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To adventure without knowing how to use a map is equally as dangerous as not having one at all. Centuries ago, Marshall Islanders from the Pacific who knew this built maps from sticks and shells. The sticks, some of which were bent to show the pattern of ocean currents, were woven into grids. Shells were then attached to the grids to show where islands were positioned.

The Inuits also combined creativity with natural resources by using driftwood to make their maps. These extremely accurate carvings were essential to the Inuit fishing industry, which many of them used as means to survive. Fortunately, though they can be as confusing as a grid of sticks or driftwood carvings, modern topographical maps are much more accurate and easier to utilize.

A hiker's ability to read a topographical map is absolutely necessary for his or her safety and survival. A handful of what they illustrate includes distance, three-dimensional terrain, and elevation. Certain colors, lines, and symbols uniformly represent these. Learning what means what is essential to understanding maps.

Typically, dark green indicates forestry and patchy green shows areas full of scrub. White means there is a lack of vegetation. There might instead be meadows, gravel beds, or alpine groves. The color blue represents all forms of water; a thick blue line means year-round flow, but a thin one means the flow is only seasonal. Black lines show where there are trails, roads, and boundaries. Purple areas are either being revised or have not yet been studied.

Manmade objects will be represented by small, black symbols. Most of them are self-explanatory. A tent displays the location of a campsite. Rectangles show where buildings are erected. Other symbols are not as obvious, like the sideways "Y" that represents a mine tunnel or cave entrance. If in doubt, refer to the legend. Some places might also have handbooks available to help hikers with their journeys, but a handbook is no proper replacement for a map.

One aspect of topographical maps that is as important as their color codes and symbols are their brown contour lines. Contour lines show different elevations. There are two kinds: index and intermediate. Index contours are thick, dark, and numbered. Intermediate contours are thinner, lighter, and tend not to be labeled. The closer they are together, the steeper the slope.

One may simply look at the numbered index contours to see if the elevation is rising or falling. If it falls quickly enough,

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