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Trans-Taiga Road (2004)

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154 points jason_pomerleau | 1 comments | 03 Jul 25 01:07 UTC | HN request time: 0.207s | source
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jedberg ◴[03 Jul 25 03:08 UTC] No.44451274[source]▶
Intersting! I know that in the contiguous USA, you will never be more than 20 miles from a road no matter where you are, but have no idea how far one can drive from a town.
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moralestapia ◴[03 Jul 25 03:46 UTC] No.44451459[source]▶
So if you're ever lost, you just walk?

(Assuming nothing kills you in nature)

Edit: Wait, no. You could be extremely unlucky and be walking parallel to the closest road, lol.

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bravesoul2 ◴[03 Jul 25 04:03 UTC] No.44451524[source]▶
Nerd snipe: given a compass and dropped in a random location what is the best strategy (based on direction assuming no clues from terrain) of finding a road. E.g. strategy might be 1000 steps south then 1000 east, repeat.

Nerd snipe 2. Same without a compass or any sense of direction. Assume you can accurately make a 90 degree turn and count steps

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labster ◴[03 Jul 25 04:21 UTC] No.44451598[source]▶
Honestly I’d just walk downhill. Most human settlements are on rivers, most roads take the lowest passes. At night, I’d just walk in the direction of the sky that’s glowing the most.
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1. jonah-archive ◴[03 Jul 25 04:33 UTC] No.44451658[source]▶
Melville (roughly) agrees -- from the first chapter of Moby-Dick:

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Once more. Say you are in the country; in some high land of lakes. Take almost any path you please, and ten to one it carries you down in a dale, and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. There is magic in it. Let the most absent-minded of men be plunged in his deepest reveries—stand that man on his legs, set his feet a-going, and he will infallibly lead you to water, if water there be in all that region. Should you ever be athirst in the great American desert, try this experiment, if your caravan happen to be supplied with a metaphysical professor. Yes, as every one knows, meditation and water are wedded for ever.

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