Who Says We’re Lost?

by Scot Rasor

Like a lot of men, I take great pride in my sense of direction when in the great outdoors. Whether hiking, camping or boating, consider me your go-to guy for getting back safe and sound. I often brag that you can place me in the middle of the woods, on the darkest of all moonless nights, and I will be able to find my way back to any designated trailhead without fail! Mind you, this is not some idle boasting, but a proven fact. My wife can attest to this inspired talent after several vacations in Colorado when, without map or compass, I unerringly delivered us back to our car without following the same trail or taking direction from any existing trail markers. It has always been my humble opinion that Lewis and Clark would have finished their journey in half the time if they had me along to point the way.

Now there is always the risk of public, or even worse, spousal humiliation, when you set yourself up as a trailblazing god. So as a backup, I always carry a GPS unit in my backpack (it’s been used once in five years) and wear a watch with a built-in compass, barometer, tachometer and every other function you can think of (It would be a wonderful tool if I could figure out how to program it). Of course, these items are only carried in order to placate my traveling companions in case of a hypothetical emergency. If truly needed, surely they would have been utilized more often.

However, as we know, all good things must come to an end, and that is what finally happened to me not once, but twice, during the same vacation last year. First, there was the failed summit attempt of Mt. Sherman on a beautiful, sunny day. The fourteener book we were carrying said it should be a fairly simple climb of roughly six hours, round trip. After briefly looking at the map (aren’t maps for people who get lost?) we started our climb with another group of folks not too far behind us. As we followed the old mining road up from the parking area, we stopped to allow the family to join us. They had never climbed a fourteener, so with three under my belt, I was, of course, an expert. It was with great pride that I informed them of how difficult the trail would be (despite never having climbed this particular mountain), how long it should take us to reach the top, and what to expect at the summit. The road provided a smooth hike and it wasn’t until the trail disappeared in to a rockslide that we noticed there might be a problem. After checking the map and thoroughly misreading it, I assured everyone that this was the proper route.

As we pondered the disappearance of our path to the top, we were soon joined by a couple of women who were under the same false impression; that we were all headed in the right direction and the only option was to continue on. They proceeded to head out across the precarious rock slide in search of the hidden trail. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you looked at it; after several near-disastrous attempts and a good deal of group persuasion, they ditched their efforts and we all headed back down to the parking lot. It wasn’t until we reached our cars, dejected and cursing the obviously delusional author of the book we had been using as a guide, that a local climber informed us we weren’t reading the map correctly and had headed up a dead end mining road. He said countless other people have made the same mistake. So now we blamed the ignoramuses that had neglected to clearly mark the road as the road NOT to take to the summit. Still, I was not ready to take on the responsibility of my own errant failure, especially since blame could be placed on so many non-present individuals. Secretly however, during the long drive back to our cabin, my thoughts were consumed by what a dolt those people must have thought I was for my cockiness and clearly misguided knowledge of fourteener climbing. It was with even more chagrin that we met them on the aforementioned summit the very next day. To my credit, I simply acted as though the previous day had never happened. Ah, the blessing of prideful amnesia.

As if the first fiasco wasn’t bad enough, two days later I found myself in an even more emasculating episode during a day hike up the lower trails of Mt. Shavano. The day started out sunny and cool and we had planned to hike for no more than a couple of hours. The trail was easy to follow in the beginning, so with my over confidence in place, I paid little attention to landmarks and just enjoyed the hike with my wife. Suddenly, without warning, as Colorado weather is prone to do, the sun disappeared and the sky opened up in a torrent of pea hail. Being a little less confident than myself, my wife asked if we should play it safe and turn around. Of course not, was my immediate reply, delivered in my best Hemingway chest puffing response, onward and upward.

The sky continued to darken and the hail continued to fall as we worked our way up the increasingly difficult trail. After another hour of hiking, we began to notice that the trail was no longer where it should be; instead it had blended in to the far surrounding blanket of white. Still, I was boldly confident that we would have no problem finding our way back down to the car. Yet, after following several “false trails” it became apparent that there was again, a problem, at least according to the diatribe that was coming from my wife. Despite my attempts to calm her fears by explaining that we could bushwhack our way, my way, back to the trail, I finally acquiesced and we backtracked until we found a trail marker. We were then able to make our way back to the car, four hours later, just before we became enveloped in darkness.

Now some things between a husband and a wife should remain private, a bond between them. Not so in my wife’s book. She proceeded to tell her brother and father how we almost had to spend the night on the mountain; how I got us lost (no mention of “we”) not once, but twice. I tried to explain to her that we were never truly lost and that from a man’s perspective, it would have been greatly appreciated if she had not misinformed her family about our “adventures.” Of course, that only caused her to repeat the story to anyone who would listen.

But as they say, what does not kill us makes us stronger. With that in mind, I have taken a vow to learn how to properly read a topographic map and to follow trail markers when at all possible. My GPS unit will be expertly utilized when any trail is in doubt (and will be brought along, as was not the case during the hailstorm). I have already started to learn how to program my highly sophisticated watch, and most importantly, my new motto includes words to live by; “It is better to be a modest and knowledgeable FOUND hiker, than an arrogant and uneducated LOST hiker.” Oh and gentlemen, if you don’t believe this to be true, just ask the lovely, yet visibly unhappy lady glaring at you, the next time you swear that you aren’t lost!