A group of canoers see a large, black creature along the river bank witnessed in Holmes County, Ohio

Open Map

I was on a canoe trip with a bunch of friends from school. There were five canoes, each with two people in them. We had canoed about a mile, when we came to fork in the river. According to the map, the two eventually link up about 1 to 1.5 miles later. So we decided to race. Three canoes went down the fork on the left hand side, that had the road next to it. My canoe and another went down the fork that was in the woods. Upon entering the fork, we became aware of a very pungent smell of decaying materials. Soon we were in the middle and the trees all but blocked out the sky. We stopped for a bathroom break along the river, and on the opposite side noticed a shadow in the trees. We passed it off as a deer. When we continued our trip, we noticed that the smell had gotten closer, and when a female companion glanced toward the smell she silently froze. She said she saw a black 6 1/2 to 7 foot creature observing us. We doubled our paddle speed and noticed that it was following us behind the ...