Report 21154: Couple has possible daylight encounter near Proxy Falls

In May or June of 1977 my wife and I decided to take a ride up the MacKenzie River from Eugene on a Sunday afternoon.  After stopping at Cougar Springs, we headed up to Proxy Falls area and hiked into the Three Sisters Wilderness area about three miles.  We had just entered a meadow about twenty yards wide and stopped to talk when we both heard something that sounded large moving in the trees just outside the clearing.  We both started listening.  Whatever was in the trees was making a low, soft grunting sound and it's footsteps were audible and heavy.  It sounded like a biped.  My wife asked me what it was but I had never heard something make that sound before.  I grew up about 40 miles from this spot in the upper Santiam River area.  Whatever it was completely circled us, staying in the trees, twice.  We were both becoming uneasy, and my wife asked me to get us out of there.  We began to walk back down the trail, stopping occasionally to see if it was following.  It didn't.