Had a Bit of an Unintended Adventure on Today's Hike

30-30remchester said:
Spending most of my life high in the mountains of Colorado hunting deer and elk, I have wandered around a bit. I have zero, none, nada, no sense of direction. Could not tell you which direction I am facing while typing. This had lead me to some wonderful discoveries. I seldom go where there is a trail. I bushwhack. My feet need to be where no human feet have been before as that is where the elk live. Every once in a while I get to where no white man has been before and find a rusty beer can. I know it is different for those who live in heavily populated areas and places that have abundant vegetation. The few time I have ventured east of the Mississippi, I was astounded by the foliage, and can see the need for trails. But out west there are vast open areas and even in dark timber you can see a good distance. I have been totally confused as to the way back to my truck and have spent hours trying to find it. When darkness falls and the truck is nowhere in sight I do not worry. I think back to the Lewis and Clark expedition. They spent 3 years wandering around without knowing where they were going, and they faired well. This comforts me.
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There are places I hunt here in western PA that you can't see 50 feet from where you're standing it's so thick. I got myself lost for a couple hours in Idaho on an elk hunt....I'd go to the top of a ridge to try and see a road or something and all I'd see were other hills covered with trees...I kept turning right to get back from whence I came.....shortly before dark, I had selected a blown down tree for a sleeping place, but decided to go the top of the hill I was climbing and crack off three shots into the ground...my buddies were about 100 yards over the crest of the hill and the truck was in sight from there...course I heard all the "flatlander" jokes and the bozos had already called my wife to tell her I was lost....she said, oh no, he always has a compass, he's not lost.........made quite a few wrong turns, however. ...now GPS goes with me when I Drift.
 
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If the sun is overhead.....

If you can see a shadow from something steady, the sun will still be moving and by marking it, in a few minutes you can see where the shadow is going.

Well marked trails....aren't. I was near the end of a long hike and the trail led into something like an open picnic area below the top of the mountain. So I kept going thinking, it's right up ahead. Some yo yo didn't think to put a sign in the area saying to turn right and go straight uphill from there. As I went it was looking less and less like the path. I was able to back track, but I was a little steamed. I had run ahead to make sure our ride didn't leave us, and my wife didn't emerge. It was almost dark when she came out of the woods.
 
Guess I just don't understand. I can guess that those here who haven't been lost or turned around don't get out much. Maybe we just don't admit it or have wildly different ideas of what lost amounts to. What I do know is that experience helps you get unlost. You learn that the first time you get the hint you're not going the right way, you need to stop. Call it a time out if you want. Any travel beyond that is just compounding the problem. Not only should you turn around when you're not lost, but you also should look forward to see what way you're heading. Not a glance, sometimes a good long stare or two. It serves other purposes, but if you're out hiking to see the scenery, you probably should look at it. And then take special notice of unusual features, like rocks or trees.

Once down in Koopers wildlife area, our leader kind of got turned around. We were jeeping, and the hills of southern KY and Northern TN are covered with thick trees. So we'd had a couple of parley's, and Chuck was without a clue. Then his wife said "ohhh, I remember that tree root over there". Leave it to Chucksters wife to notice and remember a tree root out of thousands. But then we knew where we were and just drove back to the main trail. Interesting how that works. A person who almost never utters a peep can be observant enough of some small feature.
 
havent-you-ever-g68udc.jpg
 
vonn, If you have never been lost you haven't been very far into the woods,swamps,mountains,etc.! Wow we drifted into each other raljr1!
_
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Wow, Holy moly I must have done the same!
I drifted off course just a bit once!,Found my way to the cabin before dinner! ;)
 
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As stupid as it sounds, while I was deployed with the Army we spent time in the desert and found you can get confused easily!! We followed the tire tracks to get to a camp off of the main road, a day later there are tracks everywhere!! It turned out a tank battalion took a "short cut" and messed up our trail. It is hilarious trying to figure out which ruts in the sand to follow. We finally got out the GPS and figured it out.

In Kuwait we had giant military camps surrounded by huge sand mounds. The incomer briefing was very clear. "Look around, we are on FLAT ground for miles. If you start walking up a hill you are LEAVING CAMP"!! This was also helpful because of the huge sand storms which dropped visibility to zero.
 
I love WV. My GF and I have toured a bit there-Morgantown, Cass Railroad, Snowshoe, Elkins (we got a suite with a hot tub that took up a whole room), found some rare virgin forest near there. Always drove through on the way to Myrtle Beach. Never got a ticket in Summersville, because I observed the speed limit. Appears a lot of people unable to do that through there.
 
pittpa said:
I love WV. My GF and I have toured a bit there-Morgantown, Cass Railroad, Snowshoe, Elkins (we got a suite with a hot tub that took up a whole room), found some rare virgin forest near there. Always drove through on the way to Myrtle Beach. Never got a ticket in Summersville, because I observed the speed limit. Appears a lot of people unable to do that through there.
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That's why we moved out here.
We usta live near DC in Alexandria VA. My wife worked across the street from the Pentagon and after 911, we figured we'd had enough of this area, packed up and headed for the mountains of West Virginia.
Best move we ever made.
 
You need to look into getting an inexpensive smartphone. My old one had magnetic sensors and a compass app. My current phone has a couple of mapping applications which use the phone's GPS even without a data or cell signal. Two days ago I had lunch at Jack In The Box and a lady had run out of gas and needed the address to give the auto club. Nobody in the place knew the address. I walked outside to get a GPS fix and told the lady my phone thinks we're at 2801 Hillcroft.
 
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kwselke said:
You need to look into getting an inexpensive smartphone. My old one had magnetic sensors and a compass app. My current phone has a couple of mapping applications which use the phone's GPS even without a data or cell signal. Two days ago I had lunch at Jack In The Box and a lady had run out of gas and needed the address to give the auto club. Nobody in the place knew the address. I walked outside to get a GPS fix and told the lady my phone thinks we're at 2801 Hillcroft.
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Actually, I'm looking into getting a refurbished GPS watch.
 
snubbyfan said:
Actually, I'm looking into getting a refurbished GPS watch.
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The watch will not be a camera, flashlight, calculator, voice recorder, book reader, music player, internet access device, and phone among other things too. There are some good Android phones out for under $100.
 
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