I’ve not always been in love with the backcountry like I am now. In fact, my parents rarely if ever took me there. My time with them outdoors was limited to boating and car camping. If there was any hiking involved, it was well within the safe reach of modern facilities (roads, buildings, other people).
I attribute my love for the backcountry to a friend I’ve known since grade school. When we were at college, Billy would often invite me to different waterfalls and short trails that were in plentiful supply within 20 miles or so of our campus.
On a Labor Day weekend during my college era (15 years ago or so), Billy called and asked if I wanted to go hiking with him. I said sure and within about a hour, he pulled into my driveway along with David, another friend from high school.
Our destination was some place I’d never heard of before and for our sakes shall remain nameless. It would later become one of my favorite places to hike. It took about 2 hours to get there from my house, so it was early afternoon by the time we arrived in the area. We stopped to get some food at a convenience store where I snagged one of those big Slim Jims. We left the store and headed toward the trail head. Billy wanted to make another stop, so he turned down a gravel road. He drove about 1/2 mile and stopped at a 10’x10′ white shack. He went inside and came out a few minutes later carrying a 6 pack of Budweiser (in the can of course). That’s just Billy’s style. Then we rode to the trail head.
We got to the parking lot at the trail head and headed out. It was a relatively short hike down to our destination (a waterfall less than 2 miles in). We stopped there, admired the falling, gurgling water and ate our snack. As Billy fished out our food, he handed each one of us a Bud. I must say it went down mighty well with the scenery and snack I had. Afterwards, we headed on down the trail.
After about 3 more miles, we came upon one of the most beautiful places on earth. It was a rock outcropping overlooking a beautiful valley about 500 feet below. We could literally see for miles and to this day, it is my favorite spot on earth.
After a little while, we decided to stay there, watching the sun go down whilst drinking our last Bud. It was the most beautiful sunset I’ve seen in my life. One thing I hadn’t considered though was exactly how dark it is in the backcountry. With nothing but the moon and the stars to light our way, it took some serious getting used to.
After about 100 yards, we came to the trail we had been on and Billy headed to the right. “But Billy!” I said. “We came from the other direction.” “Yeah, but this trail is a loop. We’re only about a mile from the truck. If we head this way, we’ll be driving home in 30 minutes.” he said. “Okay.” I said.
After about an hour of walking I began to doubt him. After two hours, I was really doubting him. After three hours, I was one step away from panic. We had no flashlights, no food, nothing to bivvy in. But what’s that? It’s a street light. Sure enough, it was the parking lot. It just wasn’t the parking lot with Billy’s truck in it.
We wandered around until we found the caretaker’s house. He was just sitting down with a bowl of popcorn to watch Seinfeld. We asked him the quickest way to get back to the truck. “Eight miles back through the woods, the way you came.” he said irritatedly. It wasn’t what we wanted to hear. It was 8:00pm already. We decided we’d take our chances hiking back along the road. Five minutes later, a truck rolled up to us. It was the caretaker. He said “Hop in back, I’ll give you a lift.” Finally, we caught a break!
As we rode in the back of the truck, Billy noticed he had a 5 gallon bucket with aluminum cans in it. He donated our 6 empty Budweiser cans to him (just like Billy). After about 10 minutes, we arrived back at the truck. We thanked the man, who handed us each a trail map. Ouch! Then he said “Next time you hit the trail, make sure you get a little knowledge first.” Double ouch! We got back in the truck and made the 2 hour drive back to my house.
Lessons I learned:
- If you think you probably shouldn’t, don’t. Being in college at the time, I wasn’t used to turning down free beer. But I must admit, I was a bit uneasy about consuming while on a day hike. I’m no lightweight, but drinking those 2 beers definitely impaired me physically, making the hike harder than it had to be. It also impaired me mentally. Clearly the trail wasn’t marked as a loop, but I acquiesced to Billy’s idea anyway. It doesn’t mean don’t be adventuresome. It does mean don’t be stupid.
- Think ahead and make sure you’ve got the right gear. There was nothing wrong necessarily with us watching the sun go down at that beautiful place. But had any of us thought beyond the sunset, we would have realized how difficult it would be to get back. None of us had a flashlight that would have been invaluable in finding our way back.
- Always know where you’re going or at least how to get back. If any of us had a map, we would have known that trail wasn’t a loop. If any of us had a compass, we would have known we were going the wrong way. A GPS would have told us EXACTLY where we were. We were just meandering through the woods.
This adventure turned out just fine, but could have been very different. What if it had been cloudy? We would have been walking in the absolute dark along the edge of a deep ravine. But this leads me to the last (and probably most important) lesson: Always learn from your mistakes. And that’s exactly what I did.