How to Trek Through a Jungle

Your plane has crashed--in the middle of the jungle. One minute you were flying high above the beautiful green rain forest canopy, the next you were crawling out of wreckage, far below that canopy's crest, surrounded by thick foliage and facing the mammoth task of trekking out of there. For 3 days you tried signaling for help, looking for a radio, building a fire, anything, as you waited for some sign of a rescue. None has arrived. You've been able to determine with certainty your bearings, and you figure that you can't be more than 40 or 50 miles from civilization. The only thing standing between you and safety: all that jungle. You need to trek through it. Here's how.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Machete
• Compass
• First-aid kit
• Shoes
• Hammock
• Mosquito netting
• Walking staff
• Food
• Water

1. Make an honest assessment of your health (and that of your group, if there are others). Are you up to a long, arduous trek? If so, move on to Step 2. If not, it may be best to continue waiting for possible rescue--or to hope that others in the group can make it out and bring rescue back. This is a difficult decision, and it is entirely yours to make.

2. Scour the crash site for the following items (or similar substitutes): machete, compass, first-aid kit (especially one that contains medicine to treat a fever or an infection), sturdy shoes, hammock, mosquito netting, staff, and food and water. You'll be lucky if this is all available, but try your best to scrounge up as much as you can. Each item on this list can make your trek far more bearable.

3. Look for a river, stream or other waterway that is headed in the general direction you are going. Following a waterway is usually much easier than cross-country trekking. It may seem odd to be told to follow a river or stream--they tend to wind around, after all--but they usually lead to some sort of habitation, are a good source of food and water and, if wide and deep enough, may even provide a welcome "road" for a makeshift raft.

4. Work your way slowly through the thicker vegetation, using the machete (if available) to hack a crude path.

5. Stop every few minutes to catch a breath and, importantly, to listen for sounds, which carry far in the jungle. You may just hear the sound of an airplane--or a settlement of some kind. But you'll miss these entirely if you are trekking, which in the jungle tends to be a noisy affair.

6. As you trek, use a staff--a long stick--to part branches and leaves, if possible; you never know what's in them. It could be fire ants!

7. Walk around logs rather than climbing over them; this will conserve energy and avoid potential injury.

8. Strive to look "through" the jungle, beyond what lies immediately in front of you. You'll find that your entire vision eventually changes, so that the immediate doesn't mislead you from the "bigger picture." Also, bend down from time to time to study the jungle floor; this will help you to develop, over a short time, better jungle senses--"jungle eyes"--that may help you avoid even small injuries like scratches and scrapes.

9. Look for game trails, which are often quite obviously "marked" in a jungle. These may wind around but, like rivers and streams, tend to lead to good things, like water or clearings.

Tips & Warnings

• Being able to trek through jungle is important in a survival situation, since a rescue team is often limited as to where it can pick you up. In other words, even if rescuers come, you may still have to do a fair amount of trekking.
• Don't leave your crash site if you have reason to believe rescue is imminent! Jungles are thick, and once you leave that spot, you'll be tough to find.
• Don't trek each day until you are out of energy; setting up a proper camp is important and takes effort, so spare some of that energy for it.
• Don't trek during the night.