In my twenties, I really suffered from happy feet. If I went a half hour without seeing a deer, I was off on another trek to see what was over the next hill. I saw a LOT of new country, and I'm sure I foolishly pushed a lot of deer into other hunters sights. A topo map and compass never let me down and always got me back.
One typically gray and cold Pennsylvania December day, I was hunting a new area and I was several miles back in from the road which ran E to W. I hadn't bothered with the topo too much being confident that walking due south would get me back to the road. It did... two hours after dark and after four hours of solid hoofing it and really beginning to doubt my compass. So much did I doubt it that I began always carrying a second compass in case I wanted to verify that it was correct.
That was all well and good for about five or six years. Then while I was prepping for deer hunting and getting out all of my gear, I set my two compasses out on the table. Imagine my surprise when I noticed that the better and more expensive of the two had flipped direction and now showed that south was north. I still wonder what I'd have done if I hadn't caught that until I was way back in on one of my little forays.
