How long have you been Lost ?

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Kiwi Tim

Member
Oct 24, 2014
39
0
Taranaki
Wondered what experiences people have had getting lost or completely disoriented.

My most memorable experience was pig hunting. We caught a pig. Gutted and left the entrails. Headed back for about half an hour then came across some more entrails. Wow I thought. Someone else has caught a pig too. Not the case it was from our pig. We headed off again and stumbled back across the same site a second time. I was sure we heading in a straight line.

As Daniel Boone said " I ve never been lost but I have been temporary disoriented for several days. "
 

wandering1

Nomad
Aug 21, 2014
348
2
Staffordshire
I've always been lost.....
Seriously tho twice.
1st was 15yrs ago me and some mates were driving.through the rocky mountains and broke down a mile of.the main highway in a blizzard. (one.very cold.night) we were picked up after sending an SOS on the CB (which got picked up by a ranger station and logging station)

The.second time.was on the old man. Of coniston got.disoriented and took a disused goat path eventually realised after going several hundred feet down
 

feralpig

Forager
Aug 6, 2013
183
1
Mid Wales
I got lost on a beach in Australia.
I was staying in a small campsite, somewhere in Northern Queensland. It was Forest/jungle type stuff, and not very populated.
Walked the path out of the forest, onto the beach, and along the beach. Guess I walked for about an hour, taking careful note of the (lack of) landmarks along the way.
Turned round to walk back, sort of lost track of time or distance, and couldn't find the path back to the campsite. Or any path, for that matter, nor my footprints, coz it was really fine white sand.
Eventually, I came to the path, but it tested my nerves pretty good. I didn't know if I had missed it and gone past it, and didn't want to risk turning back if I hadn't
It was really, really hot, and I had no water. I was young and dull and it was a good job it happened like it did coz it taught me a lesson I'll never forget.
I've never been so glad to see a water tap.
 

GGTBod

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Mar 28, 2014
3,209
26
1
never been lost i nature but spent 3+ hrs bewildered in the Metrocentre about twenty years ago, does that count? All i can say is thank sanity that Ordnance Survey never went with Red, Blue, Green and Yellow quadrants as part of their mapping system
 

NS40

Nomad
Nov 20, 2011
362
4
Scotland
16 years old, myself and a 3 mates decided on a camping trip in the Trossachs.

I'd remembered Ben Venue was a sufficiently 'out there' location so arranged for my older brother to drop us off. He turned up late so by the time we got there it was nearly nightfall so we quickly found a place to camp near Kinlochard.

The plan being, next day, to walk from there over Ben Venue, along the side of Loch Katrine and roughly in the direction of Loch Achray where we would be picked up. Bearing in mind this was before mobile phones so also relied on us finding a functional call box and hoping that we could contact my brother when he just happened to be at home...but the plan was..erm, flexible...with little if no planning.

One of my bold amigos told me he had a map of the area...which we later found out was his Dad's AA Book of the Road...great for roads, not so fantastic for hills & such. Stupidly we decided to stumble on regardless...how hard could it possibly be?

After climbing Ben Venue and stumbling down the Loch Katrine side, a couple of days fighting our way through ferns taller than we were, running out of food and nearly walking off steep drops in the mist we finally gave up hope and camped for the night...with howling winds and rain keeping us awake. One tent was torn to shreds (a cheapo dome tentP) while my ex-scout Vango Force 10 stood up to it's name.

We woke the following morning and saw a house with smoke rising from the chimney, a few hundred yards away. It had been too dark and misty to see the previous night. The occupier was happy enough to sort us out with some coffee and cupasoups...the best we'd ever tasted...then directed us down the path to the local hotel where we played pool & ate them out of every pack of crisps they had until our lift arrived several hours later.

These days I'm happy to acknowledge our utter stupidity and the fact things could have been much worse. It's taught me a lot about putting in the preparation beforehand, always have a plan b (c, d & e) and never make assumptions about whether someone else has brought the right gear, knows where they're going etc.
 

Laurentius

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Aug 13, 2009
2,422
614
Knowhere
Frequently. Many is the time I have tried to follow what was indicated as a footpath on the map, but seems to bear scant resemblance to what is on the actual ground. I like to wander off the tracks in my favourite woods, and no matter how straight a path you think you are keeping to, you always come out somewhere different than where you expected, but that is the fun of it for me.

I wouldn't say I have ever been so far lost that I have come down the wrong side of a mountain or anything like that, but I have had to adjust my route to get back to where I should have been on a number of occasions.
 

Bindle

Tenderfoot
Oct 10, 2014
78
0
The Mendips
I was in an orienteering event once in the New Forest, I was young, fit and in my prime. I shot off like a scalded cat and was travelling really fast. Soon I was next to a lake, which was a real bind as there was no lake on my map!
 
over 30min in a subway station trying to find the opposite direction for the train...
once in NZ i found myself in low boggy country, evening coming along and it got foggy/humid (=my glasses started to fog up...) impossible to keep a straight line for more then a few m and i ended walking in a large circle already dark when i reached the road... . took me about 2hours i guess..... (i carried enough things in my pockets to stay comfortable in the bush overnight and continue next morning, but i knew that my hosts would have gotten worried so i pushed on...)
 

Quixoticgeek

Full Member
Aug 4, 2013
2,483
23
Europe
In the entrance of pool harbour is the wreck of a ship called the HMS hood. It's a popular dive site, easy to get to, quite shallow, and with a reasonable covering of sea life.

Because the wreck is across the mouth of the harbour, the buoy marking it is offset slightly, and at the bottom of the rope, there is another rope that heads off to the wreck.

Thing is, noone had explained this to my dive buddy and I. We expected that at the bottom of the rope was a wreck, not another rope.

So we descended down to the sea bed and found an absence of wreck. We have a bit of an exchange in sign language, involving a lot of shrugging of shoulders, before we picked a direction, and swam off. We found the base of the harbour wall, and spent a pleasant hour pootling along it, investigating the sea life, conversing with lobsters and enjoying the scenery, was a lovely dive. Alas all must good things must come to and end, and as our gas started to run low, we headed slowly to the surface to await collection by the boat.

Erm, the boat, where is it?

The problem with not hitting the wreck, and thus not coming back up again from the wreck, was we weren't where the boat had expected us to appear. No, we were a few hundred yards down the harbour wall round the corner. Ah well, it's a calmish day, we're both in dry suits, we're afloat. I'm sure they'll come looking eventually.

Twenty minutes or so later, as we climbed back on to the dive boat, as the last pair to do so. The captain turns to us "How the bloody hell did you manage to miss 10000 tons of battleship you daft bugger"...

Turns out the vis on the wreck was appalling and everyone else had had a boring dive. We had had a lovely dive... Lost? maybe...

----

A few years later I decided while cycling from Baker street tube station to Victoria train station, that it would be a good idea to cycle all the way to Canterbury. I had a map in my pocket, and I knew that I could follow National Cycle Route 1 all the way, it would be simple!

I started to head out of London on a road that was 1 lane each way, but sign posted M20 Dover, which was the right sort of direction.

1 lane each way became 2 lanes each way.
2 lanes each way became 3 lanes each way
3 lanes each way became 3 lanes each way with blue flashing lights.

As I chatted to the police officer on the hard shoulder of the M20, I pulled out the map I had and asked him to show me where I was. The M20 wasn't on the map. Neither was the M25 or the M2. The following day when I was trying to work out what had happened, I realised the map was printed in 1974... It was largely useless.

---

On Tuesday nights a friend and I head out into the woods for a walk, and to practice night navigation. This week, while wandering along a track in the woods towards our next way point, we managed to deviate slightly in the dark from where we had intended. After a hundred yards or so we started to think . o O ("This isn't right"). After another 100 yards we were sure of it. Out comes the compass, and with a bit of orienteering, we realise where we actually were. Rather than backtrack to our intended route, we set a new course through the woods to come out just down the road from our intended route. All good.

---

Have I been lost? Dunno. Maybe I just had a different adventure to the one I intended on having...

Julia
 

Countryman

Native
Jun 26, 2013
1,652
74
North Dorset
That feeling when you surface from a dive and there is no boat in sight is quite unique. I did that in a 2m swell in NZ having ascended from Rainbow Warrior. Soon became very motion sick too.

Damn glad when they came back for us. They had broken their mooring and been rescuing other divers that had decided the conditions were too rough. We had had a great dive. Getting on the back of a boat rearing 6 feet was interesting.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Quixoticgeek

Full Member
Aug 4, 2013
2,483
23
Europe
That feeling when you surface from a dive and there is no boat in sight is quite unique. I did that in a 2m swell in NZ having ascended from Rainbow Warrior. Soon became very motion sick too.

Damn glad when they came back for us. They had broken their mooring and been rescuing other divers that had decided the conditions were too rough. We had had a great dive. Getting on the back of a boat rearing 6 feet was interesting.

I always carry a big yellow flag bungeed to my backplate to make it a bit easier to find me if it happened.

Yeah, climbing back on in a swell is always fun.

Julia
 

Robmc

Nomad
Sep 14, 2013
254
0
St Neots Cambs
I got lost on Cairngorm a couple of years ago. I got caught in a blizzard and you couldn't see more than a few yards. Reading the map and using a compass were impossible due to the ferocity of the wind and snow. It is a very weird feeling when you are totally disorientated.
I phoned the ranger and let him know that I was going to spend the night on the mountain, got in my sleeping bag inside a Bivvy bag, inside a Bothy bag and rode out the storm quite comfortably. Had a brew and took stock and got my bearings and made it down quite easily. Quite scary at the time though.
 

Mike313

Nomad
Apr 6, 2014
272
30
South East
That's a great question. I have two little stories for you. As a kid of about 8 years I was allowed to go to London with my little brother (6) to go to a shop not too far from Victoria Station. All went well until we tried to retrace our steps. We went this way and that, nothing looked familiar (in our excitement to get to the shop we hadn't really paid attention). We began to panic a bit so decided we best ask an adult for directions even though we had been warned about talking to strangers. We scanned the passers-by for someone that didn't look like a kidnapper or murderer and decided to ask this very tall gentleman who was dressed in a suit and a wide-brimmed hat. 'Excuse me, can you tell us how to get to Victoria Road?'. And the reply came in what I later discovered was a Texan drawl, 'Little buddy, you're standing on it!'.
The only time I got completely lost was when I set out with a girlfriend to walk in the hills in Crete. We were heading from the coast to a place called Perama and we expected to be walking for 4 hours or so. We were both seasoned walkers and carrying extra food and water. An hour or so into the walk, we discovered that our map - a Walking Map provided by the tourist office in Heraklion - was less than useless and more a schematic than a map and only showed some of the paths. We were soon lost but took it on as a challenge and ploughed on with a smile and the sun on our faces. The smiles dissipated a bit when my girlfriend felt a twinge in her ankle, nothing bad, but it meant that as a precaution I had to take her rucksack which I worn on my front (so a rucksack back and front). It was a long evening and night. We stopped for one hour for my girlfriend to sleep and then moved off again. Visibility was perfect as we had a huge full moon. I will never forget the beauty of those rocky hills in the moonlight. We came down out of the hills about 11am the next day not only onto a road but within 200yds of the bus stop to Heraklion. We had been walking for 22 hours (plus an hour of rest) and I reckon we were lost for 20-21hours during that time. This was when I was about 25 and as strong and as fit as a butcher's dog. We were both very tired but otherwise right-as-rain.
 

MikeLA

Full Member
May 17, 2011
1,955
319
Northumberland
sadly felt like it


the only time really lost was on scarfell bivvy there over night so used a compass for bearings to a path for the following morning. Woke up in thick mist (which lasted 2 days i think). Anyhow packed up and about to use my compass when my 2 companions just started walking off. Without checking I tried to get them to stop and by then we were lost. Took a sit down and careful pacing in different directions back and forth to our sit down point until we found the path. Was not fun but a good lesson i have never forgot.
 

FoxyRick

Forager
Feb 11, 2007
138
2
56
Rossendale, England
In the outdoors, I've always avoided being lost be never intending to be anywhere specific at any particular time. Seriously - that's always been my way, politically correct or not. The first time I backpacked the Pennine Way I think I did an extra 50 miles or so, but I was never 'lost', I just like exploring.

I seem to have an inate ability to direction find in the outdoors that's never been too far off the mark. Probably from being taught map reading when I was a kid by my father.

Shame I can't say the same when in town.

Some decades ago, I went to a Jean Michel Jarre concert in London; never been there before. Met up with a few friends at the train station and walked quite a distance to the concert because we were all skint in those days. We didn't even have concert tickets, but found a high vantage point and clung to the top of some railings where we could just about see and hear it.

After the concert, I had to walk back to the station alone, and got lost. It took about three hours of wandering around before I found a signpost that helped. Ended up missing the last train and sleeping on the ice-cold floor of the station. Narrowly avoided being peed on by a drunken tramp!

On another occasion, I had parked my car on an indoor shopping centre carpark and taken my wife shopping. A few hours later we returned to find the car missing. After wandering around for ten minutes thinking I must have got the wrong spot, I started to call the police and report the theft. Fortunately, just at that moment I wondered if there was more than one floor to the carpark... D'oh!
 

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