Have you ever visited a location, only to never be able to find it again?
My Story:
(this actually happened 2x, once the 2 of us, once we had his brother with us, same place though)
Me and a friend used to go ditch/creek fishing out in the country. A cooler of food, a cooler full of beer, etc. We would leave about noon, fish
till 5pm or so, hit a local bar for lunch and a few beers (we usually began drinking around 2), wait out the heat of the day till about 7 or 8, then
go back fishing till the midnight.
(Yes, we were DUI.......It was the 80's, country roads, etc. Not saying it was right, but it's what we did)
We were on a road going toward a little town (5-6 miles away) where we usually had lunch at, a gravel road, wooded, no houses. We came upon a gravel
road with a sign that said something like ''Country Inn'' and an arrow pointing down this new road (neither of us remembered seeing the sign, or that
road leading into the woods, before then). Needless to say, we turned down the road, and after about 2 miles, came upon a pole barn type building with
the usual beer neons in the windows, the obligatory nascar/Budweiser canvas banner on the outside of the bldg., a picnic area, and a creek
There were 5-6 vehicles, including a mid 60's Ford 4wd truck, all raised up/big tires (this will figure later). We parked, went in, people were
having lunch, beers, etc. The bar maid, whom I've never met before,
greeted both of us by name. We ordered lunch, and an old guy in the bar
(his truck, it turned out) asked about an acquaintance of mine. A couple people recognized us(?), we talked about local people, events, etc.Everyone
seemed friendly.
It was suggested that we try the creek on the edge of the property, saying it had nice catfish in it. We went out, fished till 10 or so, went back
into the bar. Same people inside - nobody came or left. We sat there and drank until 2 or 3 in the morning. As we were getting ready to go, debating
on parking the truck and crashing there, the red truck guy said he would drive us home in my truck, and have someone follow him to give him a ride
back.
Some facts/observations, easier to do it this way:
--- Upon awaking the next day, my friend staying the night at my place, we checked our cooler that we put the fish in. It was full of catfish, most
still alive.
---I literally, after having a meal, and a snack later, drinking there for hours, had almost as much $ in my wallet as when I left. I remember I had
about $80.00 in my pocket after buying beer, bait, and ice. I had about 70 and change in my pocket the next morning. Bottle beer was about $1.00 then,
shots were $2.00. I would guess that the way I felt upon getting home, I had at least 20 beers in that place. I do remember ppl buying us drinks, but
I also remember repaying in kind.
---Upon asking the acquaintance about the old man w/ the truck, he said that sounded like his uncle, and the truck he had right before he died some
time earlier.
---The bar maid seemed to know me quite well, asking about my (then) g/f, work, and saying that we were related. I know all my relatives, and even
asked my grandfather, who was alive at the time, about her. He told me that he didn't know her, and he knew not just our relatives, but everyone
local, from 80 years of living there.
---I was raised in that area, lived there the first 40 years of my life. I do not remember that road, etc. It's not on county maps. Nor is the creek.
Rural people will get this: I've looked on road maps, county plat maps, and recently, Google Earth. No sign of the road or the creek on either.
--- Ive asked several people about this place. A few seem to remember hearing ***something*** about a bar in the woods, but that was back in
prohibition days (NW Indiana, where, supposedly, Al Capone had several tiny backwoods bars/brothels/distilleries.) But this was a modern bldg, neon
beer signs in the windows, pole barn construction, electricity, The vehicles, including the Ford truck, were nothing special, exactly what you would
expect to see in any rural bar parking lot. A few have heard about a modern day bar out there, none claim to have been there, but one retold a
description similar to ours, 2nd or 3rd hand, of the bldg/picnic area/creek.
--- The county has no record of a ''Country Inn'' or anything similar.
---Me and my friend found the place one other time, SAME PEOPLE THERE. SAME BAR MAID. Exact same circumstances, except when we found it the 2nd time,
fishing was rained out right when we got in that area.
--- It had the old style, as I called them, ''paranoid pay phone''. You dial the number, and if it's local, wait for the other person to answer, then
you put your money in it. I called my house, talked to my g/f. She remembers the call, could tell i was in a bar. The phone was 10c, 2 nickels only.
Payphones in town were 25c at the time.
After that, we've tried to find it several times, while fishing/drinking, sober, on the way elsewhere, etc.
This was near the town of Demotte, Indiana, east of town. Now, there are a few out of the way bars out there; Ramsey's Landing ( a verified Capone
location), Gentleman Toms, Baums Bridge, and the old Hornet's Nest(closed) and Kniman Tap. All of those were in little settlements (4-5 houses, grain
elevator, etc). This place was none of those. It was all by itself, and was further east, and south of any of those.
Literally the only disagreement between my friends' recollection, and mine, is the name of the bar maid. I believe her name was Dolores, he says it
was something else.
What made me think of this was I saw a show on the paranormal channel on Roku about an elderly couple who drove between Phoenix and Albuquerque took
back roads, and always used to eat at a certain cafe in the middle of the dessert. When the wife passed, the man made the trip, tried to find the
cafe, asked someone, and was told there was no cafe nearby, never had been.
Here's what I think: I believe in guardian angels. Perhaps the bar maid, or the old man, somehow lured us there,kept us drinking until we were too
sloshed to walk damn near, to keep us from driving drunk and killing ourselves, or someone else. Until we admitted finally that we were too drunk to
drive. (TG I don't drink at all now). What other explanation makes sense? It wasn't a hallucination, unless 2 ppl can share the same one, for hours.
Implanted / false memory? IDK if thats possible. If so, then why? Did we stumble upon something not to be seen, and have that done? If so, what was
out there, middle of farm land/woods? If it was a secret lab or something, c'mon, small town America, someone would know about it.
I welcome you opinions & comments, your ideas what happened, etc. If you've had a similar experience, would love to hear it.
edit on 14-4-2017 by Brywilson2 because: Spelling error