hiking2christ

Ο Tune in to Nature
The key to using natural signs? Combining subtleties into a big-picture appreciation of your surroundings. The benefit? Smarter and safer wilderness route finding. If possible, get a high vantage, which will provide a better angle for spotting terrain and environmental clues like: approaching storms, distinct landmarks, potential escape routes (like roads), dense areas of vegetation (often south-facing), easy bushwhacking, and likely water sources.

Ο Use Your Senses to Guide You
Get your bearings by seeing, hearing, and feeling signs of terrain changes and shifting weather conditions.

>> Train your eyes.
Look up, down, side-to-side, and turn around for a peek behind you. Changing your field of view and depth of vision frequently will help you see important clues both big and small. That could mean the first hint of a storm brewing in the distance or faint game trails in dense brush.
>> Listen for leads.
Echoes can help you determine distances: For each 500 feet, an echo will take one second to bounce back to you. Pay attention to a shift in volume: Cold and humid air, which often precedes a front, carries sound better than warm dry air, so noises travel farther and seem louder pre-storm.
>> Feel subtle clues.
Use touch to orient yourself and anticipate weather. The south side of boulders and trees will feel warmer than the north, and wind speed increases may indicate shifting weather. Note changes underfoot: Windward ridges have more gravely soil, and wet canyons can hint at flood potential.

Ο TIP: Estimate Daylight
Hold your flattened palm (fingers together) at arm’s length and align your top finger with the bottom of the sun. For each finger width between the sun and the horizon, you have roughly 15 minutes of remaining light.

Ο TIP: Learn Prevailing Winds
They shape terrain and vegetation over time, so even in shifting wind, clues from prevailing conditions may help you orient.

Ο Find North at Night
Work out the cardinal directions with this no-compass-needed technique.
Look for the Big Dipper, a distinct saucepan shaped by seven stars (below). Identify the two stars farthest from the constellation’s “handle” and take note of the distance between them. Extend an imaginary line from the two stars skyward, about five times that distance. The line points to Polaris, aka the North Star. To find north, draw another line connecting Polaris to the Earth’s horizon. Where it hits will be within one degree of true north. Learn other direction-finding techniques at backpacker.com/findnorth. 

Courtesy of Backpacker magazine