Hey, all you WB members who are way over on the "Judging" side of the Myers-Briggs Judging/Perceiving continuum, why not just skip over a thread like this just this once? Take it as self-evident that this pair of hikers made some mistakes and move on. Thank you.
Life Member: ATC, ALDHA, Superior Hiking Trail Association
No can do, anymore, my spidey sense starts goin’ off and I gotta ask myself...did they really get lost. Glad they got found though.
We all mess up from time to time. If we are lucky, we live and learn.
"It's fun to have fun, but you have to know how." ---Dr. Seuss
We were hiking in Arizona last week, and leaving a difficult trail. I told my wife I thought heard something up the mountain, but never saw anything. A few minutes later, a lady and her 8 year old son came running up to my wife and I. She said they had been lost. I asked her which trail she came in on, and she told me me, but before I could give her directions she asked if they could just follow us out and give them a ride to their car. I said sure and made sure they water; her son had a camelback with plenty of water left in it. She was almost in tears in when she caught up with us. I felt sorry for her, because the trail was now well marked in places.
I can see how one could get lost in the Everglades pretty easy. It looks the same in all directions and blazing is likely thin. But I don't see how a map by it's self would help, you at least need a compass to know which way to go. If they could call 911, they should at least have had a map and compass app the phone.
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I remember Great Cypress as being well-blazed, but the water was only about 2 feet deep. Never saw nor heard alligators there, but did elsewhere on the FT.
Handlebar
GA-ME 06; PCT 08; CDT 10,11,12; ALT 11; MSPA 12; CT 13; Sheltowee 14; AZT 14, 15; LT 15;FT 16;NCT-NY&PA 16; GET 17-18
Technically it’s wading, not hiking.
I have hiked on wet Florida trails, once across a cow pasture that was boggy and had at least one alligator that my dog spotted. Not fun and we cut the trip short. I’m glad these fellows got out ok. Wild hogs and snakes are also a big problem.
"Too often I would hear men boast of the miles covered that day, rarely of what they had seen." Louis L’Amour
You add all that water into the mix and its a whole different ball game. The everglades is a huge area with few roads and other marks of civilization. You get lost in the middle of there and its not like you can just say "if I walk in this direction I'll eventually find my way out." You might be walking through waist deep water with no dry land in sight when dark comes.
^^^^This.
This incident registers pretty high on my stupidometer, but on a few occasions I've come close to being in situations that others would have said were moronic. For example, being on the top of Kings Peak in Utah at 3pm as summer thunderstorms were rolling in. Made it out totally fine but it could have easily gone very badly.
The Five Basic Principles of Going Lighter ~ Cam "Swami" Honan of OZ
I appreciate the difficulty of "hiking" in waist deep water for a few days straight.
I do have one question tho... how do you "lose" a tent?
The 911 call has been released.
I kinda got the idea that they weren't as much lost...as just behind schedule and running out of provisions
The same way you loose your map?
Since there were two of them, it makes me wonder, did they only have one map to share? They apparently had a phone, probably a smart phone? What about a map on their phone? . . . I'm guessing these guys weren't really appropriately prepared either mentally or otherwise for this adventure.
I'm not lost. I'm exploring.