Hiking - A Basic Introduction To Navigating Using Maps

Despite the fact that you would guess that it should be the other way around, you will find that most seasoned hikers use maps in order to navigate their way along trails and across wilderness areas while novices feel that maps are unnecessary. The newcomer frequently thinks that it is not necessary to go through the hard work of learning map reading and that sticking to well worn trails will be okay. Alas, that is not the case.

You can get yourself seriously lost even close to clearly marked trails and stepping just a few meters off the trail into heavy woodland has confused more than one novice. In the absence of the stars, sun or recognizable geographical features it is far too easy to get turned around and to end up straying even farther from the trail and getting yourself well and truly lost in next to no time.

Now in the example given above a map by itself will not necessarily help you to get out of the wood in question. But, you will often run across another trail which hooks up with the one you were on and a good map will help you to find your way with ease back to your starting point.

So, where should you start?

Start by getting hold of an up-to-date map that covers the area you intend to hike in and start by studying it carefully at home in a quiet and relaxed environment. You will not of course be able to match the map to features on the ground, but it will assist you in learning and understanding the symbols which are used on the map.

Every map has a legend (which will differ a liitle from one publisher to the next) and you need to familiarize yourself with the symbols. You also have to familiarize yourself with the scale of the map which will be printed on it as something like 1 inch = 5 miles.

Do not forget though that distance is only part of the story and that 1 inch that represents 1 mile on flat ground is a quite different thing from 1 inch that represents 1 mile over an area that includes a steep and winding path running up the side of a 1,500 foot cliff.

To make allowance for the latter, you have to consider altitude which is shown on the map as a series of curved lines that, if they were 'stretched out', would form a circle. The distance between two altitude lines around a natural feature such as a hill indicates the altitude. Normally you will find that there are numbers printed beside the lines in order to assist you. These lines are called contour lines and the closer the lines are to each other the steeper the ground.

Next, you need to study the longitude lines and latitude lines. Longitude lines indicating North and South run 'up and down' the map from the top to the bottom while latitude lines which indicate East and West run 'right and left'.

During the day you can make use of the sun together with natural features to orient the map so that it is lined up with the ground that you are hiking over. Remember that the sun rises in the East and sets in the West so that at the start of the day facing the sun will have you heading in an Easterly direction. Similarly, late in the day facing the sun as it sets will have you hiking in a Westerly direction.

Once the sun has gone down you will need to use the stars to navigate and you can frequently see the sky quite well as most wilderness areas are far away from the glow of city lights. One of the great pleasures of hiking is to be able to walk out under the stars and familiarizing yourself with such star formations as the Big Dipper and Orion as well as the North Star.

One of the first things you will need as a novice hiker is a good pair of hiking boots and you could do a lot worse than a pair of Vasque or Asolo hiking boots