Departure - Salt Lake City: We left Salt Lake City late because of additional requests for engineering supplies and to drop off the primary generator for repairs. As a result, by the time we left it was dark, we no longer had Internet access, and were using the truck's information binder our primary instructions. These instructions were deficient in three ways: the truck status, presence of waystations, and the approach directions. First, the truck is in poor shape: it is missing a front signalling light, has an odometer and spedometer that showed far less distance and speed than our GPS, and has poor gas mileage. Second, the long-range instructions fail to mention that the last leg of the journey lacks refuelling stations: refuel at the midpoint (Price) should be mandatory. Third, the final approach instructions are inaccurate and led us seriously astray. The instructions also failed to mention that the view from Spanish Forks through Soldier's Pass were stunning, even at night.

Arrival - Hanksville: We arrived around 3am at Hanksville, fueled at one of the automated refuleling stations, and began our search. Anthony was driving and on the first pass could not find the target road. Hugh instructed a return to our starting point at Hanksville to doublecheck the directions against the odomoter. We found a road that matched the directions in distance exactly and turned on it; almost immediately we suspected the road was not the right one and attempted to back out. Anthony at that point bogged the truck, and Hugh took over based on his greater off-road experience and un-bogged it. We then tried an alternate fork on the same road and found it ended in a box canyon, and backed out of that road entirely. We therefore re-tried the other road, at which point Hugh got the truck bogged. A brief walking survey which confirmed that this was the wrong road. At this point, Hugh then attempted to unbog the truck. The truck stalled repeatedly and the gearshift was unreliable; nevertheless, Hugh was able to get the truck free. We then returned to the starting point, re-read the directions carefully, and tried again.

Our next try, a road slightly closer to Hanksville, led to a rifle range. We then re-tried the box canyon and confirmed that it had no hidden exit. The GPS indicated we were getting closer and closer, and we decided to try again using the GPS to guide us. We drove further up the road from the instruction point and found what looked like a good candidate road. The road rapidly became rough and merged with a streambed, and when we tried to back out the truck became completely bogged. Re-check of the GPS indicated we were actually further from the hab than it had been previously indicated. We made several attempts to extricate the truck, and then Anthony got out to push; at that point we noted and apparently corrected an issue with the truck's four wheel drive seeming not to engage leaving the truck stuck in a streambed at 4am on a cloudy night.

Return to Hanksville: At this point, we obtained minimal survival gear, flashlights and water, and headed back to Hanksville at 4am in the night. Hugh gave Anthony brief instruction on night survival, and so we conducted the bulk of the walk back with no lights. Anthony reminded Hugh of the discovery of cougar tracks in the area, and so we conducted a running conversation to discourage local wildlife from approaching. (We were later told the manual's report of cougar tracks was possibly exaggerated; the largest wild fauna we saw were rabbits).

It took just under 2 hours for us to walk 5 kilometers back to town, in part because we stopped to take GPS readings at the truck, at the road, and at all the false starts we took attempting to find the Hab so we could update the directions. As the clouds began to clear the night sky was absolutely spectacular, and we were able to see terrain and atmospheric effects of moonrise and sunrise and even see a satellite. Cellphone service was nonexistent (we later found that there is no cellphone service in town at all). We arrived at Hanksville around 5:45am and after several unsuccessful attemtpts to contact Tony via cellphone, we walked over to the Whispering Sands Motel, verified that we knew where we were. At that point, Hugh insisted we walk next door to the gas station and wait until 6am to wake Don up. (It was not a life and death emergency).

Freeing the Truck: Don got us in out of the cold quickly and after we warmed up he drove us out to to rescue the truck. We mentioned the problems with the directions to him, and he confirmed that these were known problems and was fairly certain that he knew where we had gone. Sure enough, he found us, and pointed out the actual site further down the road --- so, even though we thought we had gone farther than required, we had actually not gone far enough.

Don quickly found the truck in the streambed and started to set up a tow chain, but after a moment's thought decided to survey the truck. He found our front wheels high and the rear wheels buried, and asked whether we'd set up the locking hubs on the four wheel drive. We hadn't --- the trucks Hugh was familiar with did not require setting the locks and there was no prominent warning in the manual to alert us that it was necessary. Only one lock worked, but that was enough for the truck to get out on its own. Shortly thereafter, Hugh got the truck turned around and we followed Don to the Hab.

Finding the Hab: Don had previously informed us that we had to pass mile marker 114 and climb almost to the top of a hill to find the entrance to the Hab. This indeed was a good landmark; he then led us out over a cattle guard and into some very rough and trackless terrain that became increasingly and increasingly Mars-like. Finally, we sighted the flag of Mars and then the Hab itself --- at 7am, 11 hours after we initially departed.