pm

Museum of the Weird, in conjunction with the world’s foremost website on all things cryptid, Cryptomundo.com, will be hosting a very special event on January 26th at the Museum of the Weird in Austin, TX:

Cryptomundo Night at the Museum!

Featuring an all-star line up of world famous cryptozoologists, experts and authors, it’s sure to be a night of entertainment, intrigue and mystery as we explore the unknown creatures that lurk in the darker corners of the world we live in! Please come out and join us for the festivities!

Speaker presentations and author book signings include:

Lyle Blackburn, frontman for rock band Ghoultown, writer for Rue Morgue magazine and author of “The Beast of Boggy Creek”

Nick Redfern, author of “Wildman! The Monstrous and Mysterious Saga of the British Bigfoot”, “Monster Diary: On the Road in Search of Strange and Sinister Creatures”, “The World’s Weirdest Places,” “Memoirs of a Monster Hunter,” and “Monsters of Texas.”

Ken Gerhard, author of “Big Bird! Modern Sightings of Flying Monsters” and “Monsters of Texas.”

Dave Coleman, author of “The Bigfoot Filmography”

The event starts at 3:00pm and goes until 6:00pm, then a break for dinner and to explore 6th Street and downtown Austin.

It resumes again at 8:00pm with a special screening in the Museum’s Weird Theater of the ’70s drive-in classic “Creature from Black Lake.”

Posted on January 3, 2013 by MOTW Admin

THE MAYAN APOCALYPSE DIDN’T HAPPEN, SO IS THIS THE NEW AGE? IT CAN BE.

Many people believed the end of the world would come on December 21, 2012, the date that marked the end of the Mayan calendar. That date has come and gone, and I can’t help but wonder what all the die-hard Mayan Apocalypse believers are thinking now.

There were two general ways of thinking about how this end would come: it would either be a horrific doomsday scenario that would be the end of all life as we know it, or it would mark the beginning of a new age of human enlightenment and responsibility.

One idea dwelt on the negative, the other positive.

So since the world didn’t end, where does that leave us now?

Since several days have passed and still no apocalypse in sight, I’d like to make a proposition to you, the person reading this, and to myself as well. I propose that you and I abandon all ideologies that promote fear, anger, hatred, and ridicule. Instead, let’s make a daily, conscious decision to live both our lives as positive and loving as we can be.

And how can we do this? There are two things that we must remember and embrace with the core of our being.

My high school track coach, Mr. Tintle, instilled in me one of the basic tenets of my being that I hold to this day. That is, one must have PMA, short for Positive Mental Attitude. With a positive mental attitude, you can achieve the impossible.

My other basic tenet is I live by the Golden Rule. I try not to do anything to anyone that I wouldn’t want done to myself. It’s that simple.

Keeping a Positive Mental Attitude and following the Golden Rule.

Adopt it. Embrace it. Teach it to your kids.

And with these two tenets in mind, I’d like to make a call to action to you and myself as well. Let’s do something in the world today, right now, that will make a positive difference. I’m writing an open letter to the world, now it’s your turn. What will you do?

Want to fight global warming and climate change? Plant a tree in your backyard. Can’t stand the partisanship that has taken over politics? Turn off the news and volunteer in your township. Upset about kids shooting other kids? Become a Big Brother or Big Sister to a troubled child… or simply a high school track coach.

The point I’m trying to make is, no matter how big the problems of our world seem to be… no matter what the difficulties we face… even the smallest, most seemingly insignificant action we take can make all the difference in the world.

*********************************************************************************

To the Mayans a Baktun was a measurement of time lasting approximately 400 years. December 21, 2012 marked the end of the 13th Baktun on the Mayan calendar, and the beginning of a new one. Descendants of the Mayans never believed the world was going to end on that date; instead, they look at the 14th Baktun as a period of hope and change.

So as we begin another year and another Baktun, I’d like to propose not just a new year’s resolution, but a “New Baktun Resolution” we all can adopt (after all, the next one won’t be for another 400 years). Let’s take this opportunity to leave all the hatred, negativity and baggage the human race has been carrying around with us for all the millennia we’ve walked this great earth and leave it in the past. Let’s take control of our destiny and stop living in fear. Let us start the new Bakun as a loving, more mature, and enlightened human race.

Not the end of the world, but the beginning of a new one.

Posted on October 17, 2012 by MOTW Admin

CRYPTOPALOOZA! A WEEKEND OF MUSIC, MOVIES AND OF COURSE, CRYPTIDS!

Cryptopalooza is going to be a fantastic weekend of music, movies, cryptids and most important of all, FUN!

Hey folks, just wanted to let everyone know that we’ll be a part of a fantastic cryptozoology event called CRYPTOPALOOZA, held deep in the heart of the Piney woods of East Texas in the comfy-cozy town of Jefferson. They’ll be movie screenings from across the crypto-sphere, Q & A’s with directors, presentations, music performances by major cryptozoologists, and we, the Museum of the Weird, will even be participating with a traveling version of our collection of oddities for all who attend to be entertained and astounded! Meet the owner of the Museum himself, Steve Busti, with a possible surprise appearance by the most famous cryptid of them all! Who, or better yet, WHAT could it be? Well, you’ll just have to come on down and check it out for yourself on the 19th, 20th and 21st of October in Jefferson, Texas just off of Highway 59 near Marshall.

Click here to check out the website at cryptopalooza.com for more information and tickets to this once in a lifetime event!

Mister Cryptomundo himself, Craig Woolheater, says:

Cryptopalooza has been a long time in the making, but it’s finally a reality. Over the years friends Michael Esordi, founder of Believe It Tour, and Craig Woolheater, founder of Cryptomundo, have tossed around ideas about the conference experience and how to make it even better for people. Out of those discussions the idea began to form of starting something new and unique. Michael hit on the name Cryptopalooza and things started to pick up steam when the city of Jefferson, Texas contacted Craig about doing an event in their city.

With the growing number of Bigfoot and cryptozoolgy conferences spreading across the country, it’s obvious there’s an interest in these topics and a need for events to bring people together.

You won’t want to miss this event.

Join us October 19-20, 2012, for a weekend of music, movies, speakers, cryptids, and fun!

It’s sure to be an amazing weekend of good fun, good food, and good friends!

Click here to check out the website at cryptopalooza.com for more information and tickets to this once in a lifetime event!

Posted on October 16, 2012 by MOTW Admin

LOOKS LIKE SOMETHING HAS LOST AN EYE. A REALLY, REALLY BIG EYE..

Something, somewhere is having a little trouble seeing clearly right now and, whatever it is, it’s big. What could this huge eyeball possibly belong to? What unknown sea monsters of the deep have eyes this big? Could it be an ancient dinosaur that survived the ice age in the dark recesses of the worlds’ oceans? Read more and leave a comment with your own theories!

The Huffington Post writes:

South Florida beaches are usually places where people find sea shells, tiny crawling creatures and a shark tooth here and there, but a man walking on Pompano Beach Wednesday came across something out of the ordinary.

A giant eyeball.

Large enough to fit into his cupped hands, the beach stroller made a few calls and eventually got in touch with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, who had an interest in his discovery, Carli Segelson, spokeswoman for the FWC told HuffPost Miami.

“This is definitely an unusual situation, where an eye would be found independent of any other body part,” she said.

Later in the day, an FWC employee came to pick up the blue-and-purple-colored eyeball and put it on ice. It will be shipped to the FWC’s Fish and Wildlife Research Center in St. Petersburg, where staffers hope to make an identification.

“It will probably take a little while to identify the eye,” Segelson said.

Read more and check out other photos at huffingtonpost.com

Posted on October 9, 2012 by MOTW Admin

BIGFOOT TRACK FOUND IN EAST TEXAS

Are these two prints evidence of a Bigfoot with an offspring?

Our good friends over at Cryptomundo have pointed us in the direction of a recent photo of some supposed Bigfoot prints found on the banks of a knee-high and chilly creek.

The Faceboook user Brad Crawford posted this on the Hardcore Outdoors Fan Page:

If I hadn’t seen this myself I’d NEVER have believed it! We parked the boat on the west bank of an old slough this past Friday evening about a mile from our very secluded camp, hunted, killed the hog I posted a pic of that same night, drug

the hog out & went back to camp. That night the temperature went from 79 degrees to about 45 degrees with 40pmh gusting winds all night long, there was a man with his wife & young grandson that were camped next to us but they were fishing & I know for a FACT they never left camp that night because I was sleeping close to our boats. Saturday morning we fought the wind & waves up the cove & into the same slough from the night before, parked the boat in the same spot & there were these tracks. Whoever or whatever left these tracks waded across the slough in about knee deep water in the middle of the night in 45 degree weather in their bare feet, the tracks were very visible across the shallow water all the way up onto the bank till it hit gravel & they were gone. They were NOT 15 to 18 inches long like I’ve always heard but were about 12 to 13 inches long but the tracks were pressed deep into the mud, my buddy Shawn was with me & he is 6 feet 4 inches tall, weighs 385 pounds & wears a size 14 boot & he couldn’t push his foot that deep in the mud beside the tracks! Another thing about these tracks is that the right foot seems to be missing the little toe, I SWEAR I didn’t pay much attention to the little track next to it till I got it on my computer just now. I sent it to a good friend who is also one of my cameramen last late night via cell phone & he asked me about the little track & I told him it looked like the rear foot of a raccoon. Now, on the bigger computer screen it looks like a miniature version of the big track! I can’t honestly say what I think about this but here’s the pic & the real story behind it, you be the judge!

Read the post at facebook.com/1hardcoreoutdoors

Posted on October 3, 2012 by MOTW Admin

MAN GOES FISHING, FINDS FINGER IN A FISH!

A man in Idaho caught something a little out of the usual the other day.

I’ve been fishing many times, and have my fair share of “it was THIS big” stories as well but, Calvin Nolan of Idaho has a story that’ll rival many anglers best tall tales. He found a human finger, well preserved, in a fish he caught!

CNN writes:

It’s a fish tale almost impossible to believe.

A fisherman found a human finger in the belly of a trout caught in a remote northern Idaho lake. And detectives located the owner, who delivered a surprising message.

Despite the hard work of investigators, Haans Galassi said he did not want to be reunited with his severed digit.

“At first the sheriff asked me if I wanted it back, and I was thinking ‘um, no!” Galassi, 31, said.

The reunion may bring back too much pain for Galassi, who is getting over the accident two months ago on an Idaho lake.

Galassi was wakeboarding on Priest Lake in July while holding on to a rope attached to a speed boat. Then things went terribly wrong.

He noticed too much slack in the rope, tried to correct it and the rope wrapped around his left hand, he said.

“It pulled me over in the water and dragged me for a few feet before it broke me free,” Galassi said. “I didn’t feel pain at first, just numbness, and I pulled my hand out of water and it was bad news. I look and see I’m missing all four fingers at that point.”

Galassi was rushed to the hospital and has been trying to get by without his fingers. He learned that he can still grip and grab items such as a steering wheel with his affected hand.

And then he got the strange phone call Tuesday from Det. Gary Johnston of the Bonner County Sheriff’s Department.

The fisherman who found the finger on September 11 quickly put it in a freezer and called the sheriff’s department, Johnston said.

“The lake is cold and deep so it was in remarkably good shape,” Johnston said. “We’d fingerprinted it and sent it to the state lab to match what’s on file and lo and behold, they came back and said that’s Haans’ little finger.”

Fisherman Calvin Nolan told CNN how he made the grisly discovery as he gutted a trout caught by his friend Mark Blackstone as they fished together.

He had noticed something in the gut of the fish that he thought looked like a crawdad, or crayfish, which they had been using as bait — but Blackstone said, “No, that’s a finger.”

LAKE LABYNKYR OF SIBERIA HAS A HIDDEN MONSTER

Could this be the Russian Loch Ness Monster? Is there a Siberian Nessie?

The Siberian times writes:

Known as ‘Russia’s Loch Ness Monster’, the accounts of the creature in Yakutia predate the Scottish claims yet in many ways are similar.

Intriguingly, too, there are theories that Labynkyr – which has unusual cracks on its 60 to 80 metre deep floor – is connected by underwater channels to another lake, Vorota, where monster sightings have also been recorded, including by respected Soviet geologist Viktor Tverdokhlebov, an academician not given to hyperbole.

Associate Professor of Biogeography Lyudmila Emeliyanova revealed to The Siberian Times that on her own scientific mission to Labynkyr she recorded ‘several seriously big underwater objects’ with sonar readings.

She is not the only researcher to have done so.

‘It was our fourth or fifth day at the lake when our echo sounding device registered a huge object in the water under our boat,’ she said.

‘The object was very dense, of homogeneous structure, surely not a fish nor a shoal of fish, and it was above the bottom. I was very surprised but not scared and not shocked, after all we did not see this animal, we only registered a strange object in the water. But I can clearly say – at the moment, as a scientist, I cannot offer you any explanation of what this object might be.’

20,000 MILLION YEAR OLD ANTARCTIC LAKE 12,000FT BELOW ICE HAS BEEN REACHED

The Russian research team made contact with the lake 12,366 feet (3,769 meters) below the ice on Sunday, 05/02/12.

What this looks like to me is the opening scene of a sci-fi horror movie, where the scientists out in the ice deserts of Antarctica break through ancient ice to an underground lake of freshwater that’s been cutoff from the outside world for 20 million years except, nothing scary happened when these guys actually did just that. Bummer?

Msnbc.msn.com writes:

MOSCOW — Opening a scientific frontier miles under the Antarctic ice, Russian experts drilled down and finally reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake, an achievement the mission chief likened to placing a man on the moon.

Lake Vostok could hold living organisms that have been locked in icy darkness for some 20 million years, as well as clues to the search for life elsewhere in the solar system.

Touching the surface of the lake, the largest of nearly 400 subglacial lakes in Antarctica, came after more than two decades of drilling. It was a major achievement avidly anticipated by scientists around the world.

“In the simplest sense, it can transform the way we think about life,” NASA’s chief scientist, Waleed Abdalati, told The Associated Press in an email Wednesday.

The Russian team made contact with the lake water Sunday at a depth of 12,366 feet (3,769 meters), about 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) east of the South Pole in the central part of the continent.

Scientists hope the lake might allow a glimpse into microbial life forms that existed before the Ice Age and are not visible to the naked eye. Scientists believe that microbial life may exist in the dark depths of the lake despite its high pressure and constant cold — conditions similar to those believed to be found under the ice crust on Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s moon Enceladus.

Akin to the space race
Valery Lukin, the head of Russia’s Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, said reaching the lake was akin to the Americans winning the space race in 1969.

“I think it’s fair to compare this project to flying to the moon,” said Lukin, who oversaw the mission and announced its success.

American and British teams are drilling to reach their own subglacial Antarctic lakes, but Columbia University glaciologist Robin Bell said those are smaller and younger than Vostok, which is the big scientific prize.

“It’s like exploring another planet, except this one is ours,” she said.

NEW PHOTO OF THE LOCH NESS MONSTER SURFACES

Some say this is one of the best photos of the Loch Ness monster ever.

Has Skipper George Edwards finally captured the fabled Nessie on film after 21 years of searching?

The Huffington Post writes:

A sailor who has spent 26 years searching for the Loch Ness Monster has what he believes is the best ever picture taken of the elusive beast.

George Edwards spends around 60 hours a week patrolling the famous loch, taking tourists out on his boat Nessie Hunter IV, and has led numerous hunts for the fabled created over the years.

But this image is the one that’s convinced him that there really is a monster or evenmonsters – out there.

It shows a mysterious dark hump moving in the water towards Urquhart Castle.

“I was just about to return to Temple Pier (in Drumnadrochit) and I went to the back of the boat which was facing the pier and that’s when I saw it,” said Edwards.

The 60-year-old added: “It was slowly moving up the loch towards Urquhart Castle and it was a dark grey colour. It was quite a fair way from the boat, probably about half a mile away but it’s difficult to tell in water.”

After watching the object for five to ten minutes, Edwards said it slowly sank below the surface and never resurfaced.

“I’m convinced I was seeing Nessie as I believe in these creatures. Far too many people have being seeing them for far too long,” he said.