Geraldine Largay, who died after she became lost on the Appalachian Trail.(Photo: Maine Association for Search and Rescue)
(NEWSER)<span style="color: Red;">*</span>– A lost hiker in Maine starved to death after waiting for rescue and then accepting her fate, heartbreaking journal entries have revealed.
Geraldine Largay, a 66-year-old from Tennessee, disappeared while hiking the Appalachian Trail in Maine on July 22, 2013, and the newly disclosed journal shows that she survived for at least 26 days, the<span style="color: Red;">*</span>
Portland Press Herald<span style="color: Red;">*</span>reports.
"When you find my body, please call my husband George and my daughter Kerry," she wrote in an Aug. 6 journal entry. "It will be the greatest kindness for them to know that I am dead and where you found me — no matter how many years from now." The final entry was dated Aug. 18. Her skeletal remains<span style="color: Red;">*</span>
were discovered in a tent 3,000 feet from the trail<span style="color: Red;">*</span>more than two years later.
Largay, who was trying to complete a "bucket list" hike from West Virginia to the trail's end solo after a friend left for a family emergency, was reported missing by her husband after she failed to make it to a rendezvous point. A huge search and rescue effort followed, but it was suspended after a week.
According to a 1,579-page Maine Warden Service report, Largay became lost after leaving the trail to go to the bathroom, the<span style="color: Red;">*</span>
Boston Globe<span style="color: Red;">*</span>reports. She tried to text her husband at least a dozen times, but she was unable to get a signal even after moving to higher ground.
She then set up a campsite on a knoll, where authorities found a handmade flag and evidence she had tried to start a signal fire.
On Oct. 18, 2015, a week after a forester found her body, her husband of 42 years and other family members joined wardens in a hike to the site, where they left a cross and family mementos. (Two "lost" hikers in North Carolina<span style="color: Red;">*</span>
were found in a town 30 miles away.)
This story originally appeared on Newser:
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A Heartbreaking Journal Reveals That a Lost Hiker Survived for Weeks
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Newser<span style="color: Red;">*</span>is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the Web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
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