Clovis man last seen on Wednesday near Shaver Lake found alive

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Loving embraces and sighs of relief.

Cody King, of Clovis, was reunited with his family after being lost near Shaver Lake for close to four days.

"He was terrified, I was terrified," his mother, Collette Shannon said.

Cody was with his girlfriend Wednesday night when their car got stuck in the snow in the Dinkey Creek area.

He went to get help and hitched a ride on a PG&E truck.

They drove about 30 minutes to Bald Mountain so Cody could get a signal on his cellphone.

"My roadside assistant, they weren't answering or something like that, so he ended up giving me a shovel and dropping me back off," King said.

He tried to make his way back to his car in the freezing cold.

It was pitch black, his phone died and he took a wrong turn.

"There was a Y in the road so I went left instead of right, and there was a gate down there, and I just slept by that on the side of the road," King said.

As Cody tried to make his way through the woods, his girlfriend waited for him in their car.

As soon as the sun came up, she went looking for help.

Fresno County search and rescue teams tried to find Cody, as he wandered through the woods.

"I found a creek, and I followed the creek down and found a cabin, and I broke into the cabin and stayed there," he said.

The elements hindered search efforts, but detectives found several clues along the way.

"We found some campsite that he had made, we found some equipment that he had dropped along the way and we found some shoe tracks," said Fresno County Sheriff's Sgt. Jeff Stricker.

Cody says he would light signal fires hoping someone would find him.

On day three, investigators found smoke coming from a cabin they believed Cody had stayed.

The following day those clues led them to another cabin down the road.

"The dog kind of got his scent and started working that direction," Sgt. Stricker said.

"I heard dogs barking, so I went out to the front," King said.

His mother was in church when she got the news. Cody was found alive and in good health.

"I fell to the ground. I don't think I'll ever forget that moment in my life," she said.

A weight was lifted off her shoulders. She rushed over to her son, squeezed him, and let him know how much he means to her.

Cody says he wants to thank all the Fresno County Search and Rescue members who were out looking for him.

He and his family plan to spend a few days up in Shaver Lake to enjoy some quality time together.