Making a risky ascent to get your bearings
From BearWiki
Claim: While getting to higher ground to get your bearings can be useful, if it seems likely to get you injured, don't do it, and the benefits must be weighed.
If you decide to ignore usual advice and rescue yourself, or if you have to leave your area to meet your immediate survival needs, such as getting water, getting to higher ground is a time-honored method of getting your bearings. Like all courses of action, the benefits need to be weighed against the risks. Do you already have a good idea of how to get to safety (in Costa Rica, for example, going down)? Will you actually be able to see where you're looking for, or will your view be obstructed by vegetation or ridges? How critical is getting your bearings? The risks: you burn calories (and more critically water) on your climb, and you could get injured. Injury shortens your time you can survive, assuming you have water and any requisite shelter, from weeks or months down to a few days -- assuming you survive your injury at all.
In some places, like wide-open stretches of desert, climbing to the top of a small bluff to look for vegetation, a road, or settlement, is almost certainly a good idea.
In others, like Costa Rica, such a climb is borderline useless, and serves only to worsen your situation. You won't be able to see any settlement through the trees, and the view is going to be obstructed by both vegetation and ridges. Furthermore, you already know the way to go in such a place: down.
