As McClish told it, the 34-year-old outdoors enthusiast from Boulder Creek, California, lost his bearings after beginning his hike the morning of 11 June. He had not informed anyone else of his plans, so it would not be until the afternoon of Thursday, 20 June, that the unkempt-looking hiker was found at the bottom of a remote canyon and rescued.
McClish spent much of the interim going up and down canyons, sitting by waterfalls and using his boot to collect water to drink and keep himself hydrated. He also sustained himself by collecting and eating berries, he said.
At one point, McClish said to KSBW, a mountain lion began following him – but the creature kept its distance and showed no interest in harming him. He said he would sleep on a bed of wet leaves, intermittently yell for help and think of what he would do to provide himself his next meal.
How do you end up getting lost hiking when you don’t even have a water container?
As we learned during COVID, ‘enthusiast’ is not the same as ‘expert’. This guy failed by-the-numbers and the only thing that saved him from being big-cat food was dumb luck. Good luck with the Lyme disease.
Fortunately for him, Lyme disease isn’t so common out west as it is back east.
I’m so glad not to be the only one to think that he was a moron.
I’m surprised they made it out their front door successfully.
There’s a shocking number of people who will just go off into the woods with their clothes and a phone.
I went hiking with a date once who expected to be fine walking a ten mile trail with no water bottle. Some people have no real world experience of how much water you need when you’re exerting yourself for hours on end.
When I was younger, we used to go out to that same area, smoke a ton of weed, and try to get lost. It was awesome. Sometimes we’d be turned around for hours.