Turns out the directions to the trailhead were quite clear. However, the book neglected to mention that the trailhead, located at a spot called "Three Forks", was at the junction of three major trails. "Bob," I said as we were getting out of the car, "That's the Appalachian Trail," recognizing the white rectangular slash that marks the A.T. for it's entire distance. "And that white diamond marks the Benton MacKaye does it not? Not likely to be private enough to skinny dip."

"Oh, well!" Bob replied, "should be nice enough anyway. Let's go check it out."

"O.k. which way do we go?"

"The book says to follow the trail to the northeast."

"Which trail?" I asked. "Which way is northeast?"

"Check the compass."

"I thought you had the compass."

"Oh. Well, let's just figure this out." said Bob looking up to get a bearing from the sun. Unfortunately cloud cover had rolled in and the sun was nowhere in site. "Well, let's see" Bob was mumbling to himself, " we were headed north then we turned right which put us heading west, then we turned left so we were headed north again, then we turned right" Bob spent a minute or two retracing our steps in his head before proclaiming, "That way!"