When Something Goes Wrong Out There
We've talked about heat, shade, and turning back early. This lesson is about the wider question underneath all of that: what do you actually do when something goes wrong on the trail.
Not if. When. Something will, eventually, if you walk long enough. A rolled ankle, a cramp, weather that turns faster than you planned for, feet gone numb, somebody in your group who's suddenly not doing well. Most of it is small. A little of it isn't. Either way, you handle it a lot better if you've thought about it before you needed to.
Start with what you're carrying
Before you get to what to do, you need to have something to do it with. This doesn't need to be complicated. For a walk in the canyon, I want you carrying:
- More water than you think you need. We've covered why already.
- A layer you don't think you'll use. Weather up the canyon changes faster than weather down at the point of the mountain, and it changes without asking you first.
- A way to call somebody, charged, in a pocket you can actually get to.
- Wool socks, not cotton. I'll say that one again below because I mean it every time.
- Something with sugar in it. A granola bar, dried fruit, whatever you like. Not for training, for trouble.
That's the whole kit. You don't need gear, you need consistency, and the same goes here. You need the same handful of sensible things with you every single time, not a special kit you remember only after the day you needed it.
When it's cold and wet and your feet check out
I wore cotton socks on a cold morning once, years ago now, and hit a wet patch near the creek before I'd gone half a mile. Cotton holds water. It doesn't dry out, it doesn't insulate wet, and once it's soaked your feet just sit there losing heat the whole rest of the walk. I finished that one with feet like two blocks of ice, and it wasn't a good feeling, and it wasn't a smart way to spend the morning either. I bought wool socks that same afternoon. I own eleven pairs now, which Maria will tell you is excessive. She's not wrong, but I haven't had cold, wet feet on a trail since, and I'll take that trade.
The lesson underneath the sock lesson: small discomforts don't stay small out there. Wet feet on a cold morning turn into a genuine problem a couple of miles from the trailhead. If your feet go numb, that's not a thing to push through. Get them dry, get them warm, turn around if you need to. Cold does its damage quietly.
When it's an ankle or a knee
If someone goes down on loose rock, the first thing is to stop the group, not just the person who fell. Get them sitting somewhere flat and stable. Ask them to move the joint a little, gently, before anyone decides whether to walk out or call for help. Swelling that comes on fast, or a joint that won't bear any weight at all, means you don't walk it out. You call it in and you wait. I know waiting feels like the wrong thing to do when you're two miles from the car. It's the right thing anyway.
If it's a lesser thing, a mild roll, some soreness, you can walk out slow, but slow means slow. This is where I have to be honest about my own gap. I'm built to finish what I started, and my instinct is always to keep going rather than turn back. That's not always the right instinct, and if you're walking with me and things go sideways, tell me plainly that we need to cut it short. I'll do it. I just don't always see it coming on my own.
When someone's not doing well and won't say so
Watch the person at the back. People don't always announce that they're struggling, especially the first few times out. If somebody's gone quiet, or they're breathing in a way that doesn't match a normal conversation, or their color's off, that's your cue to slow the whole group down and check in directly. Ask a real question. Wait for a real answer.
Building your own plan, at home, before you go
Here's the practical version, the thing you can actually do this week. Sit down for ten minutes and write out, for your usual walk: where the closest exit points are, who you'd call, what's in your bag, and at what point you'd turn around no matter how good you feel. Put it somewhere you'll actually look at it again. A thing not written down scatters. I learned that keeping trail notebooks for years, and it's true of plans too.
For sure for sure, you won't need most of this most of the time. That's exactly why it's worth having settled before you're standing in the middle of it trying to think straight.
Before next time: pack the kit above for your next walk, even a short one, and notice what you already had and what you didn't.