Digital Journal — Taking a hike: It’s one of the things I most enjoy when travelling. But since I’m more than a little directionally challenged, I’ve found that hiring a local guide is the only way to go. On a recent visit to Scottsdale, Arizona, I told a local guide company: “I’d like to hire you guys to help me get lost.”
One of the state’s premiere outdoor adventure companies, Arizona Outback Adventures (AOA) guides about 5,000 visitors each year on hiking, mountain biking and rafting excursions. Before meeting me, they’d never been faced with the request to help someone get lost.
I told them I wouldn’t really get lost because I would be trekking with two GPS companions — a Garmin 60CS and a Magellan eXplorist 500. I’m no GPS expert but nor am I a total newbie. Several years ago, I rented a Hertz car equipped with a NeverLost system to drive up the California coast from San Francisco to Los Angeles, and last winter I drove a 2005 Acura with a built-in navigational system from Toronto to Miami and back. But the safety of a car is no comparison to sauntering across vast stretches of dusty landscape.
AOA tour leader Bryan Jump was wary about letting me loose in the desert wilds, but he agreed to help nevertheless. He dropped me off at one of the access points to the Phoenix Mountain Trail System in the Phoenix Mountain Preserve, a 7,000-acre desert oasis within the city limits.
From that point, I set out into the desert with a GPS as my tour guide.
This article is part of Digital Journal‘s Summer 2005 issue. To read the rest of this story, pick up your copy in bookstores across Canada or the United States!
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