On our hiking holiday we had a system of car-sharing. People came back at unpredictable times. A few of the elderly ladies wanted to wait for their own spouse. However, we had a system that no car left with an empty space if it had arrived full, to be sure that the last person back was not stranded.
You often have a choice of easy and more difficult trails. The map at the start of any walking area marks the routes by colour and tells you estimated walking time.
You may wish to give the car key to the slower walkers who get back faster because they take the short trail and get back an hour earlier. That enables the slow walkers to sit in the car in the shade, gather together to talk (rather than walking off in different directions). it is easier to find everybody when the driver gets back and see if the car is now full.
On one occasion the system went wrong. A car of slow walkers assumed that somebody missing had gone off in another car. We had a list of phone numbers. However, some of the wives, especially those from Asian countries, such as Indonesia, did not have mobiles with separate phone numbers, or did not give out their phone and email numbers so we could not contact them.
Other people had low batteries and phones which had no reception. it is a good idea to tell everybody to buy and bring phone battery packs which are very cheap, about £25 on the internet. Money well spent. You can save on a taxi fare costing that much, and save lots of stress.
Distribute Essential Contacts Of Group Members
At the briefing at the start of the holiday or the start of the day, insist that you have the numbers of everybody in the group. On several occasions we were all standing around, saying, does anybody have so-and-so's number? We needed one person with a working phone, to contact another with a working phone, to ask who was on which trail and who had gone home to the hotel in which car.
Overloaded Car
Yes, the wait for a full car system went wrong one day. One car set off not full, assuming that somebody had gone ahead.
I heard that as a result the last car was short of a space. Six six-foot men had to cram into a five-seater hire car. Nobody wanted to be left alone in the dark on a mountain top after a tiring day's walking.
Overloading the car was illegal, dangerous, extremely uncomfortable. It was hard to get the door shut. One person had to sit almost on top of another.
The original idea was to just go a mile or two until the group could find a taxi so one, or two, could take a taxi and share the cost. In the end they didn't find a taxi rank. To relieve the discomfrot of the two, in fact everybody, they had to get out and change positions.
We heard assorted versions of this story over breakfast, a story which will be re-told on every holiday as if it happened yesterday.
At the top or bottom of a hill, an hour before your hotel supper, you might long for a taxi. Keep local taxi numbers in your phone or save a business card with the numbers each time you use a taxi. You might note the taxi number from the resort as you set off. You just never know when you might want to call the taxi. Also note which trail you are on, in case you twist your ankle and need to call your group or emergency services.
Contact Phone Numbers of The Walkers
We were given a printed copy of the week's walks and the partial list of group members' phone numbers. I took photos of the phone numbers and trail names and numbers with my phone as a backup. I noted in which pocket I kept the vital information. If you are right-handed you might want vital stuff such as the car key or taxi number in your top right pocket.
Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.
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