Contents

Manipulation of Our Minds

Some Commonalities

People's Experiences

In the Woods

Buildings that Don't Exist

Towns That Don't Exist

Streets That Don't Exist

Landscapes

Changed Environments

Lost and Confused

Manipulation of Our Minds

We like to experience the world in a predictable way. However, on a rare occasion, reality, as we know it, becomes vastly different. It is confusing, distressing. The house you saw along the road never existed; the town you drove through was never there either. Paths in the woods change, and an eerie silence creates even more confusion. People have experienced these situations, and they have no explanation for it. Afterwards, only the memory exists. It does not happen to only one person, sometimes a whole group or family had the same, shared experience, giving credibility to the fact that reality temporarily changed drastically.

These experiences often go together with time discrepancies, sometimes called Missing Time (although this term is a misnomer). Much more time has passed than  one can account for. A break in time is often not noticed. It is not the time that was missing but the memory of what happened during that period. It also happens that if the person is walking, he might find himself suddenly at another location, after noticing the unusual environment.

I have written about the Missing Time phenomenon before. In that article I focused on the missing memory of the time passage and also on the sometimes accompanying spatial displacement. The stories in this article focus on the experience of truly strange changes in one's environment or reality. Although the changed reality is experienced as real, they could not have happened in our every-day physical world.

It is my opinion that there are intelligences who interfere with humans in a profound way (read my e-book The Intrusion of Dimensional Beings). I think that they are able to take us out of our physical world for their own purposes. While this is happening, the mind of the person(s) is put into a kind of holographic projection that mimics our everyday reality but it does not always quite match it. A kind of advanced mind manipulation of our brain. People, who undergo these strange experiences, stay in the physical world, continuing their drive or walk, but a part of their mind is altered and controlled in such a way that they perceive themselves driving or walking in an altered environment. I think that people who see a building or a town that does not exist, are the recipient of a projected mind hologram. In other words, they are made to see something that is not there. The question is why would those beings do that to humans?

Because these entities are so apt in manipulating our minds, with or without taking us physically out of our world, we don't really have a clue to why they are doing this or what has really happened. We first have to become aware that this phenomenon is real, and compare the many stories to look for a possible answer.

Maybe, in some cases, the person(s), by stepping into an energy field or portal, is temporarily entering some sort of alternate dimension, similar to ours, but seeing something that is not present in our world.

Some Commonalities

Dense woods along a highway: There are stories of people driving on a highway, when the sides of the highway give way to dense woods that seem to go on forever, giving rise to a much larger driving time than normal. Sometimes at the end of the woods is a small deserted town where things are 'off'. Then the people turn around and drive back through the wooded area, and finally find themselves back on the regular highway again.

Paths in the Woods: A person goes into the woods. He finds himself on a path never seen before, or the trail changes. It feels weird, the surroundings are 'off', sometimes sounds are muffled or there is just plain silence. Then suddenly everything is 'normal' gain, the sounds come back, and they are on the right path again.

Buildings that don't Exist: Driving by a building, house or mobile home where the day before there was only an empty lot, and they day after it is not there anymore. Sometimes the house had lights shining through the windows. Such a building can also be present in the woods. My article of Restaurants/Cafe's That Don't Exist also belongs under this heading, but these experiences all include consumption of food, and they can be quite elaborate.

Towns that don't Exist: Passing through strange towns, that later on turn to be non-existent. They are often accompanied by weird feelings, sometimes dread.

Unfamiliar landscapes: Sometimes the landscape becomes unfamiliar, or is completely different from what should be there. Usually this happens when one is driving by in a car, but the same can be said when walking in the woods.

Cell phones don't work: Although the batteries are fine and charged up, no connection can be established during the altered reality period. Once the strange experience ends, cellphones work fine.

It can happen anywhere: It is not only in woods or on a highway that these things happen. Sometimes, one's immediate environment, in his own town, or even close to home, can be totally changed. My article of Elevators To Other Dimensions shows that even inside buildings, reality as we experience it, can be drastically changed.

Absence of familiar things: not only ordinary things are different, such as plants or roads, but there is often an absence of people and cars in an otherwise busy location.

People's Experiences

In the Woods

Roadblocks to a familiar route seems to show up once in a while, diverting one's route to another path or road where the strangeness begins. In the following account there are also several unusual things happening: the strange fire tower, temperature drops, diminishing light, silence, echoing sounds, and of course the cellphone doesn't work. Loss of (memory) of three hours too. And, the path disappeared from existence, or maybe it never existed at all:

I am a 29-year old male from Pennsylvania and I have read through several stories on your site. I thought I would share with you and your readers one of the many strange things I have personally experienced, and like other people I would like to know if they too had this type to experience. In September 2008, my best friend Ciera (pronounced Sierra) and I went to a park named Hocking Hills in Ohio for a day retreat from our busy lives. She and I had decided on this at random when we first got together early in the morning just after sunrise. It was a nice warm late summer day, and we'd just decided to make a full day drive and hike out of it. Hocking Hills is well-known for its several walking trails, a cave or two, and several water falls and running water / creek areas. The day was very warm, sunny, hardly a cloud over head, and very nice. We started a walk at random and found that one of the trails had been washed out, so we had to take another path which forced us to cross a road. On the other side was a tall fire look-out ranger's station which doubled as a Fire Tower. We had seen a lot of people out walking with us that day and a few hikers/backpackers had passed us by on their treks up until that point. We played with our phones a bit on the way to show each other some pictures we took a few days before on a different outing and noted it was roughly after 12-noon when we came out of the woods and walked across the road. It was then that we noticed there was caution tape all over the fire tower, there was a pungent smell in the air which we could not identify, the windows on top of the tower appeared to be taped up, grimy, and there were flies all over the area. We walked past it, commenting how odd it was, and continued down a seemingly new trail we hadn't seen on a previous walk in the area. The trail took us past the fire tower and then cut into the woodlands. As we walked into the forest we took notice that no one seemed to be around. In fact not only did we feel isolated from others, but we felt very chilled without explanation. That day had been very warm as we both wore very cool clothing and when we entered the forest it began to feel very cool, much cooler than we expected, and we both were shivering as we felt the temperature drop. As we continued down the way my friend pointed out that it was getting darker than either of us should have expected or seemed to be. We looked around and there were nothing but trees on all sides, there should have been a forest edge somewhere as the area wasn't really that big but aside from some hills and tall pine trees there wasn't a real 'ending' to the woods like we expected as the area tends to be narrow and normally you can see the edges. She took out her phone to use her GPS because she instinctively felt lost but her battery was nearly gone, I took mine out and it had no signal, the battery was also near dead, and showed "EE:EE" for the time (meaning it couldn't update as it was a older style flip-phone with camera and when set to auto-adjust would contact the mobile phone network every 15 min). It was only then as the light grew dimmer as we continued on our way that I noticed it was very silent suddenly. Our foot steps echoed, the leaves, grass, twigs, and our breathing just echoed. Ciera got spooked and I did too, she mentioned it was very out of ordinary. I agreed but I couldn't shake this sense of foreboding that something was amiss. I tried to rationalize it but I really, honestly, couldn't figure any of it out at all. We continued forwards going down a small hill on trail and back up when it got darker. The world seemed to have gone from shadowy to near twilight darkness. My friend grabbed my arm and started freaking out about how weird it got. Then the air grew chillier, and had a feeling of something wrong. We both took off running looking for an exit, for some odd reason we never thought to turn around at all as we ran we could hear our steps echo off the area as things just felt like they grew more gloomy. Then ahead of us down a small hill and back up the other side we could see two large bushes on either side of the trail like a gate. We made a mad dash for the bushes and just as we pushed through the plants, something odd happened: we were nearly blinded by light as sound and warmth returned all at once. It was like stepping outside of a cold, empty, and dark building to a warm busy street. We stood at the edge of a place known as Old Mans Cave which has a large water fall and a u-shaped cliff where you can look down into where the water and people gather. We turned around and the bushes were the same but the area was different, brighter, not silent for sure, and warm. In fact our skin was cold to touch which just reinforced the facts. We took out our phones and the time had finally updated, it was now 4pm. The normal trail would only have taken an hour to walk fully so it was a loss of three full hours! Logic attempted to set in, and we decided the trail we came up must have just appeared creepy because there may have been clouds over head or a storm blew by but when we went back between the bushes there was no trail. Nothing looked like it had a few seconds ago. Ciera walked around the bushes twice and it was the same bright sunny day with no darkness and no trail. We waited, it was blue sky over head, and we could see the edges of the forest and other people. The trail had simply vanished as it we had never walked it. On returning past the trail where the fire tower was located, we noticed it was normal looking and there was a blond haired young lady with her hair in a pony tail climbing the steps, the windows were not taped and very clean, and no pungent smell. We don't know what it was, but it certainly was creepy. Of course, I jokingly told her later that day over dinner we had entered the faerie realms by mistake and were lucky to get away, she didn't find that funny of course but either way we felt we should share this with you and if anyone out there has had a similar experience perhaps they can provide insight. (Phantom and Monsters)

A typical appearance of a long stretch of dense woods along the highway, together with an hour and a half unaccounted for:

About 10 years ago, a friend and I decided to visit our mutual friend at her university and spend the weekend with her. All three of us thought this was the best idea ever, so we decided on a weekend and headed out once I was finished with classes on Friday.

For this trip, we had very detailed directions from our friend at the university as she'd made this drive herself several times by then. We knew exactly where to turn, what towns we were passing through, and even which towns we should avoid speeding in! I believe we made two stops on the trip, one to a rest stop and one to a gas station. We began in Fort Worth, TX, taking I-35 down to the loop around Waco before traveling down TX-6 til we reached Texas A&M in College Station. My friend at A&M told us the drive should take about 3 hours.

While nothing went wrong on our drive, it seemed to take forever. We reached Waco in no time and headed down TX-6. We were enough ahead of rush hour that we didn't really hit any traffic. I don't remember exactly at what point down TX-6 that the woods started. But I do remember traveling through these woods for a long time--perhaps an hour. They seemed like they would never end, and we were already well past the 3-hour time frame my friend had given us. When we finally reached College Station, it was nearly 4 and a half hours since we'd left Fort Worth. I thought maybe my friend's estimate was off, or that she sped the whole way or something. Because there was no good explanation why it had taken us so much longer than it took her.

We didn't get lost, we didn't hit traffic. We didn't stop for more than 5 minutes at a time. We didn't really think much of it at the time, just wondered why it had taken so long. When the trip back was a little over 3 hours, we thought it was weird, but quickly forgot about it. It wasn't until my next trip to College Station that I realized something had been strange.

I spent that whole next trip waiting for the long path through the woods that we had been on the first time... except I never ended up going through any wooded area for longer than 15-20 minutes. The entire trip took me about 3 hours, as did every other trip I made out there in the 7 or 8 years that my friend spent living in College Station.

I want to say that we got lost, but we followed the directions my friend had given us carefully. We used my GPS to be sure. I want to say we were mistaken about the time the trip took, that maybe it only felt long. But I (and my friends) watched the clock carefully. I don't know what happened and I've never been able to replicate it. I still wonder about it every now and then. (Reddit)

Getting lost and time discrepancy, and an unusual silence during the experience:

So there is a national park type place near me, woodlands and a beach, huge area. 2 odd things have happened there, one to me and one to a friend.

Her story is, she was out with her brother, and they got lost for hours, when they found where they were, they checked the time and it had been 20 minutes.

The weird thing that happened when I was there, was I was on a path to get back to the main path, took a fork in the path to a large path, but it didn't seem to be the right one somehow, which was odd because I know the place pretty well. About 20 steps onward along the big path, it was like the sound came back on. I hadn't noticed it had gone. I turned around, and I was on the right path. About 40 steps behind me was a children's play area, lots of kids making noise... This has been an odd one for years stuck in my mind, trying to explain it, but I can't. It's a bloody weird place though but I love it there! (Reddit)

In the following account there might be a clue in the fact that his compass was behaving erratic, pointing to a disturbance in the Earth's magnetic field. The usual characteristics show up: silence, uneasy feelings, getting lost, and the environment becomes unfamiliar. His radio doesn't work. Missing time (memory) of several hours too. I could be considered a typical Missing 411 case in which the missing person is finally found but he can't remember what happened in the many hours of missing time.

I am an archaeologist in Costa Rica. Throughout my career, I've focused on the research of stone spheres, if you are unfamiliar, they look like this, thousands of these spheres of varying sizes have been found over the course of decades, some as small as your hand and some as big as houses have been uncovered in the middle of the jungle.

10 years ago, I worked at a campsite at the Osa Peninsula, this is probably the deepest, most unexplored forest in the country, some areas have never been reached or mapped because they are virtually impossible to access, and there aren't that many people trying anyway, plus the protection of wild lands in Costa Rica is a serious deal and human interaction is kept to an absolute minimum in certain areas, except for a few biologists and geographers that have slowly made their way through. The camp was set up by government officials who had called in my university professor to help identify some unearthed artifacts and scout the surroundings. While exploring, my professor had found a clearing with 9 stone spheres. Knowing it was my field of expertise, he called me in to check it out and do some research.

When I arrived at the location I noticed a few things were off, for starters, other than the artifacts found there were no signs of houses or ruins anywhere nearby, this is odd because these stones aren't usually found more than a mile away from places with clear evidence of previous dwellers or from tribes living there to this day, also, the stones were laid in a pattern unlike any I'd found before.

After a few days scouting and gathering details, something explainable happened, I left the camp in the morning that day to check out the clearing as usual, I arrived at the site and spent around 2 hours digging, taking notes, doing the usual stuff. It's then when I check my compass and realize it's going nuts, it's just pointing at a direction I know can't be right based on the pattern of the stones. I've been here already a few times at this point, so I know it's not right, it's pointing North. It spends a few seconds there, suddenly jumps to another random direction, jerking a little bit, then it points at the opposite direction again. I start walking around the place but it seems to have little effect on what the compass is doing, I am at a complete loss A compass is not a digital device, it works based on Earth's magnetic field, so this just doesn't make sense. Then I realize something else is going on, I am not hearing anything, mind you, this is the middle of the damn jungle and I can't hear a single animal, just an eerie breeze through the leaves.

I start feeling uneasy and paranoid, I've never been easily scared, you can't be when you have to spend days out in the wild at night, but this just doesn't feel right, so I decide to head back, except I can't seem to find the way back to the camp. The stones aren't more than a mile away from the campsite. I was pretty confident I knew how to get there but none of the treelines or trails and creaks are familiar to me. I tried to radio the team but no one is answering either.

The most sensible choice seemed to be to walk back to the clearing and start over, so I did, I went back and tried to radio somebody again, this time a girl from the team answers, and she sounds frantically concerned, she starts asking where the hell I've been and said they've been looking for me the whole day, I am extremely confused, as I left the camp around 9am in the morning and I didn't think I wandered off for more than a couple of hours, it turned out I was gone for almost 7 hours and everyone was worried I wouldn't come back before it got dark.

I know this all sounds insane but trust me, it's real, I never managed to get it to happen again and the campsite was closed shortly after without much explanation. I tried to review my notes over and over for a long period of time but could never find conclusive results. There's so, so much more to this story, my professor said the camp was simply closed because the permissions had expired and it wasn't worth fighting over but I never bought it, we never talked much about what happened either. I am also convinced those stones are not just solid rock, there is something inside but trying to crack one open is unthinkable, they are national symbols, it would never be approved and it could land someone in prison so even suggesting it is madness. I am happy to answer questions if you have any.

I am an archaeologist, went to investigate some stone spheres and went missing for a few hours, investigation was closed shortly after.

I don't remember the specific date of the incident, but it happened in March in 2007. Regarding the weather, it's hard to tell. It's a rain forest, so it can go from completely sunny in the morning to torrential rain in the afternoon, but I do remember it was an unusually dark month considering it was summer, so mist wasn't uncommon while I was there, could have been. (Reddit)

Buildings that Don't Exist

The following account could have been under the previous chapter as it happened in the woods. It begins with the typical confusion and unusual silence, followed by the discovery of a house in the middle of the woods:

I used to spend hours every day after school in the woods around my house as there were miles of woods in all directions except to the north. I was walking to the north, which, if you walked far enough, (about a half a mile) you'd reach the main highway which my driveway came off of.

We had made this little journey a hundred times before at least, and I knew exactly where I was and where I was going. I have an excellent sense of direction from years of hiking forest with no trails and I should've been around 30/40 yards away from the main road, but I hadn't heard traffic in a while and the forest kept going on and on until I got very uncomfortable and didn't recognize where I was, which was impossible. The woods were still and silent, almost deafeningly silent, except for our footfalls. My dog remained unusually close to me at this point in the hike, and he kept looking up at me, but I was curious and young and wanted to know where the hell I was going, so we pressed on.

We came to a large oval field with beautiful green grass which was very well taken care of. In the middle of the field was a single apple tree. At the far end of the field was a big white house with red shutters and a red door facing us, probably a quarter mile away. As soon as we reached the field, my dog took off running and barking at the tree. I tried to quietly yell at him to come back, but he was on a mission. That's when I got a horrible heavy feeling in my stomach and my ears began to feel like they were burning. I had to go and it was urgent. I called my dog a few more times. Then I just said fuck it and ran a straight line back to recognizable woods.

The strange things happen here. When I got far enough back where I recognized the landscape, I began to hear traffic behind me in the direction I came. I still kept running until I reached my front yard. I swear this is the absolute truth, and I've never understood how it happened, but when I opened the front door, my dog was waiting inside for me and I never saw him pass by me on the run back. I remained inside the rest of the day and played video games.

I made several attempts to find this place over the next few years, but never could. I've gone in every direction around my house for miles, even used Google maps trying to locate the field, and can't find anything but forest for miles and the main road to the north. (Reddit)

Another building in the woods. Note that they were led into the experience by two other children:

Me, my cousin, and my aunt were all outside on the front porch playing. We were all the same age, around 4-5. Two teenagers approached us and asked if we wanted to see a castle.

I knew this was bad news but my cousin had to go see it, so we both agreed to follow. We went into the woods and walked along a trail for what felt like an eternity. Probably twenty minutes or so realistically.

We arrive to find a beautiful, gleaming, majestic castle in the distance. I'm talking something you would see in the movies. This place was made of heaven, it literally shined as if we entered a city of wealth. We excitedly look at each other and sprint home to tell our parents. The teenagers stayed behind, never chased or followed.

Our run back was instantaneous, as if it took a few seconds compared to the walk there. We go and tell my mom and obviously she is freaked out and tells us no more playing outside for the day.

Here's the thing. My mom was so incredibly strict on me that she would have never let me out of her sight for longer than a minute. The door to the front porch was open so there's no way two random teenagers could've actually taken us into the woods let alone anywhere without one of our parents seeing. My mom and my cousins mom were the two adults home at the time.

I've spoken to my mom about this multiple times. There's no church or anything nearby that we could've mistaken to be a castle. I've even looked as an adult. No luck. All three of us remember this phenomenon. I'm 25 now so it's been 20 years, but we've spoken about this at the age of 6, 8, 12, 15, etc., essentially every time we see each other. We all remember. Always have. I know some will chalk this off as kids imagining but I swear to you that this was real. (Reddit)

And yet another house in the woods, that is not there the next day:

When I was 6, me, my sister and about four of my older cousins were walking down quad trails in the middle of the woods behind my house. I grew up on an Indian reservation in northern Alberta so the woods were pretty thick, only big enough to fit a quad but the trails can travel for about 10 km. The trails crossed someway thru the woods which lead to my aunts house; I assume that’s where we were going. As we were walking we came across a house in the middle of the trail, it wasn’t a hunting cabin but a house that looked like someone lived in it. As I said I lived on a reservation so the homes have almost the same layout. It was brown/tan and was a by-level home like my childhood home. We decided to explore inside since this was the first time we have came across this house but as we walked up to the door we saw bear shit and assumed a bear was near so we all ran away as fast as we could. Went back the next day with my sister and one cousin but couldn’t find the house and never have since. Everyone who was there that day remembers this as we are all adults now but again we have never seen this house since. Any suggestions of what happened? In our culture we have this thing called a wittagoo (same thing as a wendigo) maybe it could be that? (Reddit)

A Victorian house in good condition, also in the middle of the woods:

This happened in the mountains of North Carolina. My husband at the time was in the military, and we were stationed at Camp Lejeune. One weekend, we and another military couple decided to go camping in the rugged Appalachian Mountains on the other side of the state. After setting up camp, we decided to hike around for a bit in the hilly, mountainous terrain. Deep in the woods in a little hollow, imagine our surprise when we chanced upon an abandoned Victorian house. It was almost overgrown with kudzu vines, but we still managed to find a way inside and decided to explore. Once in, we were amazed at the surprisingly good condition of the inside of the house. Upon further inspection, we found the house to be fully furnished, and also found clothing and even old children’s toys. It was more than a little creepy, and we all got the feeling we shouldn’t be there—it was if the people who lived there had just stepped out and would return at any moment. Our husbands were just as mystified as we girls were, although they didn’t seem as scared. My husband, Richard, even began checking the walls for any hidden passages, thinking perhaps the family had gone into hiding for some reason and then perished, trapped inside the walls. I can’t express how much the house still looked lived-in. There was clothing laid out on the still-made beds, and plates and silverware set out on the dinner table. Everything was covered with a somewhat heavy layer of dust, however, so it was obvious the place hadn’t been lived in for decades. This was in the early 1960s, although the musty calendar on the kitchen wall was from 1909. Was it even possible that no one had enter this dwelling in over fifty years? The longer we spent in the house, the more scared my female friend and I became, eventually becoming almost hysterical. Eventually, after much pleading, our husbands decided we should leave, although they would have been happier to stay and explore the house more. After we had left and the shivers wore off, all we could discuss on the drive back home was how isolated the house was—it was literally in the middle of the woods, and the nearest paved highway was miles away. A few weeks later, our husbands planned a trip back—alone—to continue exploring. My friend and I were fine with that. Although I was curious about the house, I had no desire to visit again after the sense of fright that had enveloped me there. However, when the guys came back home the Sunday evening after their planned trip, the story became even stranger. Although they were sure of the exact location, they had been unable to find the house and had spent the entire weekend wandering the woods. Even though they remembered and recognized natural landmarks, no trace of the house could be found. They even stopped at a roadside general store a dozen or so miles from where the house had been, and when they inquired about the house, the proprietor emphatically denied that any such house existed. When my husband and his friend persisted, the man at the general store suddenly became angry and told them to leave, adding that if they knew what was good for them, they should forget the house and never come back! They ignored the warning and went back on two other occasions, but could never find the house again. And, like the owner of the general store, any of the locals whom they chanced upon and asked about the place refused to talk about or even acknowledge it. I know what we saw, and I know that it was real. But not being able to find it again and the local folks not wanting to talk about it only adds to the mystery— did we chance upon the site of some unspeakable tragedy? I may never know the answer, but I will always wonder about the abandoned house deep in the woods. (from Strange Things in the Woods, by Steve Stockton)

The next experience is interesting because the couple saw the exact same building from their hometown in another city. Later on, it was there anymore. In my opinion a clear sign of a projected hologram in their mind of an image taken from their mind in the first place. Question is: did something else happen of which they have no memory?

Here we have the same experience: a building at another location that seems to be taken from the person's memory, and gone on the way back:

About 15 years ago, when I was in my early 20s, I went on a camping trip with my family. My dad and I thought it would be fun to do some horseback riding, so we followed some road signs we’d seen leading to a stable. The signs led us off the highway and onto a one-lane road deep in the mountains of southern West Virginia. A couple miles up this road, my dad slams on the brakes in front of a small, white Baptist Church. He said, a little shook up, “See that church? I’ve been to that church! But it wasn’t HERE.” He definitely caught my attention, but I decided to mess with him a bit. I mean, the church looked like at least 80% of the churches around here. Nondescript. White. A steeple and church bell. It was around Easter, so they had a giant wooden cross on the lawn with a purple sash draped across it. And it sat on a tiny hill, with a small graveyard to the side leading down to the road. Still, it could have easily been mistaken for another church, someplace else?” “Oh, yeah?” I asked, laughing. “Where was it?” Clearly not in the mood, he yelled and threw his hands in the air, “On top of a mountain in Eastern Kentucky! I stop in front of it to eat my lunch three days a week! It’s the church I know, EVERYTHING is the same, but it’s not supposed to be HERE!” My dad was a truck driver, and repaired and delivered parts to dozens of coal mines across Appalachia. So he had the majority of his meals on the road. And I believe he said the church was on Pine Mountain in KY, but I could be wrong. Also, my dad is a hard-nosed cynic, and incredibly bright. He’s not one to say things like that. In fact, that was the first and only time I’d ever heard him say something like that. Anyway, he eventually calmed down, we drove up to the stables, which were boarding stables only, meaning we couldn’t ride. The road dead-ended at the stables, so the only way out was back down the same road we traveled. Only...on the way out, the church wasn’t there. It was gone. Now, the way I remember it, we stayed straight on the one-lane road and never took any turns onto other roads. And we came out by a Go-Mart, exactly where we turned onto the road. I was sweating bullets by this point. Dad needed to get gas, so I walked into pay and asked the guy behind the counter about the church up the road. I pointed at the road, which was clearly visible at our vantage point. He said, “Honey, there’s no church up that road.” OK. When I got back in the car, my dad was smiling a little, and said, “See? I told you it wasn’t there.” I would like to know what happened that day, but I’ve never told anyone but my oldest son, who is now 14 years old. My dad will mention it from time to time, but only when no one else is around. (Reddit)

Towns That Don't Exist

Driving through a town that, later on, never existed. Strange, but was it a real town to begging with, or was it an elaborate hologram projected into the mind of the people involved?

The town usually has strange features, and gives the typical eerie feelings that something is not quite right. The next experience also has the dense forest showing up as an entrance and exit to the town.

I was driving my grandmother home from Nebraska. I think we were traveling south on Highway 45. Everything was normal, we were just cruising along.

There were no side roads, and no gradual splits. Driving straight down highway 45. All of a sudden, we found ourselves in this small little town.

No exit, just a main street that led to the end of the town. Which held a strange, large, gray and black church or town hall. There were very few cars, and the cars that were there were odd. One of them I remembered, it looked like a mix between 50s and 80s Construction.

The town itself was just so strange. The second we pulled into this little town, my grandma starts getting extremely uneasy. I knew something was up, the town was just wrong. What it looked like to me, was an artist's rendition. Like if you took an artist and sat them down. Someone who has never seen what's a small town in America looks like. And then explained it to them in great detail. Then the artist paints a picture, of small town America.

Everything about the place just seemed off. Especially the fact, that we never made any turns. One moment we were headed south down Highway 45. The next the forest on either side of us thickens to the point where you couldn't see anything through it. Then it opened up, and we were slowing into the small little Main Street town. I didn't see any people, in hindsight that's probably a good thing. The big building at the End of the Street. That looked like it was the most important building in town. Gray walls, black roof, with four Towers.

I was very apprehensive, because I knew something extremely strange was happening. Highway 45, doesn't just dead end into a town that's not on any Maps. Like I said there were no gradual turn-offs. And we did not make any turns. Getting back to the way it looked. It was like a dream. At first glance if you were just driving by. Everything might appear to be normal. But you stop to look for a moment, and you see so many irregularities. Windows in wrong places, storefronts with no doors and no signs.

There were no other streets turning in or out. It seriously looks like, just the description of a small town. It was missing so many details. On the way into it, the woods got immensely thick. The trees were growing all the way up to the highway. There was no shoulder, a tree could have taken my mirror, just by getting close to the edge. Sorry I know I mentioned the forest before, it was just so strange.

With tension growing in the car, about halfway to the building at the end of the street, I've slowed the car down to a crawl. My grandma in the seat next to me, was absolutely freaking out at this point. To her credit she was doing it silently. Just terrified and shaking, saying we need to leave, we need to leave.

I guess I'm very lucky that I was there with her. If it had just been me in the car, curiosity would have absolutely gotten the better of me. It felt like we were in a place that we were not supposed to be. It felt like we were in a place that we weren't supposed to know about, that human eyes were not supposed to see. It was like this mask, was put over whatever was really there. Just in case, any uninvited guests showed up. All they would see was the strange small town.

So, thank you, Grandma, you probably saved my life. Because I would have absolutely had to have explored that place. I did a two point turn. If you don't know what that is. It's when you pull close to the right side of the Road. You put your car in reverse and turn your wheel all the way to the left. You hit the gas, and your car spins around backwards. You hit the brakes right before you go off the road on the other side. Drop it into drive, turn your wheel back to the right, and hit the gas. 2 points, reverse then forward.

We start driving back up the street we had come down. And I honestly didn't even know if this would work. I have no idea that nature of this place. I was half afraid that we would be stuck there. But soon the strange odd looking buildings, gave way to the thick forest. The forest that was almost touching the highway. After driving through this for a while, the trees started clearing out a bit. We drove until the highway went back to normal. With the trees far off of the highway. And the forest not so unbelievably dense. I continue driving north until I saw sign, that said I was going north on Highway 45.

I made a u-turn, and started heading back south down Highway 45. All the way through there were no turn-offs, there were no merge lanes and there were no slight turns that I might have mistaken for the main Highway. Once driving South on Highway 45 again, nothing else weird happened. Besides not seeing any turn-offs, and never coming across any unnervingly dense woods. Grandma was shaking, she and I both knew something out of this world had just happened. I don't know what town we ended up in. I do know there is no such town in Mississippi, I checked. (Reddit)

Even stranger, almost being home and driving into a strange town, with several hours of time missing:

A bit of background: I (18, female) was not drinking, high, or tired during any of this. Yes, it took place in the morning, but I get up every day at that time and am used to it. Now, onto what happened.

Yesterday, at around seven in the morning, my sister woke up late for school. I am currently not working, but I still get up with my mom at six or so. Before my mom left for work, she asked me to take my sister to school once she finished getting ready. I didn’t want to because, as I said before, I am not working and running low on cash. I didn't want to waste gas on having to take my sister to school because she woke up late (this is important). I had about half a tank, which should have been plenty since the school was only three miles or so away. So, my sister finishes getting ready, and we head out. I remember looking at the clock because my sister asked what time it was since she didn't want to miss her second period test. It was 8:16 when we left, plenty of time. We head out with no problem, and I drop her off at school. The buses had already left, so I could drop her off at the front door. Now on the way back is when it gets weird. I remember driving through town (if you can call about 20 buildings and one stoplight A “town") which was normal. Then I get to the blinking yellow light that leads to my house, turn right as normal, then around the turn, instead of the mile-long straight road that leads to my house, I end up in some weird town. One I have never seen before. The roads were winding and long, and I didn't see another car or person the whole time. Also, it was a lot brighter than it should have been. Like instead of 8 am it looked like it was already noon, or early afternoon. I didn't know what to think, maybe I took a wrong turn? That seemed impossible since there was no road that I could have taken anywhere in a five-mile radius that would lead me somewhere I didn't know. I drove for what seemed like only ten minutes until I looked for somewhere to turn my car around. I didn't want to pull into people's driveways, even though there were no cars in any of them. I pulled into a strange gas station with a name I didn't recognize and don't remember that seemed closed (again, no cars) and went to open Maps on my phone since I had no idea where I was, but my phone was dead, even though it had been charging all night and should've been fine. With no Maps and no idea where I was, plus no one to ask for directions or even where I was, I pulled back onto the road the way I came and decided to drive until I recognized something. The whole time, I felt weird. Like I wasn't supposed to be there, but that could have been me just being nervous about being lost when I should have been home by now. Finally, after what seemed like way too long of a time to be driving, I turned a sharp corner and ended up on the road that I should have been on originally. The one that led home. I passed the gas station near my house like normal and pulled into the driveway. I noticed my car was basically running on empty at this point, even though the whole thing seemed to only happen in less than an hour and I should have still had a lot more gas. I went inside like normal and plugged my phone into the charger (it was still dead) and I was relieved when it started charging. I saw that it was 2 pm and I had two missed calls from my mom from when she was on break, and a few texts from my friends during my five or six hours of lost time.

I have no idea what happened or how I lost about six hours yesterday when the strange drive only took an hour at most. Still really freaked out. I don't know what to think, any ideas on what happened? (Reddit)

A fully functioning town along a highway, but non-existing:

For various reasons, I don't believe that reality is stationary. I've had too many incidents that would indicate that not just my reality...but REALITY as a whole has changed. I once came across a town in Colorado that didn't exist. I was southwest of Denver on Hwy 285 (an area I've been very familiar with my whole life) when on one occasion my then-husband, myself, and my two daughters came upon a town that didn't belong there. But there it was.

I was astonished to see an entire functioning town that I had never seen before, with people, houses, and cars. I saw no school, but there was a post office. We noticed a couple of interesting shops, so we stopped and walked around. We had ice cream, and sat wondering where on Earth we were. I don't recall the name of the town now, but at the time I went so far as to write it down. Later, when I checked on a better map than the one we had in the car, I confirmed that the town did not exist. And let's not forget that this is a part of the state that I knew like the back of my hand for 20 years prior to this! To say this was interesting is an understatement. Of course on other trips through the area, the town was not there.

It could be said that when we discovered the town that wasn't there, we had taken a wrong turn. This explanation is just not a possibility. I know that often enough things like that can happen, but this was not one of those times. (Reality Shifters)

Streets That Don't Exist

Sometimes it is just a simple street never noticed before and not existing afterwards.

In the following account, not only was such a street discovered, but once turned into this road the classical symptoms began strange bodily feelings, coldness, the 'off' sensation. On top of that at the end of the street they found themselves at a much further location than possible, and several hours of 'missing time'.

Growing up I had 2 very specific people in my life. My cousin Ian and my closest friend Jake, who I’ve known since first grade. I have always felt a very tight and uncommon bond between all of us, and when we were together we could just kind of make things happen. Anyways Jake moved away to Florida in 7th grade, and during the years following me and Ian became even closer. We spent a lot of nights in Ian’s back yard just smoking and having conversations on life, aliens, dimensions, consciousness; anything 15 year old pot heads talked about… In the summer of 2011, Jake came back for a visit. Everything had felt like it was coming together again, like the missing piece of the puzzle was finally there. So one night, much like any other, Jake, Ian and I were all sitting out back of Ian's house, just talking. We didn’t have any bud and there wasn’t much going on, so around 12 am we decided to go for a walk.

Now before I go any further I must explain the layout of the streets we were walking… Ian lived directly off a main road, 12 mile, which ran horizontally. Running parallel to 12 mile, a mile north, was 13 mile (obviously). In-between these two roads was a road called ‘common’. Making it physically impossible to reach 13 mile from 12 mile, without crossing Common. Running vertically across these roads was a main road called ‘Hoover’ and a mile parallel, to the east, was ‘Schoenherr’. Ian's house laid in the middle of these two roads, on 12 mile. It was basically a 1 mile by 1 mile square…. That being said I will continue on with the story.

So we began our walk down 12 mile heading west towards Hoover, however we did not pass Hoover. A few blocks down we decided to turn right (north); into a little subdivision. Mind you, Ian and I were very familiar with these streets, we’ve taken many walks on the same route we were on now. As soon as we made this turn, we noticed the air became very peculiar; thick yet empty. Still and silent. Jake had brought this up, so it became the topic of discussion for a few minutes. We continued on our walk for a little longer; maybe 5-10 minutes, heading north towards common. Without reaching common, we came to a street that we knew to lead to Schoenherr, and decided to turn right (east), with the intentions of reaching Schoenherr, then heading south, down to 12 mile, then taking 12 mile west; over to Ians.

This is where things got weird.

On our way to Schoenherr, in the little sub-division we were walking in, we stumbled upon a street that neither me nor Ian recognized. Again, Ian and I knew these roads like the back of our hand, a good number of our friends lived in this mile by mile radius. We didn’t have cars, so we were quite used to walking these same streets. Anyways we just decided to take this street north (seeing at that was our only option), until we could turn east to reach Shoenherr. Keep in mind, we haven’t crossed Common yet, you can’t miss it. Upon arriving on this unknown street I became very cold, the hairs all over my body began to stand on end, and we became aware of a ringing in our ears. Seconds after this ringing, Ian and Jake began to act very distinctively. They both became very quiet; sullen. This was possibly because we were beginning to grow tired and slightly irritated. But it was very sudden, and rather unnerving. This lasted for a few minutes until randomly, I began to shed tears. Now I don’t want to say I was crying, because no emotion was the cause of these tears. They just began to meticulously drip out of my eyes. Like a leaking faucet. Ian and Jake both mentioned something was off, really off. Nothing we could specifically call out though. It seemed almost as though there was no solid concept of time. Physical things seemed very hallow. Finally, we found an outlet from this street, that led us onto Schoenherr. However, when we made it to Schoenherr, we were completely taken aback by where we were. Not a car or person in sight, the air succumbed to a slight fog. We ended up being on 13 and a half mile, and Schoenherr. Meaning, at some point we had crossed not only Common, but 13 mile (a major road) as well. AT NO POINT HAD WE CROSSED EITHER OF THESE STREETS. It is literally impossible for this to have happened. We were all at a loss for words and decided to get home as quickly as possible, so we immediately began to head south on Schoenherr to 12 mile. We walked for about 10 minutes and made it to roughly 12 and a half and Schoenherr, until a cop drove by. Now all of us were under-age, Ian being the oldest at 16 (almost 17). So this just added to the uneasiness of everything. Sure enough, the cop swooped around and into a parking lot in front of us. He called us over to the car and began to ask us the usual. This first thing that stood out to me was this cop's eyes, they seemed almost dead(?) His whole manner was very robotic, you could say.

At this point I drew my attention to a hooded figure walking about a quarter mile north. I didn’t think much of him at the time.

This is how the conversation went with the cop (summed up) The cop asked with authority “What are you guys up to at this time of night?” We answered honestly, “We were bored, so we decided to go for a walk.” The cop then said “Oh yeah, at 4:30 in the morning?” 4:30. In the morning. A chill shot through my body, I could feel it shoot through Jake and Ian as well. We left the house at 12 am, It being 4:30 meant that it had taken us almost 5 HOURS for us to walk a mile and a half north. Now I know we went down random side streets, but for 80 percent of the time, we were heading north, with the exception of turning right with hopes to make it to Schoenherr. This absolutely should not take that long. I quickly responded to the cops saying “We had no clue it was that late, but honestly we were headed home now”. He proceeded to ask how old we were. We all answered honestly, admitting to being 15/16. Keep in mind, we were way past curfew, which was 10 pm for anyone under 18. Any other cop would have put us in the car, and drove us home. I hoped that would be the case. But nope. He responds with “Well you boys better get home quick, because strange things are known to happen at night”. With a grimacing smile, he turned around and left. Just like that.

At this point I looked back and noticed the hooded figure behind us was gone.

I almost felt as if this cop knew exactly what was going on, maybe he was a part of it all. We rushed to Ian’s house as fast as physically possible, arriving there around 5 am. I remember specifically checking my phone upon arrival. We sat down for the rest of the night trying to make sense of what happened, drawing diagrams of the street, estimating how long it would take to get from A to B, then B to C, etc. NOTHING added up. There were hours that we could not recollect.

Weeks after Jake left to go back home to Florida, Ian and I were still extremely bothered by all of this. We retraced our steps, countless times. Never finding the street we stumbled across, and never coming up with similar results. We proceeded to do extensive research into parallel universes and whatnot. We all TRUELY believe that we had entered a separate reality. This is the most strangest thing to have ever happened to me. Please remember, we were all completely sober when this occurred. If we weren’t sober then I probably wouldn’t make so much of it. If anyone has any insight as to what could’ve potentially happened, I’d love to hear it. I'm sorry if this was hard to follow, but if you became confused, read it a few times. You’ll see how none of this could be possible. Thank you for taking the time out to read about my experience. (Reddit)

The following happened in NY city, and the person also ended up way further than possible.

I have a strange story of my own to tell. Around my neighborhood in New York City, there is a story about an alleyway or side street that only sometimes appears, and that if entered, it will lead you to another dimension. There are other variants to the story, as is usual for neighborhood legends, but it always involves an alley or street that isn't usually there (sometimes containing strange objects or beings) that leads to some unknown place. Neighbors tell each other their "stories" and kids have gone on searches for it, but real experiences have never happened, at least not to my knowledge. If you live in NYC or are familiar with it, I will say that I live in lower Manhattan, and the sidestreet is rumored to appear around there, but I will not get any more specific for the sake of anonymity. My experience is real, and I believe now that the stories have some truth to them.

It was getting late (around 10:30), and my best friend and I ran out to get some snacks. I will say now that we were not under the influence of drugs or alcohol, so the event was not a trip or hallucination. We walked a few blocks to a deli to get some chips and dip and candy, and as we left the deli, I noticed there was an open alley right next to the deli that hadn't been there when we entered. I pointed this out to my friend, and he joked about finally discovering the coveted side street. I entered the alley, with my friend close behind me, looking for anything strange like they myths always said. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary, and when we turned left (the alley was shaped like an L), it was just a dead end. Disappointed, we began to walk back to the street thinking that maybe we just didn't notice the alley before. To our shock, when we got back onto the street, we were in a completely different area! It looked like we were still in the city, so I desperately searched for a street sign. I found one and realized that we were over 35 blocks from where the deli was! Nothing strange happened after that, but the fact that we ended up almost 40 blocks from our initial location after entering an alleyway really freaked us out, and we still can not explain it to this day. If anyone has heard of something like this, or can help explain it, your responses would be more than welcome. (Reddit)

Landscapes

It is all a matter of projecting a holographic image or experience in the mind of the person. What he experiences as areal is actually not there. It is not only houses, buildings, towns or roads, but also entire landscapes.

Here we find the typical deviation from the normal path that leads to an entire non-existing valley:

Back in the 70s and early 80s my aunt lived in a small town near Fort Worth Texas and at the far back of her property, there were train tracks that were still in use. Being boys of course we were always hanging out around the tracks at a small bridge that ran over a creek.

It was always freaky because it was a wooden bridge and creaked and groaned loudly when train would pass over. Okay so early one morning myself and two cousins were down at the bridge, and we decided to explore more of the creek. We slowly made our way along the bank & a short distance from the tracks we found a fork in the creek and followed it.

And this is where it gets freaky for me. The fork lead to a MASSIVE canyon/valley! We could see the cliff walls and trees, even a waterfall complete with mist, and it was unlike anything we had ever seen in that area. My description doesn’t do it justice, but we were in absolute awe and since it was obvious we could go no further down that fork, we soon left to explore more of the creek.

It was maybe 30-45 minutes before we made our way back, and we all wanted one last look at the valley but the fork was GONE. Along with the valley of course. We walked up and down the creek trying to see where we missed it but no go, it was gone.

This valley has stayed on my mind for years and a few weeks ago was moved to do some research on the area and to my shock and dismay google maps shows a road through that specific area and there are NO signs of train tracks anywhere near that area. Now I know that they may well have pulled up the tracks to put a new road but the problem I'm having with that explanation is even the unimproved areas are slightly “off” geographically and also show no signs of tracks.

My aunt remembers the tracks and one of the cousins does remember events exactly as I do but his brother, who is a few years older than us, wouldn't even discuss it and got visibly ANGRY when I kept trying to bring up the subject.

No idea what it was but it certainly wasn't a mirage or reflection. It was in vivid detail and definitely some sort of glitch. (Reddit)

It is not always so dramatic. In the following, the family saw a grass field where there shouldn't be one, followed by a memory lapse and being suddenly at their destination. A sure signs of an intervention:

One of my earliest memories when I was young, is going to a concert with my family. I still remember the mass crowds and what a happy day was that for the whole village. Correct, I used to live in a small village in an island situated in Greece, the thing is that us village folk know every stone, every tree and every hidden path or any bush of our terrain. That day though something happened that I still don't get after all these years. That day went pretty smoothly, nothing strange happened. Everyone was ready to go, the concert was five minutes away by feet, as it is a straight road towards the center of the village, where the concert was about to take place. The miraculous thing is, that while we were going there we got lost. Literally lost. We found ourselves in a huge isolated huge green field. By the way Greek islands tend to be really bare and rocky. I still remember a strange grass field something literally out of a fairy-tale book. No people, houses or cars were around, just me my parents and my little brother. I swear it in my life, I had never seen or even been to something like that in my life before. The peculiar thing is, that it was pretty relaxing although it felt pretty empty. I was actually starting to freak out. How was it possible for a field of such enormous size existing in the village I have lived for all my life and I never had the chance to pass through it. I started asking my parents, "what's happening", but they wouldn't respond. I swear I would see fear and confusion in their eyes. After that there is a big gap in my memory. Suddenly we found ourselves in the concert, back to civilization may I say. Tomorrow morning, I went back trying to find that place, but no success. I haven't told this story to anyone before and I never had a conversation with my parents about what happened that night. The only thing that I find strange is when my father was in a middle of a fight with my mother, and he brought up for some reason how she was crying that certain night, and she knows it was her fault. The problem is that I am certain my mother never cried that night. (Reddit)

Changed Environments

Sometimes it is the entire environment around oneself that changes, or just one particular element, like a school bus for example:

In an undisclosed area of Southern Ohio lies an abandoned stone quarry. While exploring that quarry, I had the strangest, most paranormal, most inexplicable experience of my life. I choose not to disclose the location, as I refuse to feel responsible should an irresponsible party or parties venture forth and hurt, maim or kill themselves. Caveat aside, this is my story. When I was in grade school, I used to fancy myself a ‘hunter,’ and I spent many bucolic, sunlit, Kapraesque days in the woods with a Crossman BB rifle (some of you may also know this as a ‘pellet gun,’ as it would launch pellets as well as BBs). I had a .22 single-shot bolt-action rifle I had received as a Christmas gift, but I usually preferred the somewhat more silent BB gun when stalking prey in the woods. I’m not proud of it now (I hung up my hunter’s cap many decades ago and now campaign for animal rights), but I had a lot of patience and a good aim and racked up many slain crows in my day—at least the animals that I had chosen as targets were a bane to the farmers, so I was helping save the crops—although that seems like a thin justification now for my activities. On one particular day, I had ridden my bicycle—Crossman rifle strapped across my back—a lot farther and in a different direction than I would usually go hunting. If you’ve ever been through rural Ohio, you know how one cornfield can look just like any of the other hundreds that dot any particular farming community, so anything was a welcome break to the monotony. Or so I thought, when I spotted a dry, abandoned quarry. Oh, what luck, I thought as I secured my bike and began my descent down one of the hewn rock walls. The quarry hadn’t been in use in what looked like decades, and had some good-size trees growing up from the once-submerged bottom. I was in BB-rifle, crow-hunting heaven! I followed the edge of the steep wall and soon found myself mid-quarry, then decided to cut across the middle. Imagine my surprise when about halfway in, in a clump of blackberry briars higher than a man’s head, I spied an old yellow school bus. I say ‘old’ because it was of a style that harkened back to a day different than the one I currently lived in—my school bus was sleek, aerodynamic and downright modern compared to the example in front of me, which, although well worn, did not look like it had suffered years of neglect. Curious beyond belief, I picked a line and began to carefully pick my way through the briars. After what seemed like an eternity (scratched from head to toe and oozing blood from a few dozen tiny cuts, thanks to the briars), I arrived at the bus. As luck would have it, a gentle push against the doors was all that was required to make them swing open, albeit somewhat creakily and reluctantly at first. I entered the bus and was pleased to see that it was in good repair. All the windows were intact and closed, and the vinyl seats, although cracked with age, were present and intact. I slowly crept all the way to the back of the bus, ensuring that I had the entire vehicle to myself. Satisfied that I was all alone, I sat down in the very last seat to rest for a bit. While relaxing, my gun laid across my lap, I even managed to wiggle the window by my seat down a crack, thinking that I could use the bus as a hunting blind and take shots at crows that might venture close for the blackberries. While scanning the bushes for any movement, I suddenly began to hear voices approaching. Fearing I might be in trouble for being in the quarry (and aboard someone’s school bus), I gently eased myself and my rifle down onto the dusty floor and tried to remain as still and as quiet as possible. Thankfully, I had closed the doors to the bus upon my successful entry, so no one would have suspected an interloper. Sure enough, the voices grew louder still, and I could make them out clearly—it was two girls, most likely around my own age. I held my breath as I heard the doors at the front of the bus creak open. I remained still, not sure how I would explain myself when discovered. I was relieved when I realized that the girls had chosen seats at the front of the bus. I peered under the seats and could see their feet beneath the seat where they had perched. They were speaking in quiet, hushed (almost conspiratorial) tones, so I really couldn’t make out what was being discussed. After a few minutes, I watched as one girl exited the bus. I risked discovery and peeked over the top of the seats, observing a darkhaired girl wearing a stocking cap still sitting in the seat. In a few moments, I heard footsteps and observed the other girl, with longer blond hair and also wearing a stocking cap, climb back into the bus. In her hands was some sort of serving tray (looking back, I think it may have been a school lunch tray) containing two mugs. The blond girl placed the tray on the adjacent seat, closed the bus doors, and then served whatever was in the mugs. It was cold enough that I could see my breath, but I don’t recall seeing any steam rising from the cups—or from the girls’ breath either, for that matter. I decided it looked like I was going to be here awhile, so I slid back under my seat in the back and proceeded to wait them out. After about twenty to thirty minutes, I noticed it had grown completely still and quiet in the bus. I no longer heard the frantic whisperings or the sounds of shifting in the seats. Carefully, I eased my head up for another peek—only to discover that I was completely alone in the school bus. At first I thought maybe I was mistaken, and assumed that maybe the girls had done the same thing I had and were resting either across the seats or even on the floor. I left my rifle in the back of the bus, so as not to frighten them with it, and walked stealthily to the front of the bus. No one was there. Perplexed, I returned to the back of the bus and retrieved my BB gun. It was starting to get dark, and I didn’t want to be caught out in an unfamiliar area after dark—trying to climb the rough rocks out of the quarry in the dark probably wouldn’t have been a good idea. The bus doors were closed, and I even tried opening and closing them a few times. No matter how fast or slow or rough or gentle I worked the doors, they still made a distinctive sound. There was no way they could have left via the doors without my having heard them. I’m not sure exactly what I witnessed that day, but I’m sure it was of paranormal or supernatural origin. I didn’t revisit the quarry until later in the winter when I returned with a friend. I had told him all about my mysterious encounter with the bus and the girls. He eyed me suspiciously when we arrived in the middle of the quarry—and found nothing but a huge patch of berry briars. There was no evidence that a bus had ever been inside the briar patch. I now feel that this was something meant for me to experience. I have yet to fully understand the meaning, but it was essentially a turning point in my life, and I can trace back to that moment when I began to realize the ‘gift’ that I have, and I have spent the rest of my life learning how to use it to help others. (from Strange Things in the Woods, by Steve Stockton)

In the next account, I suspect that the whole scene was projected into his mind, as nothing had changed in his physical reality. It was a quite elaborate and detailed experience. Why this would happen to him is another question. In my article of Elevators To Other Dimensions are more stories of drastic and lengthy changes of reality inside a building.

It happened about 8 years ago. I'm a 35 years old anesthetist from Egypt. 8 years ago I was working in a small hospital in the rural City of Rosetta (if you know Rosetta Stone, this is the city where they found it). The hospital is formed of 5 floors. The dormitories are in the 5th floor. The ground floor had the emergency and causality department. Other floors have the wards, the labs and the operative theatre. At that time the hospital was under some maintenance. In that particular day I was on duty. There was nothing in the operative theatre that afternoon, so I was in my room in the 5th floor surfing the web on my netbook. I heard some knocks on the door. It was the janitor, he told me that some new (beds and wardrobes) would be delivered now. He asked me to stay out of my room till they finish the replacement. I stayed in the TV room for a while when suddenly the PA system announced my name to head immediately to ER. Before I moved, one security man came running, and he told me that there was a big road traffic accident that involved a school bus and that every one available is needed down. I rushed to my room, found the new furniture in place, so I closed it and ran down to the ER. When I entered the ER department I noticed the new color of the walls, before it was green now it's blue with silver decorations everywhere. While I was helping the children, I asked one nurse when did they change the colors of the ER, will all the hospital have the same pattern. She looked me confused and asked what new color, it was always like that. I got confused myself but I didn't pay attention to that. There was many injured children and some of them got burns due to the bus caught fire. There's were many doctors, pediatricians, surgeons etc. A lot of them were new faces to me. I was working in this place for several years, so I almost knew everyone. I was asking myself when all those new people came. I should be more social and so but I didn't expect anything bad. I was asking the people I know about the new doctors and always I was getting the same answers: you don't know him?! How?! He was here for several years. We meet over lunch or dinner etc. Again I was confused but I didn't pay attention, many patients are waiting for my attention. A couple of hours later, everything is fine and things began to settle down. So I went outside the ER to have some fresh air. I won't forget what I saw. The hospital place is near the Nile (the Western branch, the Rosetta branch) so that's what I usually see when I leave the hospital. But what I saw was simply the Mediterranean. Rosetta City is near the Mediterranean but not that close. I couldn't believe my eyes. I began to look to the surrounding buildings. Some I knew, some I didn't. Now I freaked out, I remembered that I didn't recognize the ER or the new doctors. I ran inside to my colleagues and I asked them about what is outside they told me It's the Mediterranean. I shouted: I know it's but how did it come to here? Every one was confused. I kept asking where am I? And my colleagues started to calm me down and try to understand why the panic. I tried to call my parents (I was single at that time) using my cellphone, but they didn't answer. I wanted to call another older anesthetist, I consider him a father and my best friend. I couldn't find his name on my phone. I really freaked out. I asked my colleagues for his phone number, every one told me that they don't recognize the name. I was sure that I wasn't dreaming, I was treating children calculating drug doses my mind was clear enough to know that I wasn't dreaming. I got a mental block, I didn't know what to do. Then I decided that I will leave the hospital at once, I need to see my family. I ran to the 5th floor to my room to change my clothes and get my things before I leave the place. Once I opened the room, I noticed the usual furniture. No new furniture, no new bed or wardrobe. I stood there for a moment totally lost. Then I heard some one calling me. It was a security guard. He told me that there is a big accident down that involved a lot of children, and they needed everyone down there. I kept staring at him without any response. He kept talking that PA is down because of a faulty maintenance and that's why they are calling the doctors individually. I told him that I will go down ... He asked me if they are any other doctors in the dormitory? I told him that I don't know, so he went to check. I had a look outside the window and here it was the Nile and the usual scene. But I was already lost. I went down to help, the same children, same injuries, but I was completely lost, confused and hands shaking my legs barely carried me. My colleagues (usual daily group - no more new doctors) asked if I was OK and that I was pale. The next few days was like hell to me. I had nightmares. I wasn't able to think clearly during my day. Then I took one week off to calm down. I didn't have anything similar. I wasn't on any medications at that time or under any kind of stress. Everything was clear it wasn't a dream at all. I'm sure. Till today, I still remember the children and what I did to them. I only told this story to this older anesthetist and later to my wife because whenever I remember it, I remember that horrible feelings I had. (Reddit)

The next story also happened in a hospital, where a boy gets lost in dark corridors that are not there. The strange experiences are often accompanied by darkness and the absence of people:

The following looks mundane, but it is interesting because it contains the typical absence of sounds, but also the total lack of people in a place that was totally busy just minutes before.

My own "glitch" occurred something like 12-15 years ago. Finally feeling brave enough to share:

I was a teenager visiting my cousins in San Antonio, TX (12-15 years ago). My parents are divorced, and we were visiting my father's sister. So it was my dad, my younger brother, myself, and 4 cousins, aunt and uncle. We'd go down there and stay for a week or so every year, and find things around the state to do. Mexico one year, The Alamo another, River Walk, the obvious stuff.

Anyway, we were at this enormous water park called Schlitterbahn. I can't stress how big the place felt, and although I can't remember the exact layout or anything like that, I remember a few key things (besides a couple ridiculous rides); There were a ton of people, and it was really noisy.

My brother and I have always remained really close, we moved a lot and shared many of the same friends, only 2 years apart. Anyway, we were walking much faster than the rest of the family (my wife hates this about me, and yells at me for power walking everywhere, but I can't help it) We kept hearing them calling for us to stop, and we'd turn around and wait for them to catch up. In any case, my dad finally figured out we were too psyched to mosey around this legendary water park, so he suggested that him, my brother and I split from the rest of the group for a bit, and meet up for lunch and ride some stuff together after that.

So here's where it gets interesting. We're walking along one of the paths, still a ton of people around, still a ton of noise. There are little gift shops and whatever lining the path, trees decorations. Suddenly had to pee, so I went by myself and found the restroom, not 15 feet away from where my dad and brother were. Because it's a water park, the restroom is the kind designed for wet people to be walking in and out all day, so it's like concrete everywhere, big huge doorway with no door, but angled around a wall cleverly so nobody could look in. It also was a single building, no walls on either sides. Meaning you could walk around it. The first thing that struck me as odd was that there was nobody else in the bathroom. It was slightly unnerving that a moment ago I was surrounded by people and suddenly I felt alone. I finished my business, instead of turning left, to leave out the door I came through, I saw to my right a mirrored version of the same entrance (same style no-door and angled walls, just reversed). I thought I'd see more parts of the park in the distance, or whatever, then just walk around and continue with my dad and brother.

Only instead of walking out into a water park filled with people, nobody was around. I was totally alone. I couldn't hear anybody either, and I started to get really confused. I couldn't hear anything. I also just felt in my core that I wasn't in the same place, even though the environment looked pretty much the same. I turned back and looked at the door, then walked to the right side of the building and couldn't see anybody from that side and got really nervous. I continued my way around it and looked down what I swear was the same path as before and it was empty. And I mean ZERO people. I thought I got lost and went through a wrong door somewhere, so I hurried back around and through the door I exited from. Back through the restroom (still empty) and out the other side.

And waiting for me was my dad and brother, and the noisy crowd I had been around all day. I don't think I was gone for a long time, or at least they didn't say anything, and neither did I.

In fact, I've never told anyone that story. I never had a reason to, because it's not a ghost story, or particularly chilling. It's just this bizarre thing that I've never been able to make sense of. (Reddit)

Being on a cemetery that is not there later on, and has never existed on that location:

This was out in the country in Rhode Island, and it happened around 1981, right after I had graduated from high school. I had gone to stay with relatives in Rhode Island, as my dad’s work had taken him out of the country to France, and my mom luckily was able to go with him. I had visited New England on a few occasions, but I was really enjoying my newfound freedom on this trip. It was nice to be a teen and not have your parents looking over your shoulder for a while. My relatives were not as overly cautious as my mom and dad, so that suited me just fine and took some of the pressure off those tasked with ‘keeping an eye on me.’ While exploring in the woods a few miles down the road, I chanced across an old cemetery, forgotten and far off the beaten path. The stones were ancient and were some of the most ornate and intricately carved I had ever seen. As I was enjoying the handiwork associated with this now-lost art, I realized it was starting to get dark and I had better head back. Although I was having a blast being free, I didn’t want to end up lost in an unfamiliar area after nightfall. I went back a few days later to do some rubbings of the headstones, but could find no evidence that a cemetery had ever existed in that location. Perplexed, I pressed on, but eventually came to the bank of a shallow but fastmoving stream. The stream was unknown to me, so obviously I hadn’t traveled this far before. I returned home with my beeswax and rice paper unused. Later on that week, I even went to the county library and pulled out the dusty old topography maps, but even by going back several decades, I could not find any evidence of a cemetery having ever been located where I had been. I was certain it was the right area, due to the roadways, one of which had originally been a part of the route stagecoaches used centuries ago. I asked my relatives I was staying with, but none of the household knew anything about a cemetery nearby. Strange, strange, strange! (from Strange Things in the Woods, by Steve Stockton)

It can be quite distressing when nothing is familiar:

In the spring of 2006, I was walking around my childhood neighborhood during a visit to my small hometown in Western Pa. I climbed the hill down the block from the old house, going to the very top of what had always been called The Mound...or The Indian Mound, as I remembered it from the 1950s. Word had been, many years ago, that someone had become interested in this mound, wanting to dig into it, but that the project came to an abrupt end.

I always loved simply standing on top of the mound. When the trees were bare in the cold months, I loved to look out over the mountains, and, indeed, it seemed as it was a perfect vantage point for watching all around for a good distance.

The day I last went there, I parked my car at the old corner store, where the proprietor was just putting on a fresh pot of coffee. She invited me in for some when I got down the hill.

Once at the top I looked over the old neighborhood, and the surrounding hills, recalling all sorts of good memories of the place...and then started down. I suddenly realized I must have gotten turned the wrong way, because the neighborhood I was heading for was, in no way, familiar. I headed back to the top, and began to walk around it slowly, checking often to see the usual way down to the little store, my car, and a neighborhood so familiar I could draw it in my sleep. No matter which way I went down the slope, nothing was familiar. Homes were there, but they were entirely different from those I knew were "really" there. The little grocery store was nowhere to be seen.

By my third turn around the top of the hill, trying desperately to orient myself, I began to feel panic, and even began to formulate what I would say if I had to knock on one of doors of those unfamiliar houses. I made a fourth turn, and suddenly everything was perfectly the way it should be. The houses I grew up with, the store, my car. Being no spring chicken, I considered it a miracle to have gotten to the bottom of the hill in one piece, because I ran to the bottom.

I never had coffee with the nice lady in the store, because I jumped in the car, peeled out, and drove back to the house where I was visiting. (Mysterious Universe website)

Here we have again the silence, and the total lack of people, except for one man who suddenly is gone:

I was stationed at U-Tapao Air Base in Thailand in '69-'70. I was 19 years old at the time. We lived in an open bay barracks about 150 feet long, 3 stories high, higher ranking NCO's lived on the first floor lesser ranks on the second and third - I was on the second floor. The bay was open, but we used lockers and partitions about head-high for some privacy. We made cubicles 4 men per, we each had a locker, a bed, and a common desk, sometimes small shelves as well. There were rows of lights all along the ceiling so if someone turned on the lights it woke the whole floor up. If you stood a little tall you could see down the barracks. The barracks was in an east-west line with double doors on each end and the latrines were on the west end. All floors were the same, my cubicle was on the westerly end. With about 200-300 people in each barracks (and my squadron alone had three barracks, the officers had quarters elsewhere) coming and going at all times of the day and night. You can imagine the mayhem, noise and lack of privacy. Also we had "hootch" girls cleaning up and washing clothes, making beds, ironing uniforms, etc. all day in and around the barracks. There was a man who lived in our barracks, an airman, who I had seen around at work and at the barracks - quiet, kind of strange, just a little off. I had heard that this man, something was wrong, and he was being flown back to the states. What the problem was...nobody knew. Rumors suggested that there was a personality issue, maybe mental health. I don't know. I heard that he just didn't fit in somehow. Here's the part that has spooked me for 44 years now. One day I had a routine medical appointment. After I was done I went back to the barracks. I had a little break before the shuttle bus was coming by, so I could get on to work. When I walked in the barracks I noticed that I was the only one in the barracks - no noise, no house girls, completely deserted and quiet. This was unusual, and very strange. I walked to my cubicle, opened my locker, got a paperback book and took a break, still not realizing the implications. Where was everyone? Usually there were guys going to work, getting off work, sleeping, hootch girls chattering away, guys drinking - but not now.After a few minutes, I got up and walked to the east end of the barracks to go out to the bus stop. As I got close to the door, and on a cubicle to my right I noticed this guy sitting in his cubicle dressed in his uniform (the khaki 1505's)...a uniform not worn for the type of work we did. He had a full duffel next to him and was smoking a cigarette. I said "looks like your leaving" and he nodded "yeah." I said, "well good luck." "Thanks" he replied. I took about four steps, suddenly remembered that I had forgot my secure area badge. I turned around to go back to my cubicle to get my badge and as I passed the cubicle where the guy was sitting...HE WAS GONE, vanished, him and his bag. The only thing left was a cigarette still burning in the ashtray, I remember very distinctly the smoke curling up and the complete silence, and stillness. There was no way he was in the hallway. If he had been I would have seen him, and if he was going to the latrine he wouldn't have taken his duffel...they are awkward and hard to move around if they're full. He wasn't in any other cubicle because on my way back to the opposite end of the barracks, I would have seen him. Nobody ever knew what happened...everyone assumed that he got on a plane as scheduled. But one thing I know for sure is that one minute he was sitting there and within 10 seconds he was gone. Just as soon as I turned my back he disappeared. I can remember the incident vividly. I know it happened but I can't explain it. To this day, I'm stymied. (Phantom and Monsters)

Lost and Confused

It is not unusual to get lost in the woods or unfamiliar terrain. Here we are talking about exceptional circumstances where people get lost and confused in an otherwise familiar environment, and even in a very small place. This is  familiar to the elf-lore, in which the elves make unsuspecting people confused and make them wandering in a very small area for hours.

Where I live, some of the old people talk about fairies, and fairy fields. Apparently, if you happen to walk into an area that belongs to the fairies, they might play tricks on you, and you can can get lost in places that should be impossible to get lost in. I am a fairly sceptical atheist, and I don't believe in this sort of stuff at all, but something kind of odd happened to my brother and I when we were younger. We were taking a shortcut through the woods and fields near our home. We were about 2-3 fields from our house when it happened. We got lost. When I say we got lost, I mean we couldn't find our way out of the field. It wasn't that big, but we spent over an hour walking around and around the perimeter without finding a way out. We were starting to get a bit freaked out (my bro at this point had put on his jumper turned inside out as prescribed for these matters in the local folklore), when we finally saw it, a large, wide open gateway that wasn't even closed or obscured by overgrown bushes or brambles. Still don't have any idea how we possibly did not find it in five minutes. (Reddit)

Being lost and confused can also happen when driving when the otherwise familiar environment becomes unfamiliar. In the next account, we have the typical appearance of dense woods next to the road, absence of cars, and darkness that often accompany these strange experiences. Of course, some 'missing time' too:

Last weekend, I was invited over to my friend's apartment to hang out. He lives about 10 or so minutes away, and I've been there countless times. Nothing about this place is new. No one is building anything, there's only two main roads you can take to get there, and he's surrounded by other houses, a Walgreens, a gas station, and a Rite Aid. He's not in the middle of nowhere.

I stay for a few hours, and decide to leave around 12:30 am. We didn't drink, we didn't do any drugs, we literally just sat on his couch and watched Thor: Ragnarok while eating some pizza. Like I said, there are two roads to get to and from his house, and I decided to take the less busy, more residential one, which I usually do when I leave. Again, I've been on this road hundreds of times. So, I start driving, put the radio on, and await my turn, which is on the left. When it should be coming up, I start to look for it, only, there's no turn. I drive for a bit more, maybe 5 minutes or so, and I think to myself that I probably just passed it, because I've been driving for way too long at this point. Again, I think to myself, I'll just drive until I find a parking space where I can pull in and turn around. Except, now that I'm actually really paying attention to where I'm going, I have no clue where I am.

What should be houses around me are now woods. Complete, extremely dark, thick woods. The road is so narrow that there's no second lane, and it's so black that it's almost blue. I have to turn on my high beams, which is rare in my city, as we have street lights. I'm extremely confused, because we don't have woods anywhere around there. Like I said, where he lives, there's a Walgreens, a dentist's office, gas stations, a laundromat, Burger King, Dunkin Donuts, Walmart, etc. It's a place people frequent, a place where there are houses and apartments all over. Not woods.

Anyway, I decide that I'll just drive for a few more minutes to see if I can get my bearings. I drive for about 3-5 more minutes, as there was only one song that played on the radio during that time, and there's just absolutely nothing but a straight one lane road, woods, and complete darkness. No houses, no cars, no street lights, no signs. I honestly started to get a little freaked out, and figured that I should just turn around. To do so, I had to do a K point turn, and with my high beams shining into the woods, there are just rows and rows of trees. You literally couldn't see anything. I'm just completely confused by this point, and turn back around.

I drove for about 3-5 more minutes, as there was a commercial break on the radio, and finally, I come back onto a street. A street I recognize, because on the left is my friend's apartment. I'm back on the main road I turned onto when I left his place, only now, it's 1:30 am, and I have a quarter of a tank of gas left, when I never let my tank get below half. Somehow, in those 10-20 minutes I was driving, an hour had passed, and I used up about half my tank of gas.

Really, really confused now, I drive down the street, and my turn is on the left, right where it should be, meaning that I never passed it in the first place, as I didn't circle around...even though I never turned off anywhere, because the road is straight, and that's the only turn you can make. I somehow drove completely straight, turned, drove straight back again, and ended up right outside my friend's apartment.

I have no clue if that's a glitch, if I somehow entered an alternate dimension... I don't know what happened. I told my brother the next day, how I was surrounded by woods, how I never made a turn, how there was just nothing, and he was puzzled too. He asked me, "where were you?" Unfortunately, I don't think I'll ever be able to answer him. At this point, I'd even chalk it up to me being tired, as it was late, but I work nights, and frequently stay up until 3:00 am. (Reddit)