I have carried a Ritter PSP for over a year now on every outdoor trip I have made, hunting and hiking. To tell the truth, I have never opened it other than to check and make sure everything was there and I knew how to use it.

The reason I have never used it is because I carry it as a backup to the things I aready carry. I keep in in an inside pocket of my daypack inside a small cheap nylon fanny pack. If I leave the daypack at camp, I strap on the fanny pack or stuff it in my jacket pocket and maybe add a few odds and ends that I think I might need.

But, to get to your question, I can think of a time many years ago where such a kit would have been wonderful.

I was in high school. One Saturday morning I went hunting at daylight on the land near our house. It was overcast with a lots of ground mist. As the morning wore on the clouds got lower, the temperature dropped and it started to rain. I decided it was time to go home, but realized that I did not know were I was, and of course I did not have a compass.

The wooded area I was in was boarderd on the North side by a clear cut area one mile long. East and West was bordered by roads that joined on the South end. After the initial panic, I stopped and thought things out. All I needed to do was walk a straight line in any direction and I would come out some where. So I started moving in what I thought was the right direction (remember it was overcast and raining, poor visability, thick undergrowth). If you have never tried it, walking a straight line in thick woods is not easy. I would pick a large tree or other land mark and move toward it slowly, keeping my last reference point marked. When I reach the landmark, I would pick out another object in line with the last point and continue. It was slow going, but I finally made it out. I was in the clear, but still had a mile walk to get home.

If I had had the button compass in the PSP, I would have made it home about 2 hours faster and much, much warmer and drier. Just a rough north west heading would have put me out near home in a matter of minutes.

It was an educational experience. You might say, I got lost in my own back yard. I had hunted in those woods may time before. Shortly afterwards I bought my first compass and have carried one into the wild ever since.