You Ever Get Turned Around In The Woods?

After having to do night navigation in the wonderful carbon copy, flat forests of eastern north carolina, and being basically lost for hours on end trying to find an ammo can I 110% bring a compass with me and I have a map of some sort with me. The california desert east of san diego was a little easier to navigate but my legs were hungry for cactus needles for some reason at night. I also have onx on the phone and I make sure that someone knows where I am and if I don't show by this time and day come find me.
 
Walked down a canyon fishing a small creek in eastern AZ. Figured walking back out would be easy—just head upstream. After a great day I turned around to head out. At a point I found the canyon no longer looked familiar. After scrambling to the top and making my way to the road, my truck was nowhere to be found. I tried to reason it out, even scratching a map in the dirt, but my brain just couldn’t make sense of it. After a lot of walking and trial and error, I finally found the truck, exactly in the opposite direction I expected it to be. Apparently I headed up a side canyon thinking I was following my intended course. To this day I still can’t wrap my brain around it.
 
Back in the early 90's when I was just starting to adventure out without my Dad or Pap, I had just such an experience. I had a cheap compass (probably from a cracker jack box) a topo map from the Forestry and was going into an area of the Allegheny National Forestry (North Central PA) that Dad/Pap had take me to before. The only issue is that I'd never learned to use the map/compass combo, mistook the south needle for the north needle, and admittedly didn't know the area as well as my young mind thought. I hiked into my spot alright, a little rock overhang with a clearly marked tack trail, and sat the early morning. The plan was that at 1030 I would leave, hike over to the next ridgeline opposite where I was and meet up with Pap for lunch. The problems started when I got to the top of the opposing ridge and it was wide, flat, and covered in hemlock thickets. I got turned around and checked my compass, mis-read the N/S needle, and took off in the wrong direction. A few hours later I was thoroughly lost and in a panic.

I kept walking up one ridge and then another trying to find anything that I could get my bearings on. Fortunately I lucked into a Forestry boundary marker that was also marked on my topo map and I managed to make my way back to camp just before Dad called search and rescue. I don't believe I was ever more than a couple miles from camp but it sure felt like I was gonna be lost forever. Lesson learned, buy better compass, learn to read a top map/compass combo, try to stay calm.
 
Over 30 years ago my cousin and I were going elk hunting in the Uintas in Utah. I had never been there. Left after work at midnight and I drove first and then slept as my cousin finished driving. We got to our parking spot around 4am and I woke up and we started hiking. Never did see our parking spot in daylight. Around 11am we decided to split up for an hour and then my cousin would bugle and we'd meet up and have lunch. After about an hour, I hear a bugle and start towards what I thought was my cousin. Ends up being an elk that I chased for a couple hours.

About this time I decide I better head back to the truck. After hiking for awhile I realized I had no idea where I was. Like the teenage idiot that I was, I decided to keep hiking. Finally right at dark I came to a dirt road (would find out later I was 21 miles from the truck). Didn't even know which way to walk down the road. Picked a direction and started walking. Awhile later I see lights and flag down a truck. Told him I'm lost and ask for help. He said hop in and drove me around for hours looking for the truck. Never did find it because I had no idea where it was to begin with. Finally I asked him if he could take me to the nearest town. He obliged and drove for over an hour to a small town and dropped me off at a 7-11. I didn't even have my wallet to give him gas money so I got his address and later sent him some money and the envelope came back as undeliverable.

I was completely disgusting with painted camo face and extremely dirty/sweaty from hiking all day. Asked the clerk if I could use the phone and called my Dad. He said he'd leave and come get me (4 hours away). Called my cousin's wife (pre cell phone days) and let her know I wasn't dead as I knew my cousin would be worried. Also called the local police to let them know not to send a search party if someone called in. As I'm on the phone a school bus rolls in and in walk about a dozen cheerleaders going to some competition. SO embarassing!

I decide to go around back of the store by the dumpster and wait for my Dad. Sit down and fall asleep. Wake up awhile later with a skunk standing next to me. Didn't think it could get worse but it did... Finally Dad shows up and rescues me. Last time I hunted without a compass and map and now I always have my InReach and OnX as well.
 
I didn't get "lost" but was boating one morning last year in thick fog. My boat has radar and an electronic chart however visibility was about zero. I kept thinking I was going in the right direction however the electronics we telling me a different story. Its unnerving for sure to trust only the electronics and ignore you feeling that you think is the proper direction.
 
2 years ago September was bow hunting where I have bow and rifle hunted many times. We experienced every season in a five day span. Went to bed watching two separate groups of elk and were going to make a play in the a.m. We woke up to everything above us socked in. We felt confident knowing the area. We drove up to the top of our trail (what we thought was trail) parked and stepped out,

Both my buddy and I were talking about how we didn't remember dropping down as fast were, the ground seemed rockier than we remembered all that usual stuff. Fog got thick enough we decided to sit down and give it a little bit hoping it would clear out since we again didn't feel right about where we were. Of course I left compass on dash like an idiot not that I'm a champion compasser, I know enough to be dangerous, Sitting down saved our rears it wasn't a death drop by any means, the slope we were on was enough to cause concern if one of would have fallen It cleared enough that we made it to the bottom of a small canyon and finally figured out where we were.


Over confidence can be a detriment even in areas you hunt relatively often or every year. I have always told the kids if we separate and you get turned around and aren't sure. Find shelter, make shelter if you have to, make a fire if you need to and wait. Taught them all how to do it and if you wanted to go and walk another ridge without me, show me you can do it.
 
Keeping your cool and not wandering around aimlessly is probably one of the most important aspect of getting lost. I know when I was in north carolina wandering around in the woods even in the day time you get a little feeling in your gut like wait a minute did I already walk past that, then you're brain starts spinning like crazy just thinking about it. The night navigation was find the locations then rally back to the start point. Some people made it relatively quick and others showed up long after the others. Some of the later ones showed up an hour or two after the established "dead" time that was allowed for the navigation.
 
I use compass, have 2 more in pack just in case! Also GPS to mark camp, other pertinent points of reference. Sometimes you just need to sit down and allow your mind to regroup to trust your compass. Snow, fog and even loss of leaves can change your perspective that can over ride common sense. Trust your compass!
 
I trust my compass as well as my GPS, but I have seen compasses lie due to some unseen magnetic anomaly and one time I created a waypoint at my truck and my GPS brought me back to a spot more than a quarter of a mile away. So, nothing is fool proof.
 
One year back when I was about 31, I had met this really cool girl. Opening day of bow season I hiked in 6 miles to stay for a few nights. Not much happening the first two days, ...yep, I got turned around alright. Beat it the hell out of there.
You know,rut, and all that.😏
 
One time I was planning to still-hunt down-slope to a road 3/4 mile below me on the topo map. I did not realized that where I parked the truck was beyond the end of the lower road. When I finally hit a road, it was the second road below the truck. I turned left and didn't know where I was until I was a USFS road sign. Thankfully I had a paper map.
 
I work in the woods alot so rarely get turned around locally.

But… #1 I was lucky to get “confused” a bit and learn an important lesson on my first solo elk hunt in Colorado. I learned that picking a sideslope elevation and just walking a ridge does not work. Although the maps don’t show the undulations, they are there. I did a huge half circle without realizing I was now on the other side of the ridge heading in opposite direction. Everything went twilight zone with the landmarks. It was raining and night falling. Had paper maps and a Garmin (1998 version). It went against every internal instinct I had to trust it, it seemed so very opposite of what I felt. Of course, it was right.

#2 Even with modern devices, signals get wonky in your brain. This past Sept I was chasing an antelope around and skirting private/public boundary. Even with onx on full time, and trying to walk certain lines, sometimes the terrain signals, slope, etc are just off enough to constantly push you off course. Literally you almost start to feel like you are being pushed, as if in a crosswind, or maybe one leg is shorter than the other, or gravity is pulling harder on your gun side. It takes EFFORT to stay in a straight line even with good map or device, if you are not heading toward a visual bearing.
 
Yep, numerous times, but never had to spend the night out. Usually just disoriented for a few hours.

Numerous mentions of walking in circles. I was in Explorer Search and Rescue for 10 years or so and remember a professional tracker at one of our searches. He asked for a pair of shoes from the lost person. He could look at the worn soles of the shoes and tell which way the person would tend to circle. Also think it had something to do whether the person was right or left-handed.

The drainage where our hunting camp is located, and we have hunted exclusively for 35 years, and it is only about 4-5 square miles total, has a spot where if you are there late afternoon, you better be pulling your compass out. It is the end of a ridge that kind of splays out into numerous flatter ridges and flats. We call it the Jungle. You think that you are heading down the ridge, only to find yourself hitting the drainage and the water is going the wrong direction or there is WAY too much water. Get out your compass and follow it. Another spot at the far edge of our area has an established hunting camp about 1.5 miles from our camp, theirs was on a ridge top and ours was in the bottom of the drainage. Numerous times we have gone to Monday Night Football at their camp due to them having a little 4" TV with a grainy signal. We were there one night and partook in a few beverages. My brother-in-law wanted to show us an easier way back to camp, I usually led down a little draw to a trail that was made from logging in the 20's, the 1920's, "go ahead, we'll follow". Clear, dark, cold night, no moon, lots of stars and we could see the outline of the ridges to the north and south. We had to go pretty much west. I was following obediently, but noticed after a bit that the north star was off my left shoulder, "think we are going the wrong direction", "no, just follow me". We then smelled smoke, huh? Then we hit a FS trail, looped right around clockwise, went below their camp and hit the trail to the northeast of their camp. I led the way back to camp from then on. To his credit, that area is another place you better have your compass in hand if it is late in the day.

Cow hunting in Utah last year in the same unit we had hunted in 2019, opening day it was snowing cats and dogs, visibility sucked. I had the tag and my hunting partner was going back to the truck and was going to pick me up at the other end of the ridge we were hunting. I told him that I wasn't real sure where I was at the time. He called me back on the radio and told me when I found out where I was to give him a call. I had only been in the spot one time and that was two years prior, but had marked a wallow on my gps. Pulled out my gps and found that I was not where I thought I was, got it all figured out and then promptly jumped a bunch of elk, tracked them as far as I could, they were going to Idaho. Found the wallow and subsequently the truck. Got my cow two days later.
 
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