My best friend, who i went to school with in Australia, and who now lives in Wellington, New Zealand, is in the news in NZ today.
I just got an email from his wife. The kids are all excited at being all over the radio and TV. My friend feels like an idiot.
Thank goodness!
Hearing the name of somebody you know in the National/World News, is never a Good Thing.
But, nobody is hurt/dead. <whew!>
Heh, Google News is currently listing that as the top story in the New Zealand section. Your friend’s famous!
They forgot one major thing. When it’s taking too long you’re lost. Turn around and take the way you came back. I’ve been on trails that the fork is missing on, and done the turn around bit.
Actually, that’s what they ended up doing. It just took a while to get back out.
I just got an email from him. He read the map incorrectly and took a wrong turn. Instead of taking the 20km easy loop, they ended up on the 50km difficult loop, which is steeper and goes deeper into the bush. He knew that all the trails in the park are loops, so when he realized after a couple of hours that they were nowhere near home, he thought the best thing was to try and complete the loop.
By 8pm, they got to the bottom of a gorge, realized they were still a long way from home, and decided to lie down for the night. But by 10pm, they were getting cold, so they decided to walk back out the way they came in. Because the trip back was almost all uphill, and they were walking instead of riding, it took them about 8 hours to walk out. They arrived back at the car park at 6am, tired but none the worse for wear.
I bet the government makes them walk back for the bikes, instead of picking them up for them. I’m glad they’re alright.
From his email, it seems that they pushed the bikes out with them when they walked out.
I’m very glad it ended well for your friend, mhendo. So many search and rescue missions we hear about don’t. Good news to hear. 