Lost... In Willowdale?

So, my lovely wife and I went out for a cruise at Willowdale with Rob & Renee. We got a little bit of a late start, we were getting hungry, and our plan of hitting all the singletrack became less important than our plan of grabbing some food and beer.

About halfway through our loop, we decided to hop on the fireroads to get back to the car via the quickest route. That's when things fell apart. Read More!

We started down a trail that was initially heading in the right direction, but soon thereafter started veering left. It kept going left until it ultimately brought us back to where we had been. D'oh!

So then we followed a trail that would take us from trail marker 7 to 8 to 28 to 27 to 26 to 25 and then we'd be right back to the parking lot...

Okay, from 7 to 8 was no problem, then from 8 to 28 was no problem, but then the trail ahead to 27 was completely blocked by a huge swamp. For some reason, we then kept going around and around and around this loop that just kept taking us back to 28.

Let's set some facts out: four people (advanced degrees), GPS devices, a trail map, and combined experience of hiking/biking/trekking in locations around the world, and we were lost in what is essentially our back yard. The funny part was that there were some hikers out there lost in the same section and they were asking us for directions. At least they did until we kept riding past them!

Rest easy though... we DID make it back (using the paper map) and we gorged ourselves on some good food... including Rob's GIANT vat of lobster w/macaroni & cheese...