What did we see last night..?

[GallopingHighRoad]

We had been away for a few nights and travelled back quite late. Towards the end of our journey, this was about 2am, we were driving along an A road in a rural area when something crossed the road in front of us in full headlights for about 3 seconds. It was about the height of a person, maybe 6 feet or over, but had short powerful legs and hips which seemed to move in a circular fluid fashion. It was not a deer because it stood on two legs. This was in the midlands and the area is traditional rolling fields and woodland. In this particular spot there are no houses or buildings, nearest is over a mile away. We drove back today as its only 7 miles from home to look at the road layout and whatever it was moved into a wide bowl shaped field dropping down to a stream. Any ideas?

I suggest watching (or avoiding) the film "The Ritual". It's got Rafe Spall in it.

My guess is scared deer, they can just about walk on hind legs if they are going fast enough to dart across the road. Like a hop run type movement. (Especially if it had an injured front leg) Easily be standing at 6ft doing that. There really isn't another explanation because let's be honest there are no mythical goat legged men roaming about the place 🤣

It was probably a Jötunn. But they're found in Scandinavia.

There's a penguin sanctuary near Daventry??!

Now I've heard everything...

lol

Had to drive to Dav this morning and boy did i do a lot of peering into the hedges and over the fields on the way!

I saw 3 deer ... but they stayed on all fours.

@AhhWoof

There's a penguin sanctuary near Daventry??!

Now I've heard everything...

Not sure about Daventry but there used to be a zoo at Southam. There is a greek restaurant on the site now. It was a private zoo and closed down in the 1970s. The penguins for the snack bar advert and the Esso tigers came from there.

I used to love southam zoo

I'd love to see deer more often

Never seen a white one.

@Mostlyjustrunning I remember that post too (unfortunately). I only read the OP though, which made my blood run cold. I couldn't bring myself to read anymore.

Happy if someone wants to post a synopsis of how it played out though...

@Laiste

I'm pretty sure what i saw going over my fence that day was a big cat. As in proper Big Cat - puma/mountain lion.

(weird that i nearly put ''just'' a big cat!)(this thread is fab)

Very interesting what @JohnStonesMissus said re: predators making birds go silent in the woods like i explained happened to me that day. I never put 2 and 2 together about that! I feel like i've just had an epiphany!

I know, it's so interesting that nature knows there's danger nearby...

Had the photo been uploaded yet?

Laiste Same. I actually wondered if I was going to see random mumsnetters poodling about the back lanes looking for sauchquach :)

@GallopingHighRoad

Update. We got back to the same place last night. Pretty much midnight as planned. There was a car already in the layby which was a bit odd. As we parked up, the driver immediately drove away the impression being they did not like our arrival.

We sat there for a bit in the quiet and dark. Barely any passing traffic at all. It got colder so we spread the blanket out across our knees. Our eyes became used to the light and visibility was better. We did not see a sausage and we were there over one hour and half. No sense of any night life at all. We did get out the car to walk to the gateway. After a couple of minutes the interior light on the car came on which startled us very was weird because all doors had been firmly shut. We heard what sounded like an occassional long low trumpet or horn noise coming from the valley below, but that could be any type of crop drying machine working at night.

Leaving aside some weird and funny suggestions here such as wombles, predator, cassowarys and the like, we have concluded that what we saw was most probably a deer on hind legs, possibly mangy and with something wrapped round its feet. Maybe standing up trying to kick it off. Cannot fathom what else it was. For those who asked, @Laiste's drawing which is most accurate is at 21 Feb time -17:35:02 and @Shambolical1 the picture at 19:53:07 is also highly possible now. We are still going back to look at tracks one day later in the week.

OMG maybe it was a dogger !

I’ve seen a big cat in Wales, many of us saw it on multiple occasions. Eventually one of the local farmers shot it while it was worrying the sheep.

They are around.

Not on 2 legs though.

Can't wait to see an update in a few days with pics of the tracks or the actual creature. One thing that hasn't, that I've seen, been suggested, is not just doggers but furries? Don't Google it if you're in work lol.

There are roads and places in Wiltshire that have strange vibes, Avebury and Savernake Forest being two that creep me out. The A4 from Calne to Beckhampton is especially eerie at night, I would rather drive a longer route than drive along there.
Years ago I had to drive a lady home from a meeting who was researching ghosts in Wiltshire for a book. She scared the living daylights out of me recalling everything that she’d heard, seen and read as we went along that road 😱

Avebury is on a ley line which explains a great deal, isn't there a really haunted pub called the Red Lion there?

Ley lines were made up by a bloke called Watkins in 1922 though.

www.skeptical-science.com/critical-thinking/thinking-about-thinking-are-ley-lines-real/

Thing is, there are so many archaeological sites and historic monuments in the British Isles that it's really easy to join the dots to make a straight line just about anywhere.

There's archaeology all along the HS2 route. It's as though there's an unbroken carpet of archaeology beneath the surface all around us.

So I'm sceptical about ley lines.

Ooooh, y'know, maybe the HS2 excavations all round here have disturbed something more than just the local villagers .....

@Laiste

Ooooh, y'know, maybe the HS2 excavations all round here have disturbed something more than just the local villagers .....

I might have missed it but did the OP said she was going back out there?

Sorry, not sure why I quoted you Laiste!