I carry a small GPS when hiking. Also a map and compass. I always try to stop at least once on a hike, pull out the map and compass, and practice determining my location. I've never NEEDED to do this, I haven't gotten lost ever (knock on wood!), but I like to stay in practice.

One thing I don't understand very well though. Here in Colorado I have lots of mountain peaks that I can triangulate off of to determine my position. And huge ridges and drainages I can use to keep myself "walled in" so I have a good handle on where I am by using just a map without compass. But how do people in the flat lands determine their location when there is nothing sticking up more than a few feet, thus nothing to triangulate off of? GPS would be a great tool for the flat land wilderness situation where you don't have many landmarks that would show up on a map.

How do you folks in the flatter areas of the country do it with only map and compass?