After years of silence, a flurry of new Loch Ness monster sightings— are occurring. Many Loch Ness watchers had begun to speculate recently that perhaps whatever the creature or creatures were, they had finally died out.

The latest sighting—the eighth in five years—includes a photograph that researchers of the elusive creature are calling the best ever.

Photo: http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01254/SNN1933BX_682_1254833a.jpg

The photo depicts a dark, cylindrical-shaped object with three distinct humps breaking the surface of the lake. The surprisingly clear photograph was snapped by the camera phone of 24-year-old Tom Pickles. Pickles spotted the creature swimming past him as he kayaked on the lake. His companion on the excursion, Sarah Harrington, 23, also witnessed the animal.

Pickles described the size of what he saw of the creature as being three car lengths and watched it undulate on the surface of the water for about 20 seconds.

Sharing his story with the UK Telegraph, Pickles said: “It was petrifying and we paddled back to the shore straight away. At first I thought it was a dog and then saw it was much bigger and moving really quickly at about 10mph. Each hump was moving in a rippling motion and it was swimming fast. Its skin was like a seal’s but it’s shape was completely abnormal—it’s not like any animal I’ve ever seen before.”

Harrington added: “It was like an enormous snake. I only saw it for a few seconds but all I could think about was that I had to get off the lake.”

Several months ago the monster made the news when long unseen film footage taken of the lake monster resurfaced. The vintage footage of the elusive beast gained new respectability thanks to the son of the man who originally caught the monster with his camera.

Simon Dinsdale, son of a famous and respected Nessie researcher declared that the footage of the world-famous creature recorded by his father half a century ago is the real thing. He also shared his own sightings of the beast with fascinated reporters.

During 2010 a landscape designer, Richard Preston, contracted to work on the Aldourie Castle gardens located by the banks of the lake. Serendipitously, Preston had a camera with him and had time to take a series of photographs as the monster swam past in the distance.

The first sighting of what some think may be a plesiosaur, a creature thought extinct tens of millions of years in the past—occurred almost 1,450 years ago. Perhaps the date 565 CE should be enshrined in the history of Scotland’s tourist business, for that’s when a visiting Irish monk, wandering the banks of Loch Ness, reported seeing a large aquatic beast swimming energetically in the choppy waters.

From that day forward, the legend of the creature grew. Some gave it the name of Nessie. They believed that name sounded less threatening than calling it a monster.

But, monster it was and monster it will remain. Tourists that flock to the world famous Scottish lake are drawn there not because they hope to glimpse a creature that might be the namesake of a great aunt, but because it might actually be a living, breathing monster.

Myth, legend, fact? Debates about its existence have raged for hundreds of years. Photographs have emerged that were later proved to be hoaxes, other photographs are thought by some experts to be real.

Theories as to what kind of animal it could be abound. The major camps circle their wagons around a plesiosaur. Photographs deemed as authentic, eyewitness testimony, and sketches all point to a surviving dinosaur species.

The problem with Nessie being a dinosaur, however, is that paleontologists believe the cold-blooded, water-loving dinosaur lived in warm water—water much warmer than the average 42 degrees Fahrenheit of Loch Ness. But then, the paleontologists may be wrong, or perhaps over millions of years plesiosaurs evolved and adopted to colder water temperatures.

Others forcefully argue that if a creature—or creatures—exist, it’s a very large eel, or a rare, long-necked seal…or even a swimming elephant!

The latest photo is exciting experts as it exactly matches the 2006 eyewitness description given by Steve Burnip, journalism lecturer.  

“I’m really pleased that someone has finally got a really good picture of it,” Burnip said when shown the photo. “I know what I saw and it shocked me, it had three humps and it’s uncanny the likeness between this and what I saw five years ago.”