Even really experienced hikers occasionally do unbelievably stupid things. I like to think it is our experience and composure as we work our way out of our stupidity that saves us. Maybe it's just pure luck.
We had set our mind to finding this cache as #900. It was supposed to be a great cache; it had been found few times; and we were in Pennsylvania. With that in mind we set out to find this cache about 45 minutes before sunset. This should have been no problem. Two miles round trip with the last half mile by flashlight. We made fairly good progress for about a quarter-mile and then came the mountain laurel. That mountain laurel was followed by more mountain laurel. Each wave of mountain laurel was thicker, taller, and more tangled than the one before. The picture on this post was taken about ten minutes before sunset. We were still on our way to the cache. The cache itself is hidden in the rocks beyond the peak visible on the left side of the page. It was lucky I took this image before we finished our milestone find.
We searched about 15 minutes through the rocks in the dark before I finally spotted the cache. It was then that the fun began. As I was signing the log, I dropped my flashlight and broke it. We had returned to about the point of the photo when my gps batteries said goodbye. Oops, I forgot to bring the rechargables with me. We were down to one gps with our track on it and one LED with the worst of the mountain laurel standing between us and the geomobile 3/4 of a mile away. No problem, were experienced. Then the batteries in the last flashlight died. Eventually and thankfully, Ali's gps held on and we emerged from this memorable find almost three hours after leaving the truck.
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