Location: Location: Off Tanglewood Firetrail, Hornsby Heights

Event: Yowie Sighting

Date: November, 2012

Time: 1pm

Around the late spring / early summer of 2012, I took my 5 year old son on a bush walk. At the time I lived right on the Tanglewood Firetrail (At No7). The firetrail runs around the back of Hornsby Heights, Northwest Sydney. We took a small track that follows the valley off the firetrail. It followed the contour of the terrain of the valley. I'm not sure how familiar you are with Hornsby Heights. It borders on to Galston Gorge which is a very steep section of ravines, gullies, gorgeous and some of the harshest terrain that you'll find up in these parts of north west Sydney. The Tanglewood Firetrail is not too far from Galston Gorge.

We had been walking along enjoying the things we would find along the way. We had been going for some time when we came upon a cliff line that jutted out. A good view of the bushland below and a great place to throw sticks and stones off. Thick undergrowth surrounds the cliff. The steepness of the decent at the base of the cliff continues down again into thick lush scrub that eventually drops into a creek. We had been on the cliff top a couple of minutes watching the stones we were throwing fall to the bottom and bounce around. After running out of rocks we returned to the track to pick up more stones. When we returned to the cliff top to do the same again out from the lush green scrub something caught my eye. A fast moving upright thing moving off to my right and running very fast through the undergrowth. It was about 6 foot, hard to tell really as the legs were hidden by the low lying scrub. It was gone in a flash and obscured by leaves and branches of the undergrowth as it hurtled with speed up the slope. It sort of glided, like it had no bound or bob to its movement. I only caught maybe a second of it moving before it was quickly behind some rocks and scrub. It was all one colour brown. No hairline separating forehead from head hair, no clothing. Just one uniformed brown colour. It was agile and swift.

Although I lost sight of it almost as soon as I saw it, I could hear it crashing through the bush. It was running up a very steep ravine at speed. The ravine was covered in thick dense scrub. It was snapping braches as it went and was running faster up this incline than I could run down it. I was able to keep track of it from the noise it was making as it ran. I quickly worked out that soon enough it would reach the same track I was on. Once it got to the track, if it turned right and continued along the track it would be upon me. I grabbed my son, placed him on my shoulders and ran like hell to get out of there coming to only two conclusions as to what it was.

1. A person in a ghillie suit that was super-fast running up unforgiving
2. Not a person but something

Either way, I did not want to know and I was gone.

The creeping knocker

Date: Sept 2018

Time: Apx 21.00

Location: Off Tanglewood Firetrail, Hornsby Heights, Sydney. Weather: Cool to warmish night. Clear skies.

Over the past year I have been selling high powered torches via my online website. When I received my first shipment of a range of torches I decided to go out at night and test them. At the time I lived right on the Tanglewood Firetrail (as describe above) that runs around the back of Hornsby Heights. It is steep terrain and is very dark at night. I walked down the local gully at the back of my place and take a selection of torches with me. It is a perfect set up to test each of the torches to see how they perform and I would be able to give a performance description to my customers. I also brought my camera with me in order to take some photos of the results of each torch.

With my backpack on, I set off for a walk by myself down the dark tracks that wind through the steep bushland of Hornsby Heights. I soon found the track that I wanted as I had walked along it many times. It was the same track when I saw the thing running at speed up the gully during the day some years earlier. I had forgotten the encounter and was happy to roam around. It was about 9pm at night when I entered down the track again. I found a good spot that broke out in to open space due to the steepness

of the terrain below. It overlooked some distance to the other side of the valley. From there I set up my tripod camera and started taking some photos of all the different torches and how well they performed in the pitch black.

The photo shoot was rather uneventful and I was not happy with the result of my efforts with the quality of the images. After some time messing around with the torches I decided to call it a night. I packed up my camera and torches getting ready to leave. I was getting rather tired and started on the track to head home. I had left out two torches so that I could use to help me get back to the track that leads to the firetrail.

The two torches were very different. One was a very wide beam that illuminated the whole area. My other torch was a search and rescue torch that could throw a very long beam distance, a good 500 metres across to the other side of the valley if I needed. No sooner had I picked up my backpack to leave I heard footsteps through the dark night crunching on the twigs and leaf matter. I immediately stopped and turned to my right and searched with my spotlight down the steep overgrown gully. When I shone the light on where I thought the noise was coming from the footsteps stopped. I searched and searched with the spotlight trying my best to make out a shape or a figure or an animal or something that I could identify. A distinct ‘two step’ footfall could be heard when the torch was not shining on it. Slow, creeping movements, but I could hear the twigs and matter crunching with each step.

Despite my searching there was nothing that I could see, just thick undergrowth and lots of dark shadows. I pretended that I hadn't heard the footsteps and began to search with my torch in other directions mostly to my left. When I took the light away from the footsteps area I could hear a very slow footstep crunch again on the undergrowth. I returned the light back to the spot where I could hear the footstep noise. It was only about 30m down this steep ravine. As soon as I shone the spotlight back onto the noise of where the footsteps were coming from the footsteps stopped. I continued to search as hard as I could but I was not able to see anything. While focusing intensely on the area that I can hear this thing creeping up on me comes the part where it starts to become quite corny and a part that I've considered not even including in the story. But what happened next is really what happened, though it seems rather fake to describe it, but all the same here it is.

From the spot where I had been searching intensely with my torches out shot a black cat running at speed directly at me. Not a large cat, but a normal black house cat. I gave a yelp and stepped backwards with fright. The cat then realised I was standing there and made a quick sharp turn to avoid hitting me and raced off towards my left. It was running quickly bouncing over logs and running into the undergrowth. I followed it's every move and it stopped a little way off and turned around to look back at me. Its eyes were reflecting back from my torch light. Although the cat was pitch black I can see where it was because of its eyes. I was rather pleased that it was a cat and not something else. I took a sigh of relief and was also a little mad at the black cat for spooking me. I took a moment and was about to head off again but to my right I can hear the footsteps getting closer again. My heart sank, my torch quickly shone back down to the gully to where I could hear these footsteps getting closer. I shone the torch into the area, but the footsteps stopped again. Both of us had paused. Neither of us moving. I scanned and searched again as hard as I could. I was also thinking of the quickest way to get out of there. There’s only one way out and that was behind me, it was a good 10 minute run back through the track. I did not think to unpack my camera, sort of preoccupied at this point.

I had a very powerful torch that was doing well to light up everything in the vicinity but I could not make out anything. Not a shape, not a movement, not anything at all. It must be only about 20 or 30meters away from me. While I was searching that gully I heard a large tree branch being knocked against a gumtree “KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK” three times. The noise was in the very place I had the lights on. I paused and was surprised I saw no movement at all of an arm swing or a tree branch moving or even bushes springing back as it passed. I guessed that the size of the tree branch that it was using to knock with was about as thick as a baseball bat. To test the situation some more and to maybe draw it out from the cover I shone the torch back to the cat. The cat was still there, its beady eyes looking back at me.

But when I had taken the light off the area the footsteps, with the twig snapping noises returned and this thing was getting closer again. I immediately shone the spotlight back into the area where the footsteps were coming from and yet again I couldn't make anything out. The knocking of wood continued and another three sharp angry sounding knocks of wood spilled into the otherwise quite night. I took a few steps back and I was ready to run. The next three knocks were harder and louder and certainly more intense. It was creeping up on me every time I had taken the light off it. I don't know how long it'd been in the bush watching me. I think it snuck up on me while I was testing the performance of my torches. But now we both knew each other was there. I turned and got out of there as quickly as I could. Nothing followed or chased me. I did not see whatever it was. I cannot identify it as I did not see it. I can’t say what it was, only that to me, it was not normal.

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