For some of the students, those are the mountains where they're headed next. They'll be made to disappear there on purpose, at least from familiar roads, although they'll never be far from an instructor, from food, from sophisticated radio contact with civilization in case something goes wrong. About 200 wilderness outfits have cropped up in recent years. Americans have been getting out more, but they've been getting in trouble more, too. The number was up to 6,338 last year.
People assume that urban comforts and certainties can be applied to the wilds.
NOLS teaches its students not to assume. It's a tough job in a society where the mere existence of risk, when it isn't attached to some form of business or monetary gambling, is considered a sin. Jack Nicholas compares it to what military service may have done in the past. It brings strangers together, throws them in difficult circumstances and teaches them how to cope. The proper disposal of human waste has its own sub-field in the LNT literature.