The Navigation Habit That's Kept Me Found for 35 Years

Most people think getting lost happens in one dramatic moment. A wrong turn at a junction. A track that suddenly vanishes. But the truth is far less exciting. You almost never get lost in a single step. You drift, slowly, over an hour of not quite paying attention, until the map in your hand and the ground in front of you quietly stop agreeing.

Years ago, on the Frankland Range here in Tasmania, I learned how much the opposite is also true. How much you can hold onto, even when you can barely see a thing.

We were crossing a section of the range in a complete white-out. Thick mist, no horizon, visibility down to almost nothing, making our way towards Tribulation ridge. This was before I had any type GPS. We had just a map, a compass and our own eyes.

Every so often the mist would thin for a few seconds and we would catch a glimpse of three little hills off in the distance. That was all we had, so we used them. Each glimpse gave us a fix, a rough sense of where we sat on the range, and those hills lined up with the ridge we needed to reach.

So we worked it slowly. Move on the bearing, wait, watch for the hills, confirm, adjust. We did not rush it and we did not guess. We let the mountains show us where we were, a few seconds at a time. We reached that ridge just as the mist finally lifted, and there it was, running away ahead of us exactly where it should be. It is still one of the proudest bits of navigating I have ever done.

Here is what that day taught me. Navigation is not a skill you pull out once you are already lost. It is a habit you run the whole time, so you never get there in the first place. Even blind in that mist, we were never truly lost, because we never stopped checking.

I get a lot of messages from people who tell me they are hopeless with direction, that they just do not have a sense of where they are. I understand the feeling. But staying found has very little to do with some natural gift. It is three small checks, done on repeat. Anyone can learn them.

1. Plan the route before your boots are on.

Before you leave, trace the whole walk on the map and pick out your handrails and your catching features. A handrail is something you follow. A river, a ridgeline, a track. A catching feature is your backstop, a creek or a junction or a change of slope that tells you if you have gone too far. Now you are not navigating blind. You know what you should pass, and roughly when.

2. Relocate before you need to, not after.

On the move, keep checking where you are while everything still makes sense, not once it has stopped. I keep an eye on my spot on the map (either digital or physical) and regularly check distances to where I am going. Every time the terrain changes, a creek, a climb, a junction, I confirm it against the map. It takes five seconds. The drift only ever happens in the long stretches where you quietly stop looking.

3. When something feels off, STOP.

That small uneasy feeling that something is not matching up is the most valuable tool you own. Do not walk on hoping it sorts itself out, because every confident step in the wrong direction takes you further from where you want to be. I use my STOP framework.

Try this on your next walk, even an easy one on a clear track. Practice relocating every fifteen minutes when you absolutely do not need to. Locate yourself on the map, eyes up, confirm your spot, carry on. It feels almost silly on a well-marked path. That is exactly the point. You are building the habit on the easy days so it is automatic on the day the cloud comes down and the track disappears.

Staying found is not a talent. It is a routine. And a routine is something anyone can learn.

THAT’S ALL FOR THIS WEEK

Thanks for reading Mowser’s Musings. I hope this helps you hike further and happier.

Until next week, keep exploring.

Mowser

Discover more. Hike further.

P.S. Last week I mentioned I have been building something on food and energy for the long days. I am still deep in editing it, real life and a houseful of kids slowed me down, but it is nearly there. If you want to be first to hear the moment it opens, click here and I will put you at the front of the queue.