# Journal reveals lost hiker survived for weeks, died



## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...l-reveals-lost-hiker-survived-weeks/84967018/



> (NEWSER) - A lost hiker in Maine starved to death after waiting for rescue and then accepting her fate, heartbreaking journal entries have revealed.
> 
> Geraldine Largay, a 66-year-old from Tennessee, disappeared while hiking the Appalachian Trail in Maine on July 22, 2013, and the newly disclosed journal shows that she survived for at least 26 days, the Portland Press Herald reports.
> 
> "When you find my body, please call my husband George and my daughter Kerry," she wrote in an Aug. 6 journal entry. "It will be the greatest kindness for them to know that I am dead and where you found me - no matter how many years from now." The final entry was dated Aug. 18. Her skeletal remains were discovered in a tent 3,000 feet from the trail more than two years later.


----------



## Kodeman (Jul 25, 2013)

So sad, hiking that trail was a goal my wife and I had in our younger days. Then kids, a mortgage and life in general put it on the back burner. I still have the maps and related info but I'm sure a lot has changed. 

I pray that Geraldine's family finds some comfort in knowing the final outcome.


----------



## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

Kodeman said:


> So sad, hiking that trail was a goal my wife and I had in our younger days. Then kids, a mortgage and life in general put it on the back burner. I still have the maps and related info but I'm sure a lot has changed.
> 
> I pray that Geraldine's family finds some comfort in knowing the final outcome.


When I read this story, the piece that has stuck in my brain is that she stepped off the trail to do her bathroom business, and then was disoriented. She never found the trail again. Isn't that weird, or is it just me?

She also had been hiking with someone who had a family emergency and had to go home.

It sounds as though she should not have been there alone. I know people who have never been good with direction, knowing directions, orientation. Turn them around a few times, and they are lost. If this were me, I would be very careful about where I went and what I did that could end up getting me killed.


----------



## Grimm (Sep 5, 2012)

weedygarden said:


> When I read this story, the piece that has stuck in my brain is that she stepped off the trail to do her bathroom business, and then was disoriented. She never found the trail again. Isn't that weird, or is it just me?
> 
> She also had been hiking with someone who had a family emergency and had to go home.
> 
> It sounds as though she should not have been there alone. I know people who have never been good with direction, knowing directions, orientation. Turn them around a few times, and they are lost. If this were me, I would be very careful about where I went and what I did that could end up getting me killed.


I always thought that if you are hiking with a partner if that partner needs to end the hike for whatever reason you both leave together.

I also thought if you have to step off the trail you tie markers to get back.


----------



## Caribou (Aug 18, 2012)

I sounds to as though she got over half a mile off the trail, couldn't find her way back, and sat there waiting for someone else to do something.

Following a stream, just going downhill, something, anything. At least a smoky fire or other signal. I have little sympathy for someone that sits and waits for death.


----------



## bacpacker (Jul 15, 2011)

And that is exactly what she did. She had a pack full of gear to hike with for some period of time. There was no reason she couldn't set up camp and survive. After that, just keep water going. And try to figure a way to catch food, plants, etc. Signal, that the best way to be found.


----------



## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

Caribou said:


> I sounds to as though she got over half a mile off the trail, couldn't find her way back, and sat there waiting for someone else to do something.
> 
> Following a stream, just going downhill, something, anything. At least a smoky fire or other signal. I have little sympathy for someone that sits and waits for death.


I totally agree with you. I think in life there are people who are of a helpless nature. They have no idea how to solve problems like this. For some, it might be innate, and for others, it is a learned response. We all know some.

And then there are people who are problem solvers, who do not quit or sit down and wait. These are people who just get things done.

I knew a girl who got lost on a solo hike in the Colorado mountains. She KNEW she could not sit down and wait. She hiked all night, trying to figure it out. There was a search team organizing in a parking lot in the morning, and she walked out and into this group, having just gotten herself out. I am so glad it worked for Annie, but I am a person who needs sleep. I couldn't walk all night, especially after hiking all day.


----------



## Tweto (Nov 26, 2011)

Did any one consider that she committed a culturally acceptable suicide.

She could have had terminal medical problems, or mental depression issues, or family problems. Doing it this way no one will ever tag her with the suicide label.


----------



## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

Tweto said:


> Did any one consider that she committed a culturally acceptable suicide.
> 
> She could have had terminal medical problems, or mental depression issues, or family problems. Doing it this way no one will ever tag her with the suicide label.


I never did, Tweto. And, if she had any life insurance, her family could collect!


----------



## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

weedygarden said:


> I totally agree with you. I think in life there are people who are of a helpless nature. They have no idea how to solve problems like this. For some, it might be innate, and for others, it is a learned response. We all know some.


Do not teach your children to be helpless, especially your girls! This is a way of being that so many do without even thinking!

I also understand that this is a male/female dynamic. People feed off each other. A damsel in distress is waiting for her knight in shining armor to come rescue her. And his ego is so stroked by rescuing her. I also understand this is a basic need! But it is not really good in the end, especially for this woman.

Being helpless is deadly, as shown in this story!


----------



## prepperking22 (May 21, 2016)

weedygarden said:


> Do not teach your children to be helpless, especially your girls! This is a way of being that so many do without even thinking!
> 
> I also understand that this is a male/female dynamic. People feed off each other. A damsel in distress is waiting for her knight in shining armor to come rescue her. And his ego is so stroked by rescuing her. I also understand this is a basic need! But it is not really good in the end, especially for this woman.
> 
> Being helpless is deadly, as shown in this story!


Absolutely agree with this. It's a mind-game. You have to be able to calm that raging mind and think clearly. Panic is the #1 killer. If you can problem solve and think creatively, that could save your butt. And this goes for men and women. No one should have their fate handed to them because they were too panicked or afraid to make any move.


----------

