Published January 19, 2009 04:08PM
Feel like disappearing and not being found? Becoming an ultralight expert might not hurt: A German woman missing for over 12 years was finally discovered living in the woods near Bern, Switzerland. Using nothing more than a tarp and an umbrella, she’d been camping there for over a year and seemed in good health.
The 52-year-old woman managed to go so leave-no-trace that the ranger who patrols the area hadn’t ever discovered her; finally, a hiker in the region saw her and reported her to authorities earlier this month. While she’s still currently camping out in the woods, the owners of the public woods plan to eventually force her to leave. Authorities are trying to place her somewhere within the surrounding community.
Police say she conversed lucidly and normally, but didn’t want any contact with family, and apparently she “spoke of a mission that she had to fulfill.”
If her mission was to test her long-term, ultralight stealth-camping abilities, I’d say, ‘mission accomplished, lady.’
—Ted Alvarez
German woman missing 12 years found in Swiss woods (AP)