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Backpacker Magazine – June 2008
Survive This: Separated From Group
If you get lost from your hiking party, here's how to get found–fast.
Photo by Survive Getting Separated
(Tim Marrs)
Predicament
You catch sight of a life-list bird and stop to take photos, telling the group you'll catch up soon. Ten minutes later, you stow your camera and set off briskly, only to realize after a mile that the trail you're following isn't a trail at all.
Lifeline
Stop. "Lost hikers can make their situation much worse by moving in haste," says John Race, owner and guide at Washington's Northwest Mountain School. Instead of shouting, blow three short blasts on a whistle. In most cases, your friends will be looking (and listening) for you. If not, mark your present location with sticks and attempt to backtrack to the original trail. If you can't find it, or get more disoriented, return to your original lost location, find a visible spot to wait, and signal for help. Bushwhack to regain the trail only if you can see your destination, have good navigation skills and a compass or GPS, and won't encounter impassable terrain.
Once you regain the trail, attempt to follow your group. If you don't know which direction to take at trail junctions, stop and signal with your whistle. Your friends will find you there.
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READERS COMMENTS
What whistle.... knew I forgot to pack something.... How about demonstrating how to make a whistle from an acorn or beer bottle cap? It's as loud as a store bought whistle and the materials are generally available.
Posted: Sep 02, 2008 Dan
This article has good advice, especially the first word, "Stop." I once got separated from the group when I was working on a census of hill tribe villages for a development project in northern Thailand. The crew were experienced Thai and hill tribe community development workers.
We were walking from one village to the next when I stopped to defecate. When I looked for the group again, I could not see them. I stopped and looked for slowly for clues for directions. There was no one definite trail, but many little criss-crossing paths made by local people and animals. Dense low clouds covered the sky, so I could not see any shadows to tell directions. There were many shoe prints going in many directions, so I could not tell which belonged to our crew. I found some of my own shoe prints, and figured out which way I had been going. I had a simple map, but no compass. I knew that we had been going east toward a village several kilometers away, and that a north-south road went through the village. So I aimed at about east-northeast, so I might arrive at the road north of the village, and turn south toward the village. But after about an hour, I saw our group several hundred meters ahead, so I hurried and caught up with them.
Posted: Sep 02, 2008 Bob Vryheid
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