A really big ape

A new study indicates the largest known ape of all time, Gigantopithecus blackii, lived well into the time when humans inhabited its Asian home. Indeed, this 550-kg King Kong may have died out only 100,000 years ago.
Aside from the implications for primatology and paleontology, this also created a buzz in cryptozoology. Gigantopithecus (there are at least two species in the genus, with G. blackii being the largest) is the only primate of which we have fossil evidence that could account, based on size alone, for those yeti and sasquatch reports which describe apes up to 8 feet tall or more.
G. blackii is normally depicted as a gorilla-like animal which was normally a quadruped. Its sheer size is the main reason for assuming this. We have only teeth and jawbones, so there's a lot of room for speculation.
The connection with sasquatch seems a reach. Why would an animal of subtropical Asia (it's best known from China and Vietnam) make the journey across the Bering Strait land bridge in sufficient numbers to establish a North American population? This area was not always snow and ice, but it was hardly enticing foraging territory for a plant-eating ape. If sasquatch exists (I doubt it, but I hope I'm wrong) I suspect the ancestor is a somewhat smaller, more adaptable , omnivorous ape whose fossils we have not found yet.