Is Fresno County's town of Friant a paranormal hotspot?

Millerton Lake which is near Friant, CA. Is this location a paranormal hot spot?
Photo courtesy of Rennett Stowe from Flickr.

I know it's been A WHILE since I have written anything. Given the past year and a half it's been hard to really go anywhere but hopefully that will be changing soon. Still I was itching to write something as it's been over two years and since then I had focused more on social media and let this site lay fallow, something I want to fix. So I decided to check out the National UFO Reporting Center for any local sightings but with a different focus, not on the newness of the sightings, but the location.

I found a few that occurred over in Friant by Millerton lake. Now you are probably asking yourself why I picked Friant, and here is why. I've been reading a lot the past year on different theories about UFOs, ghosts, cryptids, etc. and came across the idea of a place that is considered "thin". This is an old (think pre-Christian) Irish concept of where the veil between worlds is thin. Now you are probably asking yourself "Ok but why Friant and UFOs?" Well I am glad you asked that. There is a theory out there with some paranormal researchers that UFOs, cryptids, ghosts, etc. are all from the same place so to speak. Ever hear of Skinwalker Ranch? That place has everything and is considered to be a thin place. And I think Friant is also one of those. And here's why.

Remember the story I wrote about Lost Lake and the ghosts that haunt the place plus the weird creature that was supposedly seen in the water? Right near Friant. Remember the story of the phantom police officer on Friant Road? Yep, that's another. Oh remember that poor woman who was found amnesiac wandering near Millerton thinking she was a mermaid? Also Friant. And let's not forget the numerous sightings of large fish or some other strange creature swimming in the waters of Millerton Lake.

So we have all these weird things around this one location? But no UFO sightings right? Well that's where the before mentioned National UFO Reporting Center comes into play. I was able to find two sightings reported sightings around the Friant area. Now I know these are only two sightings within the last twenty years of so, but imagine all the UFOs that weren't reported either because people didn't know how or weren't aware of a way to report these sightings.

That said below are the two reported sightings. Both were of strange lights seen in the skies. I have included the text from the original reports as well as the link to them.


Reported: 8/1/2018 6:19:06 PM 18:19
Location: Friant, CA
Shape: Light



Summer of 2017, Friant, California… On the Madera side of Millerton, there is a dead end in which families can set up BBQ's and a dock for people with boats. It was approximately 9:40 when my boyfriend and i noticed people hanging out on the dock enjoying the stars.

We decided to walk down to the dock and do the same. When we got to the dock we sat down for a few moments to wait for the other people to leave so we could sit at the very end. Eventually they left and we sat on the end. Just looking into the sky discussing our relationship problems no more than two minutes into the conversation we notice a light flying smoothly threw the sky, not fast like a jet and not slow like a airplane.. It just glided vertically through the sky and before we knew it, it zoomed up into the sky horizontally and just disappeared. As it zoomed up to disappear it didnt just move at a crazy speed its almost if it just faded up into the sky. We could depict what it was, we were ! so shocked we couldn't bring our minds the the thought of us actually sighting a ufo. Crazy part is, you'd think we'd be so stoked and tell our family, but its as if the whole moment slipped our mind cause we never brought up… i'm a strong believer so how could something like this just slip my mind til this year of 2018? How did i not instantly react and pull out my phone? It's like being stuck in the moment made us forget what was really happening…

Link.


Reported: 9/25/2012 11:40:00 AM 11:40
Location: Friant, CA
Shape: Light
Duration:5 minutes
Flying colors in the middle of nowhere.

I was driving down the road which was empty at the time and looked up at the sky because I saw pretty colors which were red, green and blue

At first I thought it was a reflection of something but quickly noticed it wasn't. I pulled over so I could get a clean clear picture because it was so close and my phone froze, which has never happened before.

By the time my phone unfroze it was gone.

And I don't do drugs or drink and I wasn't sleepy, it was not my imagination playing tricks on me.

Link.

Back to the thin theory and why I think Friant is one of these places. It's rare to have the trinity of paranormal in the same area (Bridgewater Triangle in Southeast Massachusetts is another). I know I have been saying this but I definitely need to explore this area some more, specifically Lost Lake. But I wouldn't be surprised if the town of Friant has some stories. And lets not forget that the original town of Millerton lies at the bottom of the lake ever since the dam was built. Now no one died due to the flooding but I wonder what lies at the bottom of the lake? That said the area is definitely a place I need to revisit soon and hopefully it won't take me another two years to write about it.

More strange creature sightings at Millerton Lake

Millerton Lake during the spring time. Photo courtesy of David Prasad via Flickr.

The focus on Weird Fresno lately has been heavy on the haunted spots throughout the Central Valley, as they seem to be the most prolific. But I love a good creature sighting and when I received an e-mail the other night (while I was at Channel Road no less) about yet another creature sighting that occurred at Millerton Lake, I knew I had to share.

According to the person who e-mailed me, it was 1975 and he and his wife went on a camping trip up at Millerton Lake one weekday. He describes the lake as being very calm and the water was "smooth as glass". As he and his wife were enjoying the view they noticed a wake forming on the surface of the water. Suddenly a large head surfaces and then dives back down into the water quickly followed by the back of the creature (the witness said he didn't see a tail). As it completed it's dive it left a huge wake behind. He goes on to estimate that it was at least 30 feet in length and that the only way he could describe it was it appeared similar to the descriptions of the Loch Ness monster.

The next day as they were leaving the couple came across a gas station and decided to gas up. There he noticed a bulletin board with news clippings with telling about different sightings of the creature he saw the previous day.

Now I know I've reported on giant catfish sightings in the past, but the description of the wake seems similar to this story I wrote about back in March of 2010 where another witness saw a large mass swimming around leaving a big wake behind it. Could this be the same thing that was seen back in '76? And if so, what the hell is beneath the surface of Millerton Lake?

Another strange creature sighted at Millerton Lake

Something strange lurks underneath the waters of Millerton Lake.

Earlier this week I received a phone call on the Weird Fresno hotline (yes I have a hotline) from a local resident who said he and his family witnessed something strange on their outing to Millerton Lake on Sunday. What's even more interesting is that a ranger that was on patrol there, saw the same thing. The person then found this website by doing a Google search for any strange Millerton sightings. Below is a transcript of the phone call.

I found your website while trying to figure out what I saw at Millerton Lake on this past Sunday. I'm not sure what it was in the lake, it was huge and it was making waves and there was nobody else out there.

I was on the dam with my family. It was bizare because after you saw these waves and something out there, some kind of mass, a ranger boat came up to where this was going on and was looking for whatever was causing it. And I'm pretty sure it saw what it was, because it was circling it.

So I'm not sure what it was, could have been a giant catfish or some giant fish. But it was very large. I would say maybe, from my distance it was about 200 yards away, I would say maybe about fifteen, maybe twenty feet long and the width of it was maybe about ten feet. It was rather large and that's the reason why probably the ranger saw it from afar, because you could see it from afar it was that big.

It was making lots of waves and then it dissapeared once the ranger showed up and the ranger hung around there for about, I would say for about fifteen minutes circling it. I heard some weird-like noises, like from the boat I don't know if he was singing or what. It was just bizare. My wife was there, she saw it as well.

The person also gave me his contact information and a follow up call is planned, but this has me wondering. I had posted several months ago about a giant catfish sighting also at Millerton Lake, but I has just assumed that it was just a "tall tale" told by someone to someone that was told to someone else, etc. and really didn't have much truth to it. But this sighting has me wondering what the hell is lurking under the waters by the dam.

I'm hoping to plan a small excursion to Millerton sometime in the near future. If so I'll post anything I find on here. That is if I'm not eaten by the damn thing.

Giant Catfish in Fresno County's Millerton Lake?

I remember the first time I went fishing with my stepfather(I was around nine or so) and he told me this story of a friend of his who had supposedly seen a giant catfish in Millerton Lake.

The story goes that the man was fishing around the Friant Dam, when, while he was moving around, accidentally knocked off the boat motor. He was able to make it to shore using the trolling motor, but decided that he wanted to try to retrieve the motor as it was new and he had paid a lot for it.

The man rented some dive equipment and returned the next weekend. To lift his motor back to the surface, he took with him several large balloons that he would fill with a small auxiliary tank that would lift the motor back to the surface. After descending to the bottom, he began searching for his motor. After several minutes he came across something that he wouldn't have believed if he hadn't seen it for himself. Staring at him was an extremely large catfish. According to him the mouth was so big it could have easily have swallowed him. He estimated the length to be between 8-10' long. This was a quick estimate has he didn't stick around long enough to get a thorough look at it. Needless to say he got the hell out of there and never did retrieve his motor.

Now I don't know if this story is just another variant of the big fish that got away or something else, but I thought it was worth mentioning. I know back east, especially in the south large catfish have been known to be caught. Some even match the descriptions that I mentioned above. And catfish do have a fast growth rate, and they continue to grow all there life.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were several large catfish at the bottom of Millerton Lake near the dam hiding where no one will bother them. Their only company a forgotten motor boat engine that has long since rusted away.