How lost mom and son used handwritten notes to lead rescuers to their location in remote forest

Handwritten notes became a lifeline for a mother and son after being stranded in a forest with no cell signal, working car, or way to call for help.

Tami Laird and her 9-year-old son, Stirling, had been driving from Sacramento to Boy Scout Camp Wolfeboro when their GPS took a dangerous turn.

The route led them off Highway 44 and down a rocky dirt road.

Though the camp director had warned that the road might be rough, Tami trusted the map app and kept driving.

But panic slowly crept in after 30 minutes of navigating bumpy, narrow trails without a sign of the camp.

The road worsened, and the mother and son were still eight miles away from their destination.

A survival story begins with one wrong turn

When Tami tried to turn back, she quickly became disoriented.

Each new turn brought more confusion, and her car—built for city roads, not mountain trails—struggled on the uneven ground.

It bottomed out several times. She and Stirling tried to dig the wheels out with sticks and rocks, but it was useless.

The vehicle finally broke down as the sun began to set. With no signal and no way to reach 911, they had no choice but to rely on their instincts.

They stayed inside the car that night to avoid wild animals, hoping someone would pass by and see the hazard lights blinking.

Stirling used his Boy Scout whistle to signal for help. Tami didn’t sleep.

“I just stared at the sky all night hoping that a helicopter would come,” she told CNN.

Handwritten notes became a trail of hope

By morning, they knew they couldn’t just wait. Tami feared they might get separated from the car with their phones still showing no signal.

She cut a bedsheet into strips, tying the fabric to tree branches to mark their trail as they walked.

The two left handwritten notes under rocks along the road.

One note read: “Me and my son are stranded with no service and can’t call 911…We are ahead, up the road to the right.”

This small act would prove critical. Their location was so remote that even professional rescue teams would later need special radio frequencies to communicate.

Throughout the day, Tami and Stirling searched for help, hoping to spot another vehicle.

They even made plans to take a steeper path the next morning if no one showed up.

To stay calm, they played cards and tried to keep their minds off fear.

Wilderness rescue arrives in the nick of time

That evening, a sound broke through the silence—something they hadn’t heard the night before.

It was a car horn.

Far down the road, a rescue truck came into view. Tears streamed down Tami’s face. The Calaveras County Volunteer Search and Rescue team had found them.

The area was so isolated that regular cell signals and radios didn’t work, so the team relied on amateur radio to coordinate the wilderness rescue.

The mother’s last known location, shared earlier by her fiancé, helped guide the team to the right place.

But the clear trail, visual markers, and handwritten notes led rescuers to them.

They were safe—tired, shaken, but safe.

The emotional weight behind handwritten notes and survival

Tami was praised for making all the right decisions.

She stayed near the car, kept calm, and used whatever she could to leave clues for rescuers.

The lost mother and son rescued after more than 24 hours of uncertainty had worked together as a team, drawing strength from one another.

Still, once the danger passed, the emotions hit hard.

“I just started crying, and I apologized to my son, saying, ‘I’m so sorry that I’m crying like this, I was trying to stay so strong for you out there,’ and he said the same thing, ‘I was trying to stay strong for you,’” Tami said.

Since then, she’s made new promises to herself. She now travels in her car with a printed map and an emergency kit.

The experience taught her that technology can’t always be trusted in the wild.

This quiet but powerful survival story shows that even the smallest efforts—like a whistle, a piece of cloth, or a few handwritten notes—can help bring people home.

And for one mother and son, those things made all the difference.

Watch the full news story of the mother and son who got lost in the Calaveras County woods—and how their courage and handwritten notes led to a safe rescue: