Family hears strange sounds near West Point at dusk witnessed in Calaveras County, California

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This happened yesterday: My wife and I were exploring some forest land northeast of West Point, Calaveras County, CA yesterday in our 4x4 and on foot, scouting for deer. Near dusk we set out a picnic next to a creek. About 15 minutes after sunset a long howl came up the canyon from downstream. It was loud enough to hear over the noise of the creek five feet away. In between the howls there was deep toned "jibberish-barking" noise, almost like two deep voiced men talking at the same time. It did not sound like humans, but we couldn't rule it out, until another howl answered from up on the ridge behind us. Howls were exchanged from the creek valley to the ridge us and we were in between! This ruled out humans making odd howls and "jibberish". The next thing we noticed is the cows that were grazing downstream all started heading upstream, away from the howl. We could monitor their movements from their cow bells. We decided to pack up and high-tail it out of there, leaving righ...