A view of Lake Rosasco in the Emigrant Wilderness.

There we were, sitting under a tree by a pristine creek in the Sierra wilderness. There wasn’t a soul around, the moon was crossing the sky and the constellations shined bright. And, since this was the 1990s, I still could trust they were stars and not satellites owned by Elon Musk.

It might have been a woodsy blissful image, the kind that inspires you to buy a new tent in an REI ad, or maybe a mutual fund. Except there was one problem: We were lost.   And it was cold. And our jackets, long pants, sleeping bags and backpacks were about a mile away at this point. Or so we thought, since, as I just pointed out, we were lost.   We hadn’t eaten for hours. And we would have to sit there in nothing but shorts and T-shirts for several hours more before dawn arrived and provided enough light to hopefully find our way back to camp.   Oh, and both of us blamed the other for this happening, though no one actually said anything.   I think about this experience of being lost whenever I go hiking in the Sierra. And for years, I’ve vowed to get some skills to improve my chances of not losing my bearings in the middle of nowhere, which recently, only about 25 years after the fact, I did.   And now, with hiking season ramping up, and knowing many more people will get lost again like they do every year, I am reminded of this trip.   It all happened while backpacking to Lake Rosasco in the Emigrant Wilderness, an area which borders the northwest end of Yosemite National Park. Emigrant had always been a favorite of mine since I started going there with my dad and uncles as a kid.   Lake Rosasco sits up on a ridge and can be tricky to find. After taking the well-used trail down Cherry Creek, you turn off to a barely marked trail (at least it was barely marked as of a few years ago) and then climb a switchback you need to be looking for or else you’ll miss it. Then, after about a 20-minute climb, you are there.   And when you arrive, you are rewarded with a pristine Sierra lake that is apparently just remote enough to keep away the crowds. At least, the few times I’ve been, there have never been other campers.     So, after a day spent at Rosasco, we decided to take a day hike over to Hyatt Lake, another breathtaking high mountain lake surrounded by granite, which the Emigrant Wilderness tends to have in abundance.   To get to Hyatt Lake involves crossing a long open stretch of granite. There is no trail per se, you are mostly following cairns across a fairly flat landscape where trees are few and far between.   After a relaxing afternoon at Hyatt Lake, we began the journey back to our camp and all seemed to be going fine. Until it wasn’t. Somehow, as we finished the final uphill section of the open granite bowl where we were supposed to run into the trail back to Lake Rosasco, the trail wasn’t there.   Or at least it wasn’t where we thought it should be. We looked and looked, but it had somehow disappeared. Apparently, when we had left earlier in the day, we failed to note where it had transitioned from being a trail within trees to the wide open landscape where we would follow the path of cairns.   We had not looked back and established any landmarks. We hadn’t paid attention. And now we were hungry and dehydrated, the sun was intense, and this was a problem.

A map shows Lake Rosasco and its surrounding areas. 

We consulted the map in the guidebook, and when that proved fruitless, my wife suggested the trail had actually been more to the right of where we were looking. She was pretty sure about that. I didn’t think she was right at all, but since I didn’t have any better ideas, off I went.   This may have been partly to avoid adding marital discord to a bad situation, but basically we were just doing what every single outdoor guide tells you not to do when you’re lost: We were starting to panic.   In 2020, an article in Wired magazine gave a detailed explanation of what is going on with people lost in the outdoors who go into panic mode. And it seems to boil down to this: Being lost “delivers a psychic double whammy: Not only are you stricken with fear, you also lose your ability to reason.”   The article goes on to say, “90 percent of people make things a lot worse for themselves when they realize they are lost—by running, for instance.”    Which is exactly what I did. At first, I walked along to the right, the direction I was pretty sure was wrong. But instead of going back and try to gather my thoughts, I just began to run back and forth along the ridge.   Soon enough, both of us were as disoriented as if someone had blindfolded us and spun us around.  The huge open granite field became indistinguishable. I wasn’t even sure where we had walked up anymore. The best that can be said is we did not lose sight of one another.   One of the best guides I have read so far on how to deal with getting lost is from the U.S. Forest Service.  It begins: “The best tool needed to avoid getting lost outdoors is your skill of advanced planning. You must expect the unexpected and plan accordingly.”   We did not do this on any level.   On our hike, we didn’t set visual landmarks or spend time with a map. And we did not have food, water or some kind of warmth in case we got lost. We were winging it, the worst possible thing you can do in the wilderness.   If you do get lost, the Forest Service has a handy acronym to follow that we should all sew into our daypacks: STOP. This stands for S: Stop, T: Think, O: Observe, P: Plan.   Expanding on the “S” — aka Stop — the Forest Service’s most important advice comes right away: “As soon as you realize you may be lost: stop, stay calm, stay put. Panic is your greatest enemy.”   So, having failed with “S,” “T” and “O,” we were in a bad spot. The sun was setting, the temperature was quickly falling and only “P” was left. I did not want to be stuck on this exposed ridge all night. We needed a plan.   Somehow, we still had enough sense of geography left to determine that if we bushwhacked straight down from the ridge we were on, we would run into Cherry Creek and the trail we had initially taken to get to Lake Rosasco. It was a roundabout way of getting back to our camp, but it was something.   Granted, this could have been a very disastrous decision, as are many that are made by people in a lost and panicked state. But, to our relief, it turned out for the better. As dusk was nearing, we ran into Cherry Creek and the trail that would lead back to our camp.   But having wandered very far off course, the walk back turned out to be long. And when darkness hit, we still had not reached the switchback that leads back up to Rosasco.   So, rather than risk getting lost again, we spent a very long night sitting under a tree near the creek.   I do not remember much about that night except watching the moon cross the sky, which was spectacular, but it was also tedious and cold. And I recall trying to start a little fire by burning some pages of our guidebook. Unfortunately, that failed, as I had wisely bought the laminated waterproof edition. And still totally stressed, neither of us said much of anything. It was as if we were holding our breath until everything was OK again.   Finally, in the earliest moments of dawn, we had enough light to locate the switchback and scramble up to Lake Rosasco. Once we got there, we climbed into our tent and passed out.   Over the many years since, I’ve often considered the ways this experience could’ve been avoided. Just looking at that list from the Forest Service shows me many things that could’ve been done better.   A few years ago, I even returned to Lake Rosasco with some friends and revisited the place we had gotten lost. I could see where we had miscalculated. The trail had actually ended farther back into the trees, which we hadn’t noticed on our dreaded day many years before. It’s likely that we were no more than 50 feet from the trail back to camp before we panicked and began to run aimlessly along that ridge.

A look at Pingree Lake, a short day hike away from Lake Rosasco.

Perhaps if we had stayed in one place and hadn’t panicked, we would have found our way.   But there’s another reason we got lost: We lacked orienteering skills. I always felt if we had a good topographic map, instead of the one in the guidebook, and a compass, maybe we could’ve found our way back. And if we had skill with them, even better.   So, this past fall — better late than never, right? — I signed up for an orienteering class sponsored by REI. It took place at China Camp State Park in San Rafael. Embarrassingly, I got lost driving there, which seems kind of impossible in the days of Google Maps and being that China Camp has basically only one road in and out.   When I finally arrived, it turns out only three of the eight people who signed up actually showed — maybe the rest of them got lost? — but in 4 hours I got a few of the skills I felt I could work on so I wouldn’t get lost so easily again. We worked on reading topo maps, identifying landmarks and using the compass and map. We practiced triangulation and adjusting our compasses for magnetic declination.   With a few of the things I've learned, I think I’d at least do a few things differently if I got in a Lake Rosasco situation again. For starters, I’d definitely take a few breaths, try not to panic and perhaps even remember what S-T-O-P stands for. And maybe I’d invest in some kind of new tech tool to help me know where I am, but those aren’t necessarily going to be the answer.   But one thing I do know, if things do get bad and I have to spend a night under the stars, I will have some snacks, a warm layer, some matches and make sure to never buy a waterproof guidebook ever again.

David Curran is a homepage editor at SFGate.com.