My first multiday solo hike happened due to a COVID-19 related tantrum. The lockdown of a neighbouring area left me without work for a week, and without a playmate, so I made a snap decision to go for a six-day hike in Central Queensland, a place with few people and limited mobile phone coverage.
Four hours into my eight-hour drive to the middle of nowhere, I started thinking “Is this a bad idea?” I’ve heard people say that stupid people are too stupid to know that they are stupid. What if that is me! What if I am driving toward my own death? Or worse still, driving toward public humiliation by being featured on the evening news wrapped up like a storebought burrito in a reflective emergency blanket?
In a patch of mobile phone coverage, I called a friend to check if I was being foolish. And while a complete psychological assessment is still pending,
