Screams at Pico Blanco - Costa Rica

During my travels as a consultant, I´ve had the opportunity to get to know different countries around the world, and listening interesting stories about phenomena without explanation. One of these stories occurred during one of my trips to Costa Rica, Central America.

I was visiting an old friend and he invited me to climb the Pico Blanco, in Escazu, and although I don't like climbing, i´ve thought that the encounter with the nature  would be interesting.

We departed at 6:00am, a sunday of March, from a place known as “San Antonio de Escazu”, and we began our ascent to the famous Pico Blanco, a mountain of approximately 2000 meters of height.

We were climbing for a couple of hours at a steady pace. While we went up, I heard several times some kind of scream very far in the mountains, however, as apparently only I listened because nobody repaired in the, I thought it was my inexperience in this kind of rides.

At approximately 10:30am we arrived at a plateau on the mountain, there we find another group of climbers, led by an older person and with a lot of experience in climbing to Pico Blanco, who had decided to climb the mountain but from the other side

We sat down to rest and tell the different experiences of each member of the group and it occurred to me to ask if it was a custom to make those screams when one climbed the mountain. When I mentioned that, all the members of the group stopped what they were doing and were silent. The guide of the other group asked me with a straight face -'" You have heard a scream in the mountain?, did you answered it back?"

I was surprised by the seriousness of the question and the look that everyone had, but just at that moment we heard back again the scream... it was a strange, acute and serious at the same time, all remained silent, but what really scared us all and left us speechless was that a few seconds later... we heard back again the same cry but only a few meters away from where we were all sitting. The guide again said, but with a firm voice and almost whispering... "No matter what happens, please no one  say absolutely nothing, don't move, do not panic or run.".

We were all petrified, about 80 feet away, trees and shrubs began to move as if something giant was moving, we heard something heavy being dragged in the mountain leaving behind many leaves... a few seconds later, we heard again the scream, but this time very far inside the mountain.

No one said anything, no one asked anything, we prefer to discuss other topics and ignore what had just happened. We continue walking in the mountains until we found the exit on the other side, around 14:30pm. When we arrived at the house of my friend, I asked him if he knew what had happened, only told me "At least no one dared to answer the scream".