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We went up a sister-in-law's home in Malad, Idaho yesterday, for a family party. On the way home, we decided to stop off at my property in Samaria, to show some of the family where we're going to build our new home. I mentioned to the kids that there were supposed to be some caves at the top of the hill behind the home site, so of course they headed up to look. I followed a few minutes later because I hadn't been up there either, and to make sure they were safe.
When I arrived at the top, the kids showed me a set of woman's clothing they found up there. Right next to the cave was a pair of dark blue stretch pants, a light blue top, a pair of bright pink panties and a pair of flip flops. They were folded neatly and stacked on a rock. The clothes were in good shape, not weathered at all, and looked like they had been placed there earlier that day. This is about 400 yards from the road, a 250-foot vertical climb up a very rough, rocky hillside.
We didn't know what to make of it.
If it weren't for the shoes, I'd have thought maybe someone had stripped down and gone for a walk, or was up there with a guy or something. Or maybe she had decided to go into the cave nude, to keep her clothes from getting dirty. Or... I don't know. Lots of weird but not necessarily sinister posibilities.
The shoes made me wonder, though. It's very rough up there, lots of sharp jagged rocks, surrounded by sticker weeds and sagebrush, and populated by the not-infrequent rattlesnake. The inside of the cave isn't much better. I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to walk that terrain in flip flops, much less barefoot.
My brother-in-law came up the hill behind me and we looked at the clothes, looked around the area, and looked in the cave. There were some scuff marks down the near-vertical cave entrance. Nothing added up.
Another oddity was a dog that came sniffing around up where we were. It was obviously a well cared-for pet, very friendly. When my brother-in-law offered it some food and water, the dog wolfed it down like it was really hungry. Could the dog belong to the owner of the clothes, we wondered? Has the dog been hanging around here waiting for it's master to come back?
We walked back down the hill, and it kept bugging me, so I finally called 911, which connected me with the Oneida County Sheriff dispatcher. I told her what we'd found and she asked if we could wait a few minutes for an officer to arrive. We said we could, and he showed up about 15 minutes later.
We hiked back up the hill with the young reserve officer (part-timer), and showed him. He was just as baffled as we were. He called his superior, who was actually off-duty and attending a class in Pocatello, an hour's drive from Malad. The Sheriff also called him, even though he's on vacation. The off-duty officer drove down from Pocatello to determine if the Search and Rescue should be called out to go down into the cave and see if anyone was in there. The officer asked for our identification, so they could contact us in case it turned out that something bad had happened and our formal statements were needed.
When I arrived at the top, the kids showed me a set of woman's clothing they found up there. Right next to the cave was a pair of dark blue stretch pants, a light blue top, a pair of bright pink panties and a pair of flip flops. They were folded neatly and stacked on a rock. The clothes were in good shape, not weathered at all, and looked like they had been placed there earlier that day. This is about 400 yards from the road, a 250-foot vertical climb up a very rough, rocky hillside.
We didn't know what to make of it.
If it weren't for the shoes, I'd have thought maybe someone had stripped down and gone for a walk, or was up there with a guy or something. Or maybe she had decided to go into the cave nude, to keep her clothes from getting dirty. Or... I don't know. Lots of weird but not necessarily sinister posibilities.
The shoes made me wonder, though. It's very rough up there, lots of sharp jagged rocks, surrounded by sticker weeds and sagebrush, and populated by the not-infrequent rattlesnake. The inside of the cave isn't much better. I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to walk that terrain in flip flops, much less barefoot.
My brother-in-law came up the hill behind me and we looked at the clothes, looked around the area, and looked in the cave. There were some scuff marks down the near-vertical cave entrance. Nothing added up.
Another oddity was a dog that came sniffing around up where we were. It was obviously a well cared-for pet, very friendly. When my brother-in-law offered it some food and water, the dog wolfed it down like it was really hungry. Could the dog belong to the owner of the clothes, we wondered? Has the dog been hanging around here waiting for it's master to come back?
We walked back down the hill, and it kept bugging me, so I finally called 911, which connected me with the Oneida County Sheriff dispatcher. I told her what we'd found and she asked if we could wait a few minutes for an officer to arrive. We said we could, and he showed up about 15 minutes later.
We hiked back up the hill with the young reserve officer (part-timer), and showed him. He was just as baffled as we were. He called his superior, who was actually off-duty and attending a class in Pocatello, an hour's drive from Malad. The Sheriff also called him, even though he's on vacation. The off-duty officer drove down from Pocatello to determine if the Search and Rescue should be called out to go down into the cave and see if anyone was in there. The officer asked for our identification, so they could contact us in case it turned out that something bad had happened and our formal statements were needed.
