bowed our heads and prayed.
After praying, we decided to continue tracking the deer and headed in the direction of their escape. It didn’t take long before we found ourselves in another canyon walking between tall stonewalls. A small stream of water bubbled out from a large sandy area, which formed a shallow pool of water. All around the outer edges of this pool were green, mossy plants and deer tracks. We knew we had found a deer water hole. The only problem was that we were a long hike away from our supplies and shelter. We knew that it would be better to head back to camp and start out earlier the next morning.
We climbed up and over a large pile of boulders, then hiked along the canyon wall for a short distance, then headed up and out of the canyon. We made it over the boulders with no trouble, but when we began to hike along the canyon wall, my brother called to my father to look at something on the walls. There on the walls were ancient petroglyphs, stone pictures that were carved on the canyon walls centuries ago by prehistoric native people. These carvings were not the usual ones, which we were accustomed to seeing on other walls in other canyons. These were not pictures of sun, bird, stars and lightning symbols. These were pictures of people without heads, or with the heads and arms of animals. There were pictures of owls and figures with opened mouths. My father and his friends spoke out loud, “These pictures tell that this canyon area is full of supernatural forces. The pictures of headless people mean that bad witches and animal spirits were working together to make bad medicine here many years ago.” We all agreed that to get out of this canyon as soon as possible, would be the best thing to do.
We hurried our hike and soon reached the top of the canyon. We reached our camp just after dark. We got dinner going on the fire and after eating our fill, drank a few cups of coffee. Not once did we mention the weird sounds, the deer’s reaction or the petroglyphs we had experienced that day. It is best to not talk about such things. To do so, we believe, would call to us the dark forces. We decided at around eight that evening to call it a day and get into our sleeping bags. After placing some more wood in the fire we all stretched out, close to the fire ring. We were very tired from all the hiking of the day, and were eager to get enough rest for the next day’s activities. Very soon after zipping up into our bags, we fell into a deep sleep. I must have been the last one to nod off because I remember hearing everyone’s snoring before falling asleep. The next thing I remember is being suddenly awakened by a loud snapping sound coming from one of the burning logs in the fire.
I opened my eyes and stared at the black, moonless sky above. I remember thinking to myself, what a beautiful sky it was, as I viewed all the stars filling the dark spaces from one vast direction to the other. Then I turned to face some movement, which caught my attention in the brush a short distance from our camp. I saw what looked like a naked person crouching down on his legs staring at me! I thought that I must have been imagining this because of how tired I was. I closed my eyes and rubbed them with my cold fingers. I again turned my attention to the figure in the distance and sure enough, it was still there, just staring at me. I began to get scared, thinking it might be someone who was going to rob us. I knew that my rifle was just a few feet away from me, but I would need to react quickly in order to do any good.
As I observed this person, I realized that he was the size of a child. I watched as he made a quick motion and stood straight up. That did it for me. I threw off the sleeping bag and yelled for everyone to get up as I went for the rifle. I yelled,” Hey, there’s a guy over here.” Everyone reacted quickly by jumping out of his sleeping bags. I told them about the person I had seen in the bushes. My father listened to me and then said; “I had been seeing that guy for some time before you woke us. There are other spirits with him as well. I’ve been seeing two more of them moving from juniper bush to juniper bush.” This got my brother a bit scared. He spoke: “Well what are we going to do. Will they hurt us, do they want us to leave this place?” My father’s friend responded: “I think we should pack up and leave this place. These are not good spirits. We saw the pictures on the rocks; those are not good pictures. Those are pictures of witches and people who work with bad spirits. I really think we should leave this place tonight.”
We threw more wood on the fire and we got it burning brightly. We decided to take my father’s friend’s advice and leave the canyon that night. As we packed up our gear, I again noticed the shadows of people, or spirits, running from bush to bush. I let the rest of the men know what I had just seen. My father decided to sing a prayer and the rest of us joined in. My father’s friend then ended the prayer by announcing, in the direction of the spirits, that the creator was watching over our well being and that they should leave us alone. Suddenly, we heard the low sound of laughter and hoof beats leave our camp. This is when I knew our power of prayer helped us chase away what ever was watching us.
We all got in our trucks and drove home that night. We did not speak again about our experience until the next morning. During breakfast we told our mother about our experience. She said that during the day and night we were gone, an owl had been making hooting sounds in the tree in our front yard. This was very unusual and she knew that this was an omen that something bad was happening to us. She herself began to pray for us to return safely home. Aside from this experience I have had a couple more that have taken place, but I don’t think I’d like to talk anymore about this.”
Tohono O’odham
The Tohono O’odham, or “Papagos,” as they were named prior to 1980, presently exists on a reservation, which extends over a hundred miles following the Arizona and Mexican border. This reservation is also the second largest in the U.S. It begins north in the Casa Grande area, east in the Aguirre Valley, west in the Sand Tank/Sauceda Mountains, and then ends south in Old Mexico, where a small population of Tohono O’odham presently reside in the state of Sonora. They still practice much of the traditional ceremonies and beliefs that were alive prior to contact with Spanish missionaries in the late 17th Century.
The People chose to renounce the negative name “Papago” which means “Bean Eaters,” for the more appropriate and suitable name that they have always called themselves, Tohono O’odham. The Tohono O’odham are a true desert-farming people. In years past, they used a “dry farming” technology (like the Hopi to the north), which utilized the infrequent thunderstorms and rains that flooded the washes and valleys. They planted traditional seed crops in these areas and simply waited as the earth’s wet season provided the needed moisture for germination. Presently, these farming practices are no longer in use by the people and, instead, they utilize water provided by modern wells.
An Italian Jesuit missionary named Father Eusebio Francisco Kino made contact with the Tohono O’odham in the year 1687. This meeting changed the culture of the Tohono O’odham forever. New crops and domesticated animals were introduced, as was a new political system and religion, Catholicism. Today, church structures remain as evidence of this legacy. The Tohono O’odham provided the prime labor and artists who built all these beautiful buildings. The joint knowledge of the Tohono O’odham and Europeans regarding construction and design is admirable and will for all time be deserving of notable recognition.
David War Staff’s (Yaqui) Story
David’s story is unnerving given its location and time of night. I tend to wonder how anyone might have reacted in a more rational manner if found to be in a same situation as he. During my research I rarely come across stories compelling such attention as his. Fortunately for David and his cousin, they were aided by two strangers who just happened to be in the area. Let’s simply hope we all can be so lucky as they were.
— Antonio
“It was February in the year 1991 when I had my experience with a ghost. I was seventeen years old at the time. One Saturday evening in Phoenix my high school was having a
