HOOK & BASELINE

In PART 8 of our navigation skills series, Lyle Brotherton shares a handy technique that can help if you get lost...

Ideveloped the ‘hook & baseline’ technique while exploring the flat and relatively featureless Somme Valley in northern France, and I now employ it everywhere I navigate – from the streets of Manhattan to the mountains of Scotland.

A ‘baseline’ is simply a bearing taken on any prominent feature, from a water tower or a skyscraper to a mountain peak, that you can use to find your way back to your starting point – and it is especially useful if you are lost. A ‘hook’ is a ‘catching feature’ behind the prominent feature from your starting point. These would ideally be linear, and hard to miss: in Manhattan for example I used the Hudson River!

Employing this technique allows you to roam without a specific route.

1 From your starting point, take a bearing on a prominent, nearby feature (see diagram) – one that will be visible from all points on your journey. This bearing is your baseline; note it down.

2 Study the map and select a hook (‘catching feature’, see diagram) that is behind the prominent feature with respect to where you are, and note its location.

3 On your journey, if you need to make a direct route back to your start, or you are lost, locate the prominent feature you identified, even if you have to (safely) ascend to do so.

4 Take a bearing to your prominent feature, then move sideways until this bearing matches the one you recorded at the start.

5 When your current bearing to the feature matches your baseline, following it will always take you to your starting point. On your journey back, if the prominent feature disappears from sight, or if you encounter obstacles in your path, use your ‘boxing’ techniques (see the March 2017 issue of Trail) to bypass them, and you will eventually arrive back at your start position. If you overshoot your start, your hook (catching feature) will stop you: 1 If you reach your catching feature – ‘hook‘ – stop.

2 Determine the back bearing (see boxout, above right) to your prominent feature. 3 Now travel along your hook until you are on this bearing.

4 Once there, travel back towards to your starting point.

Employing this technique allows you to roam without a specific route, even off your map!

Lyle uses a water tower in France as a ‘baseline‘ feature in the same way you could use a summit, tree or mast.

Lyle: “in Glasgow, the middle tower was my ‘baseline’ feature as I travelled towards the spot this picture was taken. The motorway in the foreground was the ‘hook.’ Navigating in urban environments is great practice for the hills.“

Lyle uses the hook & baseline technique in many different environments.