Lost stories here

Post your lost story here, so we can all laugh at them.

My first one is "The lake that shouldn't be there". I was flying from north
of the Dallas/Fort Worth area to my home port of Luck Field which is south
of Fort Worth. No radios of any type in my little Taylorcraft. All was
well. A nice day with reasonable visibility. Some haze but strong VFR.

About halfway to Dallas I come over a lake. A big lake. One that would be
HUGE on my sectional. It was not on the map. I had just been flying for
about 45 minutes on a magnetic heading and keeping close track of time.
There was NO way this lake could be on the ground but not on my map. The
vis was such I couldn't see the buildings of Dallas or Fort Worth. I was
convinced somehow I had gotten lost. I thought maybe the compass was stuck
on the wrong heading. I did a couple of small turns to see if the compass
moved. The compass passed this test.

But my training kicked in -- if in doubt, fly the heading needed and keep
track of time. I did this. After about 20 minutes I got to another lake
and this one was on the map. I was on course.

It turns out my mystery lake was new and not on the maps yet. My map was
current. I swear it was. I never use out of date maps. That's my story
and I am sticking to it :-)

Anyway I was where I thought I was, but very concerned for a while when I
saw that damned lake under me that wasn't supposed to be there.

What is your favorite "lost" story?

Danny Deger