I will start this off by saying this is all 100% true and there is 0% exaggeration. I did leave out a few screams and cuss words but the rest is accurate
We were coming back from town Saturday around noon and were almost home. Had about 2 miles to go. We just popped over a hill and around a sharp curve and here is a herd of buffalo in the road. Not only are they in the road but they are stampeding down the road. Right at us. When we first saw them they were about 100 yards away and coming fast. I didn't even stop but just slammed the car into reverse and started backing up. Buffalo are still coming and getting closer by the second. My wife is now yelling "you have got to go faster, faster, faster". I'm now doing about 30 in reverse up a hill and around a curve. The buffalo are still gaining and are less then 50 yards away and still gaining fast. Wife is still screaming at me to go faster. This is a part of the road where there is a high rock cliff on 1 side and a steep drop off on the other. No room for mistakes. We're now backing up around 35 mph around a curve. Can't see anything behind us including the road. Buffalo aren't gaining on us anymore but they aren't loosing ground either. After about 1/4 mile my wife yells for me to turn right and do it NOW NOW NOW. She's right, there's a flat spot on the side of the road and I swing the back end of the car into it. Don't even hit the brakes but toss the car into a forward gear and floor it. Buffalo are now less then 20 yards away. The lead one is tossing it's head and blowing steam and is intent on ramming us. We could hear and feel their hoofs hitting the pavement and we had the radio on and the car is whining real loud. We get up to about 40 mph and the buffalo start falling behind a little bit. We hit 50 and are going around curves meant to be taken at 30. We get to a neighbors house and head inside real fast. Lost the buffaloes as they wouldn't cross the little bridge over a stream. The neighbors looked at us like we were insane when we told them what happened and don't think they believed us until later when other neighbors started filling in the entire story. They should have been able to smell the fear on us.
When we were going in reverse up the hill and around the curves we were doing 30-40 mph. In REVERSE. I normally don't drive that fast on that road going forward.
We knew the buffalo were running loose in the area and had been for a couple of weeks. We sure weren't expecting them to be stampeding down the road in the middle of the day.
We learned this next part later in the day.
The stampede started when the buffalo were spotted on a neighbors farm and the owner and a few neighbors decided to try and round them up. They were all on foot and waving their arms and yelling. That spooked the buffalo and the male buffalo decided to protect his herd and charged one of the neighbors. The guy barely managed to get out out of the way and behind his truck. He shot the male buffalo and it went down. Then it got back up. Shot it a couple more times and it stayed down but the females are now spooked by the gunshots, the smell of blood and the noises the male buffalo was making and were now stampeding and trying to run over all the people. Everyone managed to get out of the way and behind trees but the stampede was on.
That's when we just happened to be coming down the road. Just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
We did see the dead male on the back of a flat bed truck later in the day. It was huge and the owner said it was smaller then the females and it only weighed about
1500 pounds. I can believe that because the female that was at the front of the stampede was huge huge. They said she probably weighs around 2000 pounds. Estimated value of the male buffalo was between $5000-$6000.And I understand that there is going to be a buffalo bbq given by the owner of the buffaloes.
Last I heard late last night was they didn't know where the herd went to and couldn't find them. The owner of the buffaloes stopped and asked where the last place we had seen them was. We had no idea where the last place we saw them was other then OUR WINDSHIELD....
You would think 20 or so buffaloes would be easy to find but nope. They get off into the woods and down in the ravines and unless they are making lots of noise you have no idea they are there.
Randy