It followed a lead from the British Hominid Research website, which gave an account of three anglers who were terrified by a huge, ape-like creature with glowing eyes while night fishing at Bolam Lake, near Belsay.

Normally a peaceful country park more well known for its swans than its Sasquatches, it nonetheless became the focus of a media frenzy and spawned hundreds of column inches of debate.

In their account, the local lads had been doing a spot of pike fishing in the small hours when the woods were completely devoid of human visitors.

But they soon became convinced they were being watched.

As they headed back to their car along the tree-lined pathway, one glanced over his shoulder - only to see what looked like a dark figure standing behind him in the middle of the track, silhouetted by the moonlight.

He later told BHR investigator Geoff Lincoln: "I was sure it was a person, the others did not see it at first.

"I pointed towards the figure ... it looked about 8 feet tall, heavy built, its eyes, or what seemed to be its eyes, glowed in the darkness.

"We ran, top speed, all the way back to the car. I had a camera in my bag, but the thought had not crossed my mind, too scared I think."

It wasn't the first time they had experienced a close encounter of the hairy kind.

One of the group said he had seen 'something' on a hill near the boundary wall, close to the remains of an Iron Age settlement, the year before.

Again, the creature was described as dark brown in colour and with huge muscular arms.

A few weeks after that sighting, on another overnight fishing expedition, the witness and a friend were disturbed by the sounds of snapping of branches and two loud thuds, one less than 10 feet away.

In the morning their tackle box was found lying on its side with everything tipped out, and their fish had vanished.

After the 2003 sighting, however, the beast hasn't made another reported appearance.

All I found, meanwhile, were swans and a few Canada geese.

Maybe Bolam Lake just got too busy for Bigfoot.

Related article: Is this really Bigfoot?