Three Sightings of Ogopogo in Three Weeks Gives Investigator Hope of Lake Monster's Existence

A picture submitted to ogopogoquest.com in September of 2018 by amateur photographer Andrew S.

Monster hunter Bill Steciuk is excited at the prospect of three new sightings of Lake Okanagan's resident lake monster, Ogopogo.

“There haven’t been a lot of Ogopogo sightings lately, which is the problem,” Steciuk said. “Then all of a sudden you have three in three weeks. Totally amazing.”

Steciuk has recorded sightings of British Columbia’s most famous lake monster since 2003 on his website, www.ogopogoquest.com.

The most recent spate of sightings began September 7th when two brothers spotted something ‘snake-like’ along the shoreline near Bear Creek Provincial Park.

“When you’re sitting on the beach on a sunny day, you don’t expect to see a dinosaur coming out of the water,” David Halbauer told Global News. “We were all just stunned.”

Halbauer said the creature appeared about 100 meters offshore, and was so thick that he didn’t think he could put his arms around it.

Luckily, he was able to grab his cellphone in time to take a video.

The second sighting, on September 9th, was reported directly to Steciuk from amateur photographer Andrew Stark, who captured the photo displayed at the beginning of this article while sitting along Bluebird Bay.

"I was sitting on the shore of Bluebird Bay on a quiet Sunday (September 9, 2018). I am an amateur photographer and I love catching images on the lake. A large moving object suddenly reared out of the lake and moved quickly from left to right in my view. As you can see in my picture, there is a boat in the distance toward Squally Point, but nothing else, certainly no boats large enough to kick up such a wake. There also was no tremor recorded in the Okanagan September 9th (18) that would kick the lake up as I saw," he is quoted as saying on Steciuk's website.

The third sighting came from "Martin from Vancouver, currently working on [a] new highrise condo in Kelowna," according to Steciuk.

Sept 18, 2018 - I was working on the 22nd floor of a new highrise condo in Kelowna. I am working from out of town so I was taking in the views at approx 9am this morning. I noticed that there are not many boats in the water on a weekday and how calm the water was. I saw something in the water today that is very hard for me to explain. It looked like a giant snake breaching out of the water (barely) but enough to make pretty big waves in and around it. There were no boats in the area, and the water was very, very calm.

I told a co-worker to look out at the water in the area in question and my co-worker was looking and seeing what I was seeing and was also dumbfounded. I still do not know exactly what "it" was, but after doing some research on the internet the possibility of something very large living in the very deep and extensive waterways of Lake Okanagan is very possible...This "it" must have been approx. 30-50 feet long breaching out of the water for approx 2-3 minutes. I tried grabbing my cell phone out of my pocket to get a picture or video of this disturbance in the water, but by the time I got it out of my pocket, it had submerged and the waves almost instantly vanished and the water went calm. It is very interesting that there was a sighting last week near Bear Creek Park when MY encounter this morning was not far from there at all. Rough bearing from Google Maps is: 49°53'13.4"N 119°31'14.7"W.

It was approx. 200-300 Meters from the shore and definitely worth investigating further. I have always had a hard time believing in something that I have never seen with my own eyes...But after my experience today, I honestly can say that there IS something in these waters. They find new species all over our planet everyday and much of our planet has not been fully explored. I wish someone could get some drone footage of this area to possibly get a glimps and put all the speculators to rest.

I know there is something down there. I just find it very interesting that the Sighting last week by the man with the video was at Bear Creek Park which is not far at all from my sighting...Very similar description. There MUST be something. Would love to purchase a Drone and go up and down that stretch to get some concrete evidence.

This sighting report did not come with any photographic or video evidence, as Martin was unable to get his cellphone out of his pocket in time to capture the encounter.

Although extremely encouraged by the sighting reports, Steciuk is not necessarily surprised, since, as he said, September is a common month for encounters with Ogopogo.

“The majority of sightings, historically in Okanagan Lake, happen between the last week of August and the first week of October,” Steciuk said in an interview with Global News. “So if anybody wants to get a picture of Ogopogo they better get a camera and they better get out there on the lake.”

Fewer boats on the lake and changing temperatures could be factors involved in the increased number of sightings, he added.

For his part, Steciuk thinks that a species of large, snake-like creatures could inhabit Lake Okanagan after they swam up from the ocean and became trapped following the lake's waters receding to their current levels.

“The theory is that, eons ago, this lake was open to the ocean,” he said.

Steciuk has compiled sighting reports describing the ‘snake-like’ creatures going back to 1873 on his website.