California Bigfoot investigators were shocked over Memorial Day weekend when they found strange markings and hair on their pickup truck windows.
Now, they're hoping DNA tests will prove once and for all the existence of the legendary man-beast.
"On the passenger side window, when I first saw it, I almost threw up," said Jeffrey Gonzalez, an AT&T electronics technician and founder of the Sanger Paranormal Society.
Gonzalez and several others were in California's Sierra National Forest searching for evidence to confirm the reality of the creature. When it started to snow at their campsite, they were forced to leave two of their vehicles behind.
PHOTOS: THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT
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This still image taken from a 1977 film purports to show Bigfoot in California.
A film still shows what former rodeo rider Roger Patterson said is the American version of the Abominable Snowman of Nepal and Tibet. The film of the tall creature was shot by Patterson and Robert Gimlin northeast of Eureka, Calif., in October 1967.
Ohio Bigfoot Encounter -- April 2012
As a motor biker was driving through the Grand River area of Ohio in April 2012, an alleged Bigfoot ran across the road and was caught on videotape.
Depicted is an illustration of a creature reported to inhabit the Kemerovo region of Siberia. Scientists from the U.S., Russia and other countries have yet to find one of these creatures known as the Russian Snowman. In early October, researchers claimed to be 95 percent certain that the animal exists.
An alleged footprint of a Yeti, or Abominable Snowman, appears in snow near Mount Everest in 1951. Now, scientists are setting out to find evidence of a reported unknown, hairy, bipedal creature known as the Siberian Snowman.
Bigfoot or bear? Impression left on the driver's side window of a pickup truck owned by Jeffrey Gonzalez. The bizarre image was left by an alleged Bigfoot in California's Sierra National Forest over Memorial Day 2011. DNA samples of the impressions will eventually determine the identity of the animal responsible for them. (See next slide for a close-up of the paw-like impression.)
Close-up of the "paw" print image. The impression was reportedly left by Bigfoot on the window of a pickup truck in the California Sierra National Forest over Memorial Day weekend 2011.
Bigfoot or bear? Pictured is a second impression left on the rear side window of the same truck from the previous slides. According to forensic/law enforcement photographer Mickey Burrow, "What you're seeing is a swipe mark. It looks like a small hand, swiping to the left, leaving another impression, and there's hair within those areas -- you can see where the hair would be."
This footprint was found over Memorial Day weekend, 2011, near Fresno, Calif. by a group of campers who were on a Bigfoot-hunting expedition. The print, measuring approximately 12 inches, was found near a truck where possible DNA evidence was left behind by more than one Bigfoot creature.
This footprint was found in 2008 in the Sierra National Forest near Fresno, Calif.
Thomas Byers snapped this photo of "Bigfoot" along Golden Valley Church Road in Rutherford County on March 22, 2011.
Bill Willard is the leader of a group searching for evidence of a Sasquatch or Bigfoot creature, spotted by, among others, his two sons in Spotsylvania County. He is shown on May 19 in Thornburg, Va., with a plaster cast he made from a suspicious footprint several years ago.
This still frame image from video provided by Bigfoot Global LLC shows what Whitton and Dyer claimed was a Bigfoot or Sasquatch creature in an undisclosed area of a northern Georgia forest in June 2008.
This October 2007 image was taken by an automated camera set up by a hunter in a Pennsylvania forest the previous month. Some said it was a Bigfoot creature; others believed it was just a sick bear.
A preserved skull and hand said to be that of a Yeti or Abominable Snowman is on display at Pangboche monastery, near Mount Everest.
Idaho State University professor Jeffrey Meldrum displays what he said is a cast of a Bigfoot footprint from eastern Washington in September 2006. Some scientists said the school should revoke Meldrum's tenure.
Joedy Cook, director of the Ohio Center for Bigfoot Studies, talks to a visitor to his booth on Oct. 15, 2005, at the Texas Bigfoot Conference in Jefferson, Texas. The event, hosted by the Texas Bigfoot Research Center, drew enthusiasts and researchers of the legendary creature.
Ken Gerhard of Houston, Texas, holds a duplicate plaster cast footprint Oct. 15, 2005, at the Texas Bigfoot Conference. The event, hosted by the Texas Bigfoot Research Center, drew enthusiasts and researchers of the legendary creature.
Josh Gates, host of Syfy TV's "Destination: Truth," holds a plaster cast of what Malaysian ghost hunters said was a Bigfoot footprint in 2006.
Al Hodgson, a volunteer guide at the Willow Creek-China Flat Musuem in California, holds up a plaster cast of an alleged Bigfoot imprint in 2000. The museum houses a collection of research material donated by the estate of Bob Titmus, who spent his life trying to track the creature.
Costume maker Philip Morris, who does not believe the Bigfoot legend, claimed the Patterson-Gimlin film showed a person wearing a gorilla suit that he made.
"Two days later, we came back to pick up our vehicles and that's when we found the impressions," Gonzalez told AOL Weird News, recalling what he and his companions noticed on the passenger window.
"Apparently, the creature was looking in the window and left behind dirt and oil on it, leaving such an awesome picture, you can see the nose, the eye, the hair all over the face and the shoulders -- it's creepy, and it's not a bear."
Gonzalez and his friends -- including a former science teacher and a correctional officer -- also found a 12-inch footprint at the site. They concluded their hairy intruder wasn't a bear because none of the four ice chests that were filled with food on the back of Gonzalez's truck had been touched.
But it wasn't just the passenger side window that presented a surprise -- the driver's side of the truck showed the imprint of a much larger creature, strongly suggesting there were two unexplained visitors to the campsite.
"An impression was left of a nose, eyes and lips, but they were extremely large," Gonzalez said. "The lips measured about 6 inches long. You can see that the whole face was full of hair, so when it leaned up against the window, you can see the depth of the eye socket in the glass.
"I've shown people -- non-believers -- this photograph and this totally freaked them out."
After Gonzalez returned home that day, he called a forensic expert to take DNA samples of the fur or hair that was left around the window impressions.
"One of the cautions I have about finding a nose print or anything on the side of a car is that it could be a homeless person, resulting in people letting their imaginations go wild," said Loren Coleman, owner of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
"Of course, if you take a DNA sample and it comes back near-human or primate, then it would match both Bigfoot and a homeless person," Coleman told AOL Weird News.
But what about the addition of the large footprint near the truck where the window impressions were made?
"A 12-inch footprint is not too exciting, because it could be a human or bears imprinting on top of each other," Coleman said.
"In this case, it might not have been a homeless person, but in wilderness areas, there are other hikers and somebody would've naturally put their nose up to the window to look inside the car."
Gonzalez is holding a news conference on June 23 at the Piccadilly Inn in Fresno, Calif.
"I'll be presenting video of both windows, pictures and live testimony from the people who shared the event with me. We will also have a forensic expert who took DNA samples," he said.
Coleman, a long-time investigator of Bigfoot and other legendary creatures that come under the category of cryptozoology, is cautious about the outcome of this kind of news.
"You know, I'd be a fool if I didn't say that I'm hoping there's definitive evidence of Bigfoot found. I hope somebody will turn over any evidence to some scientists who could then hold a news conference at a university.
"Then people won't doubt what's going on."
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First Posted: 06/16/11 08:50 AM ET Updated: 11/15/11 05:44 AM ET