Deep impressions seen in the snow witnessed in Yancey County, North Carolina

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In early spring 1988, some friends of mine and I were traveling up the road to the top of Mt. Mitchell in a four-wheel drive vehicle. Mt. Mitchell is the highest peak east of the Mississippi River at 6,684 feet, and as a result, the mountain gets heavy snowfalls well into March and sometimes April. There had been some heavy snowfall in the weeks preceding our drive, and there were some deep snowdrifts piled up alongside the road, although the road had only a dusting of light snow on its surface. Almost no one goes up on the mountain in the wintertime, and as I remember it, we had to skirt our way around a barricade to even get on the road to the summit. We reached the top of the mountain, then turned around to drive back down. About a half mile below the summit, we went around a sharp, left-hand turn, and our headlights hit the steep bank beside the road. In the snow on the bank we could see several deep impressions that led up the bank and into the woods. We got out and examined t...