Let’s try find our way out of here, some 5 miles from camp with a compass…

It may be hard to believe, but throughout the United States, it happens all the time…

You must go into the Known or Unknown,  prepared or face the worst…

Recently there was an article published in Field & Stream (October 2017) about a father and son hunting and getting lost in the rugged Siskiyou Mountains of Oregon.   One never made it back… The other his son forgot his GPS and Phone when heading back out to find his dad, he was lost for a number of days…  Searchers finally located him!

“From 1997-2016, 80 have been found dead and another 76 not found”  In this region of Oregon

Some of those that were never found, could have had other issues, such as venturing into a spot they did not belong in…

I know this number could be a lot less, if one were well prepared to the venture into the rugged mountains of the North America.  Most feel they know all the ways back to camp from any location.  Think about being in the Snake River Canyon in the morning at 65 degrees and sunny chasing a herd of Elk and in the afternoon the weather changing to a blizzard with the temperature dropping to below freezing and your horse has been moved from where you tether him up on the trail, plus you must venture into dark timber and any hint of daylight is about gone…

There is no hiker, hunter or outdoor enthusiast that has not gotten mixed up while in the field…  Today there is so much technology to keep you from staying mixed up, lost permanently, or dying in the outdoor from being lost…

Touch screen GPS that works in deep timber.

So many time when trying to help hunters find places to hunt, I request them to have a Garmin GPS, onX HUNT mapping for both the Garmin GPS (colored – microchip capable) and mobile device, such as the smart phones which 90% of hunters and outdoor enthusiasts carry with them 24/7.

Emergency Beacon
Needs to be registered.

The Garmin GPS, at least in the 21st should have WAAS (Wide Area Augmentable System) Note: Global Positioning System GPS is made up of at least 24 satellites, working in all conditions 24 hours a day and is FREE.

Garmin Rino 755 has two way and your location is available to another user. This is one that I highly recommend.

I would say at least 40% tell me they are “Old School” and use paper maps and a compass (that is maybe on the compass).

Just one little note with onX HUNT on the mobile side there is a trail layer that features trails old and new (CONUS).   Another tool that can help in many hunting areas.

Let’s get real about paper maps, most are outdated, and boundaries change all the time.  I threw out all my paper maps, that I have had for more than 30 years with all the X’s on them, moving the X’s to my GPS.  Paper maps are outdate in field use and lacking the ability to Zoom in.  Even if you mark your map with routes, it surely isn’t going let you do an active route back to camp or truck as a GPS would do.  As for the compass, it’s Okay, if your batteries go dead or enemy decides to use an electromagnetic pulse or EMP while you’re in the back country.

These can reach out many miles and reasonable in price in the pairs.

Beside the Garmin GPS, Mobile Phone with the onX HUNT APP and chip, there is the 2 Ways such as Motorola handheld communicators, and last but not lease is an Emergency Locator Beacon, just in case you’re in real trouble and are immobile…

We must remember to have them in our backpack or ditty bag (U.S. NAVY), along with the other tools used in the field.  Frank Biggs