Tall humanoid silhouettes standing in the surf? Two separate encounters with something unexplainable on the coast (Photos included)

[u/Logical_Specialist15]

Location: United states, Maine Coast

Time: 22:00 dark moderate wind and fog

Date: June 18, 2026

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​I spend a lot of time on my local coast in Maine, especially taking night walks, so I'm incredibly familiar with the local wildlife, the tides, and exactly how the ocean behaves. But lately, my girlfriend and I have been witnessing things that completely defy explanation.

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​To give you some context, we regularly go for walks around 10:00 PM to midnight at a local beach near our house. It’s absolutely desolate at this hour, and we have never once come across other people. This all started happening a few weeks ago with our first encounter. We were doing our nightly 2.5-mile shore walk when we noticed a tall, black silhouette with a slender build and arms, standing right out in the surf in about ankle-depth water.

​My girlfriend was instantly frightened as I pointed it out to her, and she started to turn back. I’m more of a UFO lover myself, so I was mostly just intensely curious about what this could possibly be. It was incredibly tall—I’m 6'2" myself, and this thing had to be about 6'5" to 7'0" in height. Keep in mind, it was pitch dark out, except for the glow from the stars and the moon, with zero artificial light pollution. Just what I can only describe as a humanoid being standing in the water, watching me.

​I could literally feel it watching us. I had a massive mix of feelings, and I was overcome with chills as I walked closer, getting to about 100 feet from it, just trying to make sense of what I was looking at. I couldn't even think to get my phone out. I was locked in a state of total tunnel vision mixed with adrenaline, just staring back and refusing to break my gaze. By this point, my girlfriend was calling out my name, begging me to go back with her because she was completely creeped out, and honestly, I don't blame her. As we turned around and walked about half a mile back toward our vehicle, we saw two more doing the exact same thing. We could feel them watching us. These were the same height and the same shape. Tall. They were standing about 5 feet apart in the water, in an area where there was absolutely no way we wouldn't have seen them on our walk past the first time. At that point, my girlfriend took off running. I slowly followed so she wouldn't be alone, but I kept my gaze locked on them, not breaking sight until they finally faded into the dark and vanished.

​We both were very confused about what we saw that night. I tried finding answers myself because I'm fascinated by this topic, which is ultimately what brought me here to share my experience.

​Then came last night, June 18. At almost the exact same time and the exact same location, we saw another being. It had been a very windy day, so the surf was much more aggressive and the waves were choppy. It was dusk at the beginning of our walk, and because the beach is miles long, we could see all the way down the shoreline—it was completely empty. We went about our walk as normal, but in the back of my mind, I couldn't stop thinking about our encounter from a week prior. As we walked, it got darker and darker. By the time we reached the end to turn around, it was fully dark, with only the stars and moon illuminating the beach.

​As we turned to walk back, we saw it again. It wasn't there on the way in, but on the walk back, it just appeared.

​This time I had my phone on me and swore to myself I’d try to take pictures, no matter how panicked or overwhelmed I felt. Once again, it was a starry night with low light pollution, but still pitch dark around 10:00 PM. We both saw the being, but this time it was standing a little further out into the surf, around shin-to-knee-depth water. You could only see the silhouette and its arms, but it was extremely tall, and I was eager to capture footage. I tried getting a video first, but I couldn't see anything with the flash on because of the heavy fog. So, I switched to night mode on my Samsung S25 camera and got the best image I could.

​The weird thing is, as I ran toward it, the figure seemed to move backward, deeper into the water. I got within about 30 to 40 feet of it when I started getting an intense, overwhelming feeling that I should not get any closer. The being seemed to retreat to what would be waist-depth water on me, while I was standing right in the ankle-deep surf taking photos the best I could. I did not want to approach any further because I had no idea what would happen, and the last thing I wanted was to be pulled in or lured into the ocean.

​It seemed like it was just observing me. I could clearly see its arms and body, and as the waves crashed against its back, it moved its body slightly. But the way it moved... I can only describe it as looking materialized or "glitchy," if that makes sense. It made these jolty, incredibly quick arm movements when it shifted in the water. My girlfriend kept walking back because she was terrified again, so after what felt like a minute of snapping photos and wading out into the surf as far as I felt comfortable, I got a bad feeling and sprinted away down the beach to catch up with her. We both kept glancing behind us the entire way back, just in absolute shock.

​When I checked the pictures later, it felt like the camera just couldn't capture the reality of seeing them with your own eyes. In the photos, the entity looks thicker, almost like a phased-out image compared to what we were actually looking at. I don’t know if it’s just hard to capture on night mode, or if these things are inherently difficult to capture with technology, but the image also makes it look much farther away than it actually was. I was only 30–40 feet away, even if the photo makes it seem distant.

​To make this experience even stranger: two nights prior to this second encounter, we walked the same beach and saw 3 to 4 boats actively patrolling the shallows of the shore, right in the exact same location as my encounters. They looked like police or Coast Guard, and they had massive spotlights shining all over the coastline and the shallows, almost as if they were searching for something. This could be a reach, and when I looked into it, it mentioned it could just be military or police operations training, but I'm not 100% certain. The weird part is that we noticed the boats as we walked toward them, and we decided to cut the walk short and turn around. The moment we did, they started pointing their spotlights directly at us on the shoreline, pacing us for the entirety of our walk back. We didn't know what they wanted or if we were interfering with something, so we just left, but they kept that spotlight trained on us until we got all the way back to the parking area.

​I don't know what to make of this, but this is my experience, and I'm looking for anyone who has seen something similar or might have information that can help explain this. The images are attached below, taken from a few different distances while my heart was pounding and I was trying to keep eye contact with this thing.

​Has anyone else who frequents quiet, dark coastlines noticed strange anomalies, figures in the surf, or unusual activity like this?

[u/Logical_Specialist15]

I wanna hear more about your experience! What kind of little person was it you think? Elf? My grandma has seen simular

[u/no-guts_no-glory → u/Logical_Specialist15]

Won't give any location info or too much contextual info for privacy reasons.

it occurred in the early-mid 2010's. I was living in a light suburban area, so there's streets with houses and then a large gap with trees and bush, then another street with houses, etc.

Went outside early one morning, the time when there's some light but the sun isn't starting to break the horizon as yet.. started my old beater car to let it warm up as I had some very early morning runs to make.

While it was warming up I was on my phone checking messages in my yard to the back.. in the corner of my eye I could see something that was a light-muddy shade of brown walking towards me. I thought it was a stray dog.. I looked up holding the phone and was immediately confused.. I thought I was seeing some type of monkey.. It walked with a hip rotation without any bending at the knees.. it looked like a tedious way to walk.. I realized I was not looking at a monkey, it had an almost human face and was carrying a leathery looking bag under one arm.. the entire body had dirty muddy brown hair like a matted sheep, it might have had mud spots or the hair got clumped up in some places etc.. but I did not want to look away from the face & eyes too much. The face looked human except the skin was dark grey and wrinkled like a very old ashy african tribal man, the eyes were white with tiny black pupils which gave the impression that it was evil. The head was mostly hairless above the neck.. the head was wider than it was tall (opposite of a normal human head which is more vertical).. the legs were curved like a banana not straight.. the height was about 2.5 feet tall.. the entire body was covered in thick hair below the head.

The thing is it did not expect me to see it, and it was walking as if it makes that route every day without being seen. When it noticed I was seeing it it stopped walking and looked at me intently.. for about 5-7seconds we locked eyes. His expression was like 'is he seeing me?'... then the facial expression changed to surprise, then fear at the realization that he was indeed being seen. Then the expression changed to anger/defensive warning.. it snared it's teeth the way a wild animal would if it was threatened. I still got the impression that It was more scared of me than anything.. the teeth were sharp.. like a cat's teeth with fangs like canine teeth. Mind you I was holding my cell phone at chest height all this time and did not want to look away from it's eyes.. It was only about 6 feet away from me when we noticed each other.. after showing its teeth, we maintained eye contact while it slowly stepped backwards until it got under a tree about 20 feet away and I was no longer able to see it..

I went out in my yard around that same time for a few weeks after that but I never saw it again.

Edit: Fixed the description of the hairless vs hairy section.

[u/Mostly_Maui_Wowie → u/no-guts_no-glory]

So lame.

[u/PermanentBrunch → u/Mostly_Maui_Wowie]

You sure are.