Wilderness campers have an unknown visitor in the Trinity Alps of Northern California witnessed in Trinity County, California

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I have been backpacking in the Trinity Alps for 12 years and have ran into many bears and even mountain lions but this experience was much different. My wife, brother, and another friend of ours went packing to Bear Lake in the trinity alps. It was our last night and we were the only ones at the lake. Since it was in August fire wood was scarce and we had none for our last night. We sat in our dark camp until about midnight then everyone wanted to sleep. My brother and our friend shared a tent and my wife and I shared one. I lay in my tent and couldn't sleep. I looked at the time and it was 1:30 am. My wife was asleep and I heard what I thought was my brother walking around in camp. It walked around for at least a minute so I whispered my brothers name to see if it was him but it kept walking around and not responding which made me very nervous. I heard the steps getting closer to my tent and I started to smell a horrible animal stench. I had left my backpack leaning against a log ab...