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Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the Ranges- Something lost behind the Ranges. Lost and waiting for you, Go!
-Rudyard Kipling
Identifying your location and knowing how to determine how to get where you want to go next are necessary skills for wilderness travel. On your backpacking or canoeing course, you will be using topographic maps issued by the US Geological Survey to plot your course, measure distances, and identify particular geographical features. Top means "place" and graph means "drawing," so a topographic map is a drawing of a particular place.
At the bottom of each topographic map you will find a legend, which provides you with the contour interval, a magnetic declination diagram, a scale, and other useful information, such as the date the map was issued.
You will see several colors on topographic maps. The colors identify the following features:
White = non-vegetated areas
Green = vegetation features (wooded areas, forests, orchards,
vineyards)
Brown = elevation features (mountains and hills)
Blue = water features (streams, lakes, ponds, rivers, marshes,
springs)
Black = man-made features (buildings, roads, trails, railroad tracks)
Red = heavy-duty and medium-duty roads and highways
You will use your maps in conjunction with a compass, which uses the earth's magnetism to help you identify the cardinal directions of North, South, East and West.
You will also need to know some basic navigation terms to be proficient at leading your group.
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