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Trapped in the desert for THREE NIGHTS
In this gripping episode of 'How I Survived,' Claire Nelson shares her harrowing experience of being trapped in the California desert for three nights after a devastating fall. With a shatte...
Trapped in the desert for THREE NIGHTS
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Interactive Transcript
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This episode deals with serious and distressing content.
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Listener discretion is advised.
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Hi, this is Beth.
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While I've got you, if you love how I survived,
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please rate, review and subscribe.
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It helps other fans like you find us too.
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This is not what I expected to end up.
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The shattered pelvis.
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It does it.
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I might die here and I really scared it.
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That's the case, I don't know.
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I don't know what to do.
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I can't get a signal right here.
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I call for help.
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No one's out here.
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This is the stupidest thing I've ever done.
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This is How I Survived.
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Stories of everyday people
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and how they survived against the odds.
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I'm your host, Beth Yel.
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You know, I'm going to die or what?
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I mean, I look back and down.
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I thought, you know, how did I have a supply of that?
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I think that I probably survived for a reason.
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How I survived.
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Driving across California's sprawling Joshua Tree National Park
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on her way to start a nearly 13 kilometer hike.
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35-year-old Kiwi Claire Nelson
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decided to stop and take a moment
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to appreciate the desert's beauty.
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I had actually pulled over to the side of the road
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just to take in the scenery.
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And this coyote was standing there at the side of the road
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and crossed the road and fronted me.
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And then as I started to drive away,
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it kind of trotted alongside the car.
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And I just remember that it was a really nice moment.
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I love animals and fascinated by wildlife
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and I just thought that was really neat.
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The desert was beautiful and peaceful.
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Everything that frantic London,
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where Claire had been living for 13 years, was not.
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A whopping 800,000 acres,
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the National Park is more than twice the size of Greater London.
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But within that space, there was nothing but miles of rolling
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hilly desert and rugged canyons, dotted with mammoth boulders
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and the almost alien Joshua trees, which give the park its name.
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I hear a lot of clichés about it,
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but they're all accurate, so it's hard to avoid them.
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Like it is an otherworldly place.
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The trees look a little bit like Dr. Sue's sketches.
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You know, everything's kind of strange and different
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and not like anywhere else that feels familiar.
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Claire wasn't even meant to be here.
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She'd recently moved to Canada
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and the plan was to spend some time on the road there,
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exploring and immersing herself in the great outdoors.
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Then her mate Nat and her husband Lou,
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who lived in the Californian desert,
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reached out with an invite to house sit and watch their cats
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while they were on holidays.
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Claire jumped at the chance.
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She'd been there before and she loved it,
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especially the hiking.
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Staying for three weeks in total,
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she was already halfway through her time there.
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I think I'd been hiking every day that I was there,
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even just small hikes, even just like an hour or something.
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Any chance I could to get out on the trail, I would take it.
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So I was already feeling really comfortable with the terrain.
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And the heat.
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Getting close to summer in the Northern Hemisphere,
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the dry desert temperatures were soaring up to
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and over 40 degrees Celsius each day.
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Claire's friends had warned her to be careful.
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There were stories of hikers who'd got lost in the desert
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and some who'd even succumb to the heat and died.
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I was thinking, wow, yes, but I'm going to be sensible.
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I'm not going to go off the trail.
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I'm going to be fine.
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I'm just going to be doing established trails like everybody else.
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And it's so easy to get caught up in that mindset of thinking,
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this doesn't apply to me or it wouldn't happen to me.
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We're all guilty of thinking like that.
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But Claire was prepared.
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She had five litres of water, split between a hydration pack and two one-leater bottles,
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snacks, a first aid kit, and a hiking stick that she'd grabbed at the very last moment before
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heading off. She'd left bright and early that morning.
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And the plan was to knock off the hike in about four hours.
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Still, once she'd made the one and a half hour drive across the park to get to the trailhead,
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she stopped into the visitor centre to chat to a ranger.
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Like Nat and Lou, he warned her about the extreme heat.
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But he also just kind of mentioned that there would be some scrambling
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at a little bit of a climb down to the valley at some point,
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sort of towards the end of the hike.
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And I just put that in my mind like, oh okay, yeah, there'll be a bit of a,
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you know, a bit of a challenging part where I'm going to do some scrambling.
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And then thought nothing more of it, then then head off on the trail.
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Following the trail, it merged with a dried out riverbed,
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and Claire kept walking along completely in her element.
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But she kept a cautious eye out for rattlesnakes.
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She was halfway to her destination, the Lost Palms Oasis, which is hidden deep in the valley,
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when she reached a 3.5 meter high stack of boulders.
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And I thought, okay, well, you did mention there was some scrambling,
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and so I just clambered on up.
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And I could see this valley below just kind of falling away and I sort of sat there.
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And I had broken my water bottle, so I just sort of emptied that while I was sitting there,
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just having a drink, looking at the views.
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It was breathtaking.
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And as Claire drained the last of the liquid from her broken bottle,
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she wasn't even remotely worried.
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She wasn't going to die of thirst.
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She still had plenty of water to see her through until the end of the hike.
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She'd even thought to leave a bottle in the car for when she got back.
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And then I figured out, okay, I'm going to have to climb down the other side of this boulders stack.
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And the easiest route to get down was on the opposite side, so I thought I'm going to have to
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cross these boulders. And I stretched my foot out, checked and I had a good sort of
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foot hold on the rock. And then once I put more of my weight into the foot hold,
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my foot started to slip and I realised there really wasn't a foot hold there.
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I started to slide down the face of the rock.
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Claire had put her faith in her balance and her sturdy boots with their high quality grippy
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rubber soles. She'd gotten complacent and terrifyingly she realised as she began to slip towards
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the edge, complacency kills. I'm starting to slide and I'm trying to grab at the rock with my fingers
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and I've got my hiking stick in one hand so I'm trying to sort of stab at the rock with the
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stick with one hand and then grab it with the other but it's like everything's going in slow motion
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but it's also really really quick. And then my brain sort of gives me a warning like you're about
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to get hurt and then I go over the edge. I landed in a clearing surrounded by very high rocks,
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about 25 feet down. At the moment of impacts I heard my bones break, I felt the break and just
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this pain just shot through my body and I quickly realised that I'd shattered my pelvis.
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I could feel the pieces of bone in my hip if I had moved slightly they would move slightly.
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I couldn't move. I could sort of wiggle my toes so I knew I wasn't paralyzed but any other movement
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was just out of the question. It was a miracle that Claire hadn't landed on one of the many
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boulders surrounding her but in a small clearing. Flat on her back and unable to move, she was
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now completely shittin' from view. I knew I needed to get emergency help so I grabbed my phone out
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of my bag which was next to me and called 911 and I didn't have any signal and I realised then of
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fours because you can't get any phone signal in the middle of the national park and so that was
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a moment of absolute horror of I am in serious trouble and I actually can't tell anybody and
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on top of that it was the crushing realisation that I haven't let anybody know my plans so nobody
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knows I was coming out here. Claire's fingers shook as she frantically scrolled through her phone,
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shooting off several texts for help each time the little red exclamation marks screamed out
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not delivered and the emergency SOS function on her mobile also required signal. It was looking
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really bad. And then I look at the GPS maps and I see where I am on the trail and I'm not on the trail.
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I'm actually about at least a mile off the trail so at some point I've come off and gone the wrong
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way and that was the last straw for me. I was like all these things are against me but now even hoping
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that someone's gonna just come by while hiking the trail and find me that's not gonna happen either
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so I realised that I could not have been in a worse situation.
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Cold prickles of horror ran down Claire's neck. She held again and again for help
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but would anyone even hear her screams or would they be lost on the desert breeze.
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In the sky above her a lone hawk had already started to circle.
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And that kind of freaked me out just watching them go directly above me round and round.
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I mean one of the things I love about going hiking by myself is you just get to feel like
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you're an animal out in the wilderness you know but now I was a wounded animal out in the wilderness
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you know my position in the food chain had dropped substantially.
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And it wasn't that long ago that she'd spotted that majestic coyote but earlier she'd been in
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the safety of her car. Now she was vulnerable. I was very aware that coyotes were around and on top
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of that I knew there was a risk of seeing rattlesnakes. I had been looking out for them on my hike
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so I kind of wanted to see one from a safe distance you know just being from New Zealand we don't get
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snakes it still seems very exciting but once I was lying on the floor of the desert that was the
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last thing I wanted to see. When I'd run out of options of things to do to get help and to
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call attention to what was going on all I could think to do was to then record a message.
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I thought well there's a huge chance that I'm not going to get found so I thought I'll just leave
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a video message on my camera.
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This is not where I expect this to end up.
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The shattered pelvis.
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I might die here. I can really scan that's the case. I don't know.
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I can't get a signal right here. I call for help. No one's out here.
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This is the stupidest thing I've ever done.
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Speaking to the camera, Claire felt just a tiny bit less alone.
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Maybe she could get through this and if she didn't make it out alive at least now there was a chance
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that her beloved friends and family would know what had happened to her.
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By now it was mid-morning and the oven-like heat pressed down hard.
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With her pelvis shattered, Claire couldn't move and it was only going to get worse.
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And I realized very quickly that the sun was going to be my biggest problem. I didn't have any
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shade. I couldn't move into any shade and so I had my hat so I just held it up with one arm
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straight up above me blocking the sun from my upper body and my face because it was the only
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thing I could do. I couldn't protect my legs so I had to try and cover my legs with a map of the
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park that I had in my bag and then use my hiking stick to apply sunscreen to my legs to the parts
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where I couldn't reach. I was just trying to do everything I could to stop my skin from burning.
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Grabbing her first aid kit, she pulled out a Tylenol bottle. There were three painkillers rattling
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in the bottom. Chugging them down, they didn't even make a dent in the crippling agony.
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But it was her water supply she was most worried about. She was down to just three litres.
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As the owl was ticked past at an agonizingly slow pace, she took tiny frequent sips.
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Claire was parched beyond belief, but she had no idea how long she'd have to make the precious
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liquid last. Then, horrifyingly, a sudden gust of wind blew, snatching Claire's map which had been
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covering her legs. Now they were exposed to the blazing heat. The sun was unbearable,
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but as it set and darkness cloked the desert, Claire was gripped with terror.
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I was absolutely terrified that I would be spinning a night out there. As soon as it started to get dark,
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I knew that the gnome was going to come by before, but definitely not going to come by now.
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Being flat on your back on the desert floor in the middle of the night, you feel so vulnerable.
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I was aware I was at snake level. Even though snakes don't come out at night,
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it doesn't matter, I was so terrified that snakes were coming out of the crevices and the rocks
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around me and even though it was really dark, I would sort of squint in my eyes at it,
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get used to the darkness and then I was convinced like the seeing them moving and kind of,
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you know, winding their way out of the dark crevices and coming towards me. So I would get my
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iPhone, turn a torch on and shine it and then there was nothing there. This went on for much of the
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night. The temperature had plummeted too. Dressed in just shorts and a tank top, Claire shivered
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uncontrollably. Her teeth chattering violently. Needless to say, she didn't get much sleep.
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I was so relieved when the sun came up the next morning. It was a weird mixed feeling of
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kind of, I can't believe this has happened. At the same time thinking, wow, okay, well, at least the
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worst is over now. I've spent a night in the desert. This is absolutely insane, but I've survived it.
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So now we're going to be fine. It's a new day. It's going to be people in the park. You know,
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this is all going to be over and I was so uncomfortable as well. I mean, my whole body was so
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fed up with being in this one position, not being able to move. I sort of felt that really
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agonizing pressure of feeling my bones pressing to the ground and not being able to roll over.
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And then as the sun started to get higher and I realized what I was actually
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in for was another day of that excruciating heat. So I sort of had to brace myself for that.
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Claire's only hope were her friends, Nat and Lou. Even though they were on holidays in Scotland,
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they knew Claire had planned to go on this hike at some point during her trip.
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Would they notice her absence and raise the alarm? But she couldn't rely on them.
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Screaming into the abyss might have seemed fruitless, but she had to try.
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I felt like I needed to scream for help because it was just gave me some little
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strand of hope to cling to that. If I scream for help and somehow the sound carries
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the right time, the right direction and there's a person there and they hear it like it was a
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tiniest little possibility, but that was all I had to cling onto. And then the screaming for help
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took a lot out of me. It really left my throat sore and dry and it it it wore me out made me feel
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a bit dizzy. So I had to do it before I got too hot. So the morning before the sun came directly
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over me, I would try and do as much of that as I could. And then once the sun came over me, it was
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all about keeping myself from burning. It is fucking hot. I don't know what temperature it is out here.
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It must have been the forties. And I can't get to any shade. I just tried
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at a sheer moment of fucking pain again and I tried to roll myself over into that little
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CDL curve. I almost got there. Soon as I managed to kind of lever my pelvis over, you hear this quickly
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quickly crunch crunch crunch and then oh the noise it came out of me, I sweated down and of course
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you're all back over and nearly passed out. I don't want to pass out in the sun forever.
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Despite Claire's best efforts to hold her hat up on the end of her hiking stick to block out the
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sun's rays, it wasn't cutting it. Her arms were killing her. She needed to get creative.
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And my brain just went into this mode of okay what can we do? What have we got? Let's do this.
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Scanning the clearing, she spotted a thin but reasonably sturdy looking stick about the length of
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her arm. Using the hiking stick, Claire dragged it towards her. She pulled the hair tie from her ponytail
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and used it to bind both sticks together in a t-shape. Finding a roll of physiotape in her first aid kit,
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she tore off a strip and wrapped that around the binding to really secure the frame.
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And then I had a plastic bag in my backpack that I stretched out across the pieces of stick
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and then put my hat on the top of that. So I made this bigger shade that I could then hold up much easier
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over me. My makeshift umbrella. This is basically me for the next six hours now that the sun's
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coming over me and legs covered. It's very very hot.
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My childhood of growing up in the 80s watching Maghiva paid off. So it was about 24 hours after I
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had fallen at this point. I still had all my food. I'd eaten the boiled egg but I wasn't hungry at all.
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I made myself eat it but I found food in a little bit repulsive actually. It was just this
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just absolute desperate need for hydration. I was fantasizing about cracking a can of diacoccal.
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Like the sound of it that fizz the wet sort of burns your tongue because it's so fizzy.
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On a hot day that was always like my vice and I became obsessed with this. I mean yes I wanted water
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but that became this weird obsession in my mind and I couldn't stop thinking about it.
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Claire also couldn't stop thinking about the bottle of water she'd left in the car.
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If only she could go back in time and make a different decision but that wasn't going to happen.
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Just like a can of icy cold diet coke wasn't going to suddenly materialize out of thin air.
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She did have one other option though. The whole time I'd been there so far I had been
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collecting my urine because I didn't want to be sort of lying there. Just weighing on myself.
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I just thought no it's going to make things worse and also it's going to attract animals.
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So what I was doing was peeing into the little Tylenol bottle which was small enough for me to get
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into the Toffin Meshorts and then tipping that into the empty broken water bottle that I had.
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And so after about 24 hours of being out there my water supplies were running really low
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and I was very aware of the fact that I was probably going to have to drink urine.
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Dehydration had left Claire's pee a dark orange colour. It looked disgusting and no doubt it would
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taste even worse. But if she could get past the taste and keep it down it could be a lifesaver.
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And what I did was decide to have a couple of sips of it before the water ran out because if I
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physically can't keep this down then I'm screwed and I found I could I could keep it down. I mean
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it was disgusting but at least I knew that it would sustain me for a little bit longer.
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You're in taste exactly as you think it would taste. It had that kind of musty warm kind of
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cloying taste if you have like a flat beer that's been sitting up the sun. The worst part about it
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is more of the aftertaste. It kind of lingers in the back of your sinuses. It's it's pretty bitter
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and pleasant and I had a vanilla chapstick in my pocket so I was sort of eating a little bit of
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that after to take the taste away. I guess you remember what day I ate this on domicona. I've got
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I've got no more resources. My kidneys hurt, dehydrated. You know this is the color of what I'm drinking.
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She just kind of says it all really. It's not how I want to go I don't have to say
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really hoping someone finds me. By this point my phone had died so I had no way of
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keeping track of time. It was it was a lot of guesswork and sort of just working out where the
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sun was at that point. It was I would say about the middle of the day I was drinking urine and
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kind of thinking this is a really serious situation I'm in and so then by the afternoon of day two
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there were two hawks circling and I just felt really ominous. I just thought oh no they've
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clocked me. I figured out there's an injured animal down in the canyon. Over the next couple of
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hours Claire battled the baking sun until it began to set and finally she was in the shade.
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It was bitter sweet though it meant she was sliding towards another night alone in the desert.
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I started to feel worried that no one was going to notice that I was missing and I remember there
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were a lot of stars that night and I was watching shooting stars and being like this is really
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you know this is really amazing but also this you know this is all for at the same time.
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After another restless night beneath the stars Claire woke to her third day flat on her back in
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the desert. The third day it was the hottest day yet and I was really struggling with the heat
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and the dehydration and so I started to hear things.
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This wedding is a sign to get off my legs which has always been an hour after it gets off my face.
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I was quite a fight with a heat today.
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I'm not living it when. Oh yeah boy I don't want to have to do that again tomorrow.
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And this crazy heat I keep thinking I'm hearing a helicopter at one point I thought I'd
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be that's an existence but it was all in my head. It wasn't fair not at all. Claire's not a
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cryer she calls herself an emotional vault but looking into the lens of her camera to record
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another message it all became too much.
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This is the first time I've actually cried because I'm getting really freaked out now.
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And I just think of all of you guys my friends and my family and I
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are doing anything to see you guys.
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I don't know I worry for one of you here.
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I really don't want to forget it.
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So I should find some hope and the fact I can still find some of your tears I'm not gonna be
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trying to try it out yet.
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They're so hurt they're so hurt if I just feeling a little bit freaked out.
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Claire might not be used to crying but she wasn't going to waste the opportunity.
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You might have noticed that tiny pause in the video that was Claire wiping her eyes
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and trying to drink her tears. Over the day she'd record more videos each capturing her rising
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desperation. I'm not worried about food it's just as water that I'm worried about.
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That's a lot of three days.
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You can go.
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We'll be less in the desert.
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I'm gonna come looking for me.
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This trait, fate is trying to get to me.
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I'm gonna let it in.
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So by the time the third night was sinking in it was a super very eerie calm in the desert
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and I was also feeling more accepting of my fate. I think I was reaching this point of
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well this is gonna be it for me and maybe I just need to you know get to grips with that fact
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and as I was sort of lying there and bracing myself for another night in the cold and the dark
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I saw something moving and the rocks above me which really made me freak out like oh god
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what what's there.
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There's some bats flying around up here and the muck
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I'm hoping they're not biting bats and that they have understood me.
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Now they've realized I wasn't a threat so there was kind of the creatures all around me the
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desert was starting to kind of stir and I mean yes it was kind of scary but also I don't know
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I just I remember feeling very calm about it and being fascinated in watching these bats and
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thinking how lucky I was to be there and and watching them and you know it made me feel sad
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and away because it's like well gosh there's so much you know so much of the world I still want to
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see an experience I kind of thought this is gonna be it for me and maybe I should just you know
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appreciate where I am while I have it.
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In that moment Claire began to realize that if she did die out here of all the places where her
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bones could rest it wasn't too bad out in nature where she was her happiest
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excepting her fate she closed her eyes with the knowledge that she might never open them again
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but she did she'd survived a third night but with just half a bottle of pea left to drink
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and little chance of making anymore how on earth could she survive a fourth.
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At this point everything on my body is aching like just the pressure of being in one position
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for now four days I didn't have as much strength to hold the sun shade up so I just sort of laid it
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down and draped it on top of me just couldn't keep holding it up and I didn't know at that point
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whether I would have another 24 hours in me the idea of it at the time just felt completely
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implausible. Turning her camera on Claire looked into the lens her face was sunken her dry
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parched lips painfully cracked she told her friends and family she loved them then the battery
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finally ran out cutting her off like that her last connection to the outside world was gone
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now she had no fight left in her
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and I was kind of starting to just drift in and out of consciousness and I was having these really
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vivid sort of daydreams about me as a child and just kind of being really thirsty and like
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being summerant and being really hot and so I was just I wasn't even very present at this point
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but then this voice comes out of nowhere and I just hear the words fucking coyote
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but really clear as if someone had just said them like right next to me I was so confused and I
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thought it was my brain just messing with me but it sort of snatched me back into consciousness
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and I kind of came back to the room so to speak and I was listening and then I realized to do what
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was a helicopter and for a moment I thought I definitely hearing things again but it wasn't it
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really was a helicopter and I was like oh my god she had no idea but Nat and Lou had noticed how
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quiet Claire had been on Instagram and couldn't let it go usually when Claire traveled she'd take
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plenty of snaps and upload them to her social media texting again and again of course they didn't
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hear a peep so they'd sent friends around to their house to check on her finding it empty the car
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gone and Claire's handwritten calendar which read Tuesday lost palms oasis finally the alarm had been
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up in the air in a rescue helicopter pilots Eric Baster and Manny Romero were on the lookout for Claire
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as we were flying around research some of the common trails made a lot of announcements over
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our PA system that if Claire could hear us if she could make any type of movement
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and then the same voice came again and they heard them say we're looking for a missing
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high-cutter and I was oh my god I have to get their attention I wasn't even sure it was me I
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thought maybe there were people in another high-cutter like but maybe they can also find me while they're
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out here and so I started to scream and wave my sunshade I couldn't see where the helicopter was
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like only here and then I heard it get quieter and quieter and quieter and then it was gone and so I
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I remember just kind of begging to the powers of B that they would come back and I have no idea
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how long it was because it was so hard to gauge time especially with the emotions I was feeling
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but after a while I heard them come back and then I heard them say my name which was just
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incredible and again I'm screaming and waving this thing and I sort of caught a glimpse of the
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helicopter in between the fire cliffs on the horizon and I thought oh gosh they can't see me like
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they're in the wrong place but I'm screaming and I'm waving this thing and then again the helicopter
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gets quieter and it's gone and I just thought I've missed my chance my heart I mean we're just like
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pounding like I don't know what I'm gonna do now tugging the plastic bag of her sunshade
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Claire hung her t-shirt on it like a flag then stretched the white grocery bag across it again
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to make it as big a target as she could with her last bit of strength she held it up as high as it
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would go waving it like a mad woman and at the bottom of that stick was Claire Nelson waving at us
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what I would describe as a floating bag is what it looked like to me so I heard the helicopter again
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and they came over and I still couldn't see them but this time they saw me and I heard them
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say the words we see you we're gonna come and get you and I'll never forget those was there burned
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into my brain I just knew at that point I'd gone from thinking that was it I was gonna die to realizing
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that actually I'm not gonna die and I actually went into shock I think at that point
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Claire wouldn't have to spend a fourth night in the desert amazingly she was saved
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well time these two guys managed to clamber their way down into the canyon I'm ecstatic like
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I'm making jokes with them I pretty much hysterical like laughing I just couldn't believe it
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and these two guys couldn't believe it the these guys are out searching for people all time
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and they said they were expecting to find a body so the fact that they arrived and found this kind
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jokie hiker they they were just blown away so we were all in this kind of weird state of like
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what is happening right now it was a really lovely moment like we were all just ecstatic
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and manny and eric had come bearing gifts water which Claire gratefully guzzled never had she
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tasted something so divine and then one of them manny he said oh you know we actually have a
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board in our office of the people we find alive because it reminds us why we do this we use it to
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keep our spirits up and keep us motivated he said you know it'd be really great at some point
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to get a photo with you for the wall and I remember saying like yeah but just not right now like
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this really isn't we know much of like a tinder style photo opportunity and they were just
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howling they were like we can't believe you're making jokes right now and I was like you don't
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you don't understand like I've never been happier never in my life if I felt as happy as I do right now
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it's the best day of my life. Race to hospital Claire needed surgery to fuse her shattered pelvis
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back together she'd also broken her foot and sprained an ankle and the patches of skin she wasn't
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able to cover had been scorched by the sun she'd been a wheelchair for the next three months
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so her lovely mum flew to the US to bring her back to New Zealand to recover
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but I was I was itching to get back onto that hiking trail and finish it and that became a really
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big motivator for me so I just knew that I had to heal properly and sensibly but I was also really
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keen to go as soon as I was able to. Claire fell over the edge of that cliff in May by the following
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January she wasn't only back on her feet she was in the US pulling on her hiking boots and
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guessing ready to conquer the trail where she had very nearly died. I don't think my family was
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that stoked about it but they also knew that there was no stopping me. It was something I had to do
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for myself as well to get some closure. There is no way I would have been allowed to go and do that
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on my own so yeah I had friends come with me this time they were four of us. We all did this
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hike together and when we reached the point that I had meant to get to which was this oasis
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palms that's hidden down in this valley and we came over the top of the of the rise and looked
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at down into the valley and saw those palm trees and we all just stood there and stared and I remember
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thinking like I don't know if it was always going to be this magical but it's just sure it's magical
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this time like this feels more magnificent given how it could have ended up like it just really
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had home for me. Being holed up flat on your back in the desert on the brink of death gives you
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a lot of time to think. Claire's even written a book about her experience called Things I Learned
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From Falling. These are the two main lessons she's learned. The most profound change for me has
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been in recognizing fear and how much it was holding me back whether that's anxiety or whether
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anger or frustration, the fear of missing out or the fear of failure, all this stuff and having
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been lying out there looking back at my life and thinking gosh I really wish I hadn't been so afraid
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all the time. I still feel those fears I mean that's just part of being human being. I now know that
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I get to control them and not the other way around and I always thought that to be strong and successful
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I had to be really independent and completely reliant on myself but what I've realizing now is that
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having needs and admitting to those needs and also asking for help it doesn't take away from
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my strength it actually adds to it it actually takes strength to do those things. I started saying to
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Claire that I wouldn't have thought of half the things she did to survive as long as she did out there
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and then I stopped myself maybe I would maybe you would too if you had no other option.
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So many people say to me I wouldn't have thought of that I would have died out there and I don't know
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I always say to people you don't know what you're going to do in that situation because we're
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designed to keep ourselves alive and I just think because on our daily lives we're not we don't need
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to rely on our survival instinct in quite that same way so I think people underestimate themselves
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and I think they would you know quite surprise themselves in that situation. Be that as it may
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without the hiking stick Claire would have faced a much tougher battle. Unable to move it helped her
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to drag the things she needed close to her and it gave her the ability to protect herself from
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the sun and to think she very nearly left it at home. I almost left without it but something made me
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think no hang on a minute and I went back inside and grabbed it. If I hadn't gone back for the stick
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I don't know that I would have made it out of the desert it's a really weird almost scary thought
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that so much could be riding on something so so miniscule. For Claire the hiking stick is like a
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talisman she's living back in London now and she's taken it with her it can't hurt to keep it close.
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I've got my hiking stick right here next to me you know I can't not have it in my my possession
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anymore it's it's got some sort of magic power I'm sure of it. This will be our last episode for season 4
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and thanks to you all we've also just hit a whopping one million downloads we are so proud
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and we can't wait to bring you more incredible stories of survival soon. We're thinking of you all
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during these difficult times and hope you're all staying safe but like all of our courageous
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inspiring survivors I know we'll get through this.
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If you feel you've been affected by any of the topics in this week's episode help and support
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is available by calling Lifeline on 131114 or lifeline.org.au or beyond blue on 1322-4636 or
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beyond blue.org.au. If you enjoyed this episode please subscribe so you don't miss more incredible
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And we'd love it if you could find our Facebook group how I survived and we're on Twitter at SurvivedPod.