Missing hiker speaks on 9 nights lost in Santa Cruz Mountains

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    BOULDER CREEK, California (KSBW) — A three-hour hike turned into nine nights lost in the Santa Cruz Mountains for a Boulder Creek man who was shirtless, drank water from creeks and ate wild berries to stay alive.

“I didn’t bring anything because I thought I was doing a three-hour hike to go to work,” said Lukas McClish.

McClish went into the woods with only a flashlight and folding scissors. It would be more than a week before the raggedy-looking hiker was found.

“So I kind of just hiked each day. I go up a canyon, down a canyon to the next waterfall and sit down by the waterfall and drink water out of my boot,” McClish said.

It was Tuesday when the 34-year-old McClish went for a hike in Boulder Creek and ended up getting lost. He wouldn’t be found until Thursday evening.

“I felt comfortable the whole time I was out there I wasn’t worried. I had a mountain lion that was following me, and it was cool. It kept its distance. I think it was just somebody watching over me,” McClish said.

The problem is McClish didn’t tell anyone where he was going, and by the time Father’s Day rolled around Sunday, his family started worrying and filed a missing person’s report with the sheriff’s office; the search was now on.

“Some nights, I just had to trust God that he was going to be OK, and that was hard to do. Some nights when we would go to bed at night because I would worry about where he was, where he was sleeping and how cold he was and where he was if he was alive,” said McClish’s mother, Diane.

McClish slept on a bed of wet leaves while yelling for help and thinking of his next meal.

“Just help, help. I’m over here. Or is anybody out there? I want a burrito and a taco bowl, that’s what I thought about every day when after the first five days, when I started to kind of realize that I might be in over my head,” McClish said.

But Thursday afternoon, someone finally heard his cries for help, Boulder Creek fire deployed a drone and spotted his location, a state park’s K-9 tracked him down, and McClish was escorted out of a remote canyon, reunited with family.

“Met a lot of people because I had more people come to me and tell me how much they love my son and how they just hoped that we would find him. I didn’t realize that so many people in this town love Luke,” said the mother.

That search effort involved dozens of law enforcement officers and first responders from Boulder Creek fire, the sheriff’s office, state parks and CAL FIRE. The hiker’s parents thanked all of them, plus friends and family who helped bring him home alive.

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