Creature Feature Friday: The Slide-Rock Bolter
Ready for a really weird one? Sliding straight out of lumberjack lore, it’s the Slide-Rock Bolter! Have you ever heard the tale (…pun kind of intended…) of this monstrous land whale? Check out our Creature Feature Friday in an excerpt from our blog, 9 Cryptids That Are (Probably) Too Absurd To Be Real:
Imagine you’re taking a leisurely summer hike through the mountains, your family by your side, as you enjoy the scenic spruce trees and mountain views. Without warning, the ground begins to rumble. Rocks slide down the slopes as the rumbling grows, and the sound of trees crashing starts to come closer and closer. Then suddenly… you’re swallowed by a whale. Sure, it sounds absurd, but if you believe the legends of the Slide-Rock Bolter, that’s exactly what could happen if you’re a tourist hiking the mountains of Colorado. Another cryptid from lumberjack lore, the Slide-Rock Bolter is a giant terrestrial whale-like creature that uses grab hooks on its tail flipper to bolt onto mountainsides, awaiting a human snack to walk by. The huge cryptid can wait unmoving for days on end, positioned strategically on slopes greater than 45 degrees so as to give itself the fastest possible trajectory as it comes shooting down the mountain to swallow its prey. According to legend, the Slide-Rock Bolter was responsible for gulping up whole parties of tourists in one mouthful, and ruining numerous spruce trees with each mammoth slide down the rock face. Finally fed up with the mountain whale’s destruction, a clever forest ranger of Ophir Peaks and the Lizzard Head is said to have rigged up a decoy tourist outfitted with dynamite and blown up the Slide-Rock Bolter as it swallowed its last meal. Colorado tourists have that unnamed ranger to thank for now being able to traverse through the mountains uneaten - at least by this particular absurd cryptid!
