Roadside Bigfoot: Georgia museum devoted to legendary beast

Along a bustling four-lane highway that winds through the north Georgia mountains, an unassuming wooden structure breaks the monotony of churches, billboards and stores selling kitschy knickknacks.

Once a BYOB supper club, it's now ground zero in the search for a legendary beast.

Welcome to Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows Bigfoot researcher David Bakara opening a box containing plaster cast of footprints said to be from a Russian Bigfoot at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

"I can remember my great-grandmother talking about having a cabin in the woods, and she saw Sasquatch," says Sherry Gaskinn of Villa Rica, Georgia, who was driving by one afternoon and had to stop in. "I've always been curious."

Her husband, Phillip Blevins, lets out a skeptical chuckle.

"If it was up to me," he says, "I'd already be on down the road."

In this Aug. 8, 2019, photo, a cutout of a Bigfoot directs visitors to the entrance of Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda.

He's looking to provide both entertainment and enlightenment in an area known for apple orchards and blazing fall colors.

"I wanted to take what I know about Bigfoot as an active researcher and investigator, but I'm also a huge Disney World fan," the 57-year-old Bakara says. "I was thinking, 'Maybe I can make this thing like a family attraction.'"

This Aug. 8, 2019 photo shows a Bigfoot attack display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

Instead of Space Mountain, the attraction not far from the Tennessee state line has an elaborate display of Bigfoot laying siege to a remote cabin, with a hatchet-wielding mannequin desperately trying to bar the door as two hairy paws burst over the top. Color-coded maps document hundreds of alleged sightings, a towering reproduction depicts a hairy 8-foot-tall beast, and the famed 1967 video of an alleged Sasquatch sighting plays on a loop, along with harrowing recollections from those who claim to have encountered a Bigfoot.

"The reason I didn't shoot it is, it was just too human," a hunter says in one account. "I couldn't pull the trigger because something told me this ain't right."

There's even a glass case claiming to hold feces collected from a Sasquatch in Oregon.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows a plaster cast of footprints believed to be made by a Bigfoot on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

Believers continually add to the already ample collection. On a recent day, the mail carrier delivered two casts of footprints supposedly made by foreign Bigfoots.

"You want to see an Australian cast?" Bakara asks, tearing into the package.

He has filled up the former supper club and is planning to expand his museum, which welcomes about 50,000 visitors a year.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows Bigfoot masks on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

For those who think Bigfoot is a phenomenon confined to the Pacific Northwest, where that grainy video from more than five decades ago gave Sasquatch its greatest brush with fame, Bakara is quick to point out countless sightings the world over.

In Australia, the mythical creature is known as Yowie. In the Himalayas, they call it Yeti. In Russia, it goes by Alma.

Closer to home, there's the Florida Skunk Ape, the Georgia Booger, the Missouri Momo.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows items donated by the family of Yeti researcher Tom Slick on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

"There are several subspecies of these things," Bakara claims, displaying nothing but sincerity. "Some have short hair. Others have long, red flowing hair. Some are multicolored, almost like a squirrel where's there's gray and red and brown mixed together. Some of them have a very human-like face. They just run the gamut."

He'll gladly tell you about the time he saw a pair of the elusive beasts.

In 2010, Bakara says, he was summoned by a Florida man who had spotted strange creatures on his property. Using a thermal imager, he and his team were able to make out a pair of creatures emerging from a nearby swamp.

In this Aug. 8, 2019, photo, Jared Schultz looks at a display of a Bigfoot attack at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

"We took turns looking at them," he says. "They finally figured out we could see them, so they left."

Bakara could talk all day about what's become his life's work but clams up on the most obvious questions:

What is Bigfoot?

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows a Bigfoot mask on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

Where did it come from?

"That's a secret we're not supposed to know about," he replies ominously.

Bakara implies that the creatures are the unintended consequence of a government experiment gone haywire, hinting that his life would be disrupted if he ever went public with his entire body of work.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows hair samples said to have been recovered after a 2015 Bigfoot sighting in north Georgia on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

Bakara has been interested in Bigfoot since a young age, spurred on by early news reports and the 1972 cult classic "The Legend of Boggy Creek," a sort of docudrama about a Sasquatch-like creature supposedly hunkered down in Arkansas.

He knows he'll never persuade all the people — even most of the people — of Bigfoot's existence, and he's fine with that.

"Does everybody need to know everything you know?" Bakara asks. "No. It's best they don't know.'

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows a Bigfoot mask and other items donated by the family of Yeti researcher Tom Slick on display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. The owner of this intriguing piece of Americana at the southern edge of the Appalachians is David Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

There are doubters, of course.

One person signed the guestbook as "Bigfoot," listing his home as the "Woods." In the section that asks "How did you hear about us," the visitor writes: "People were taking my picture."

But Bakara says most visitors treat the museum with respect, at least while they're on the grounds.

This Aug. 8, 2019, photo shows Bigfoot researcher and museum owner David Bakara pointing to a display at Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum in Cherry Log, Ga. Bakara, a longtime member of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization who served in the Navy, drove long-haul trucks and tended bar before opening the museum in early 2016 with his wife, Malinda. (AP PhotoJohn Bazemore)

"I'm just curious," says Angie Langellier, who stopped in with her family recently while passing through on a trip from Illinois. "So far, I've had nothing that's convinced me.

"But obviously, a lot of people have seen a lot of things that have convinced them."

Follow Paul Newberry on Twitter at www.twitter.com/pnewberry1963 His work can be found at https://apnews.com

On the web: Expedition: Bigfoot! The Sasquatch Museum at https://www.expeditionbigfoot.com/

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Ukrainian court on Friday ordered the detention of the country’s farm minister in the latest high-profile corruption investigation, while Kyiv security officials assessed how they can recover lost battlefield momentum in the war against Russia.

Ukraine’s High Anti-Corruption Court ruled that Agriculture Minister Oleksandr Solskyi should be held in custody for 60 days, but he was released after paying bail of 75 million hryvnias ($1.77 million), a statement said.

Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau suspects Solskyi headed an organized crime group that between 2017 and 2021 unlawfully obtained land worth 291 million hryvnias ($6.85 million) and attempted to obtain other land worth 190 million hryvnias ($4.47 million).

Ukraine is trying to root out corruption that has long dogged the country. A dragnet over the past two years has seen Ukraine’s defense minister, top prosecutor, intelligence chief and other senior officials lose their jobs.

That has caused embarrassment and unease as Ukraine receives tens of billions of dollars in foreign aid to help fight Russia’s army, and the European Union and NATO have demanded widespread anti-graft measures before Kyiv can realize its ambition of joining the blocs.

In Ukraine's capital, doctors and ambulance crews evacuated patients from a children’s hospital on Friday after a video circulated online saying Russia planned to attack it.

Parents hefting bags of clothes, toys and food carried toddlers and led young children from the Kyiv City Children’s Hospital No. 1 on the outskirts of the city. Medics helped them into a fleet of waiting ambulances to be transported to other facilities.

In the video, a security official from Russian ally Belarus alleged that military personnel were based in the hospital. Kyiv city authorities said that the claim was “a lie and provocation.”

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said that civic authorities were awaiting an assessment from security services before deciding when it was safe to reopen the hospital.

“We cannot risk the lives of our children,” he said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was due to hold online talks Friday with the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, which has been the key international organization coordinating the delivery of weapons and other aid to Ukraine.

Zelenskyy said late Thursday that the meeting would discuss how to turn around Ukraine’s fortunes on the battlefield. The Kremlin’s forces have gained an edge over Kyiv’s army in recent months as Ukraine grappled with a shortage of ammunition and troops.

Russia, despite sustaining high losses, has been taking control of small settlements as part of its effort to drive deeper into eastern Ukraine after capturing the city of Avdiivka in February, the U.K. defense ministry said Friday.

It’s been slow going for the Kremlin’s troops in eastern Ukraine and is likely to stay that way, according to the Institute for the Study of War. However, the key hilltop town of Chasiv Yar is vulnerable to the Russian onslaught, which is using glide bombs — powerful Soviet-era weapons that were originally unguided but have been retrofitted with a navigational targeting system — that obliterate targets.

“Russian forces do pose a credible threat of seizing Chasiv Yar, although they may not be able to do so rapidly,” the Washington-based think tank said late Thursday.

It added that Russian commanders are likely seeking to advance as much as possible before the arrival in the coming weeks and months of new U.S. military aid, which was held up for six months by political differences in Congress.

While that U.S. help wasn’t forthcoming, Ukraine’s European partners didn’t pick up the slack, according to German’s Kiel Institute for the World Economy, which tracks Ukraine support.

“The European aid in recent months is nowhere near enough to fill the gap left by the lack of U.S. assistance, particularly in the area of ammunition and artillery shells,” it said in a report Thursday.

Ukraine is making a broad effort to take back the initiative in the war after more than two years of fighting. It plans to manufacture more of its own weapons in the future, and is clamping down on young people avoiding conscription, though it will take time to process and train any new recruits.

Jill Lawless contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Ukrainian young acting student Gleb Batonskiy plays piano in a public park in Kyiv, Ukraine, Thursday, April 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)