A few months ago, I took an overnight trip out to the woods by myself. I slept in the bed of my truck on an abandoned forestry road somewhat deep into a state forest. I went with no pre-planned destination so I just turned onto unpaved forestry roads randomly until I eventually got to a quiet dead end that petered out. My wife knew the state forest I was in, but no one on Earth had a more precise location for me than that.
It was a little nervewracking and spooky even though in truth I was only about a twenty minute drive from the edge of the park and civilization. To know that if I slipped and broke a leg or something I'd be screwed for a couple of days until a crew could find me.
But I experienced it as a good kind of anxiety. I deliberately wanted to get outside of my comfort zone and spend a little time getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. It was an absolutely rewarding experience and one of the highlights of 2020 for me. I woke up the next morning refreshed, centered, and excited to return home to my family.
A quote I think about a lot is J. A. Shedd's, "A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."
I have the ACR ResQLink 400. Can't exactly "recommend" since I haven't used mine (they're single use only), but I researched this a bit before buying.
Just make sure you get one that uses 406Mhz rather than two-way LEO satellites. The two-way stuff requires monthly payments and is far less reliable, won't get through forest canopy. The 406Mhz SARSAT beacons are single use only one-way transmitters (they receive GPS, not 406Mhz-SARSAT, although they still work without a GPS signal). Anything that advertises using it to send SMS messages is junk for emergency use.
There's an older, lower-frequency SARSAT band somewhere in the 150mhz-ish range, but it gets so many false positives (like some ATM in Kansas) that it's basically retired. The 406Mhz protocol has a lot more checksums in it.
From some reading I've done, it seems the type of device I'd want is a PLB and not a EPIRB (which you register to a vessel?) It also says PLBs you'd register to yourself and have to update every 2 years - but some articles I've seen say you can use them more than once. (source: https://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/personal-locator-bea...) How much of this is accurate?
Well, they both use the same satellites and radio signals. It's the same electronics in different packaging.
Speaking of packaging, the product you linked to is the buoyant version. Don't get that for hiking, it's significantly larger (physically) than the non-buoyant one. Confusingly, they are both called the "ResQLink 400".
It was a little nervewracking and spooky even though in truth I was only about a twenty minute drive from the edge of the park and civilization. To know that if I slipped and broke a leg or something I'd be screwed for a couple of days until a crew could find me.
But I experienced it as a good kind of anxiety. I deliberately wanted to get outside of my comfort zone and spend a little time getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. It was an absolutely rewarding experience and one of the highlights of 2020 for me. I woke up the next morning refreshed, centered, and excited to return home to my family.
A quote I think about a lot is J. A. Shedd's, "A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."