Most of the article is about the mountain biker who went missing at Spider Lake
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I still wonder about this mystery as I have spent a lot of time in that trail system both before and after he disappeared.
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Same here. Very sad. Didnt know about the father taking his own life. I cant even the imagine the pain he was holding on too.
Careful out there fellas
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Anyone know if the police ever followed up on the hunter who has been known to sabotage those trails?
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I’ve heard from some people who were part of the search. They say they combed the area pretty thoroughly and were doubtful that he was in there.
I dunno, someone else’s body was found a year later that the searchers missed when they were looking for Marty.
As was said in the article, it only takes one person to miss him and then cross off that area as cleared.
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A body that had been there for years in one thing but a cyclist and his bike is an other.
They did two grid searches one with volunteers and a second a couple days later with army reservists after every trail was searched the first two days. Everyone may have missed him and he may still be there but I find it hard to believe.
All search tasks finish with a clue probability report. In some terrain we could step over a body and not know it, but this wasn’t the case in Spider. Areas with low probability of detection often get searched again. Areas are always missed to some degree since the resources just don’t exist to get 100% in all areas.
We used to search adjacent to the Evil Birch trail every year for this one fella. One time a trail builder finally found the remains somewhere not near any trail nor near where we were searching.
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Yeah, Evil Birch guy was found in Fox Point area way over on the Aspotagan peninsula.
Quite a mystery, for sure.
Then I’m thinking of another fella that was found between Fox and Ash Lakes.
I often wonder is/was there any way to reasonably search the water of spider lake itself, or that smaller body of water where skull loops back?
The missing bike is what stands out in the story for me, it makes it more of a mystery.
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My theory is that the Spider Lake dude is thousands of miles from here. He rode out to a pre-determined point, put his bike in a new beau’s vehicle and got the hell out of dodge. Changed his name and is currently enjoying his new life.
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EXACTLY this
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Some people have no desire to ever be found again.
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“A change is as good as a rest”
-Jim Lahey
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There are so many trails and old roads in that area that I find it hard to imagine how you could get lost. Hiking, sure, but with a bike? If you are biking on a trail and it ends, the only logical thing to do is to go back the other way. I struggle to come up with a reasonable explanation as to how you’d get too far away from a trail with a bike.
Intentional disappearance of some type certainly seems like the most likely explanation.
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And what a spectacular way to do it too. Of course, it cost a lot to mount that search and undoubtedly ruined his family’s life.
But, man. You’ve gotta admire the panache.
Hell, he may be reading this thread or that article.
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Yeah, I’ve always wondered if it was a witness protection thing of some sort. It couldn’t be any easier to ride in and meet a waiting car on the highway.
I was away during that search so I can’t speak specifics on what the team did. I was a member of HSAR at the time. Water lines are almost always searched. From the helicopter you can see straight down into the water in many circumstances. Also bodies in general float, sink, float, sink and so on at various stages of decomp, so it’s easy to miss when doing a shore line search. I remember when a body was found in the water at another place, there had been several searches at various times walk right past and not see anything.
I also remember hearing a theory that he was murdered by somebody and the missing MTBer was just the cover for it all. We’ll probably never know until his body is found alive or dead somewhere.
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