Two words: You Tube The answers to all your questions are there. (You don't have to join a club.) Lots of videos for people in your situation. One example: "

Two words: You Tube The answers to all your questions are there. (You don't have to join a club.) Lots of videos for people in your situation. One example: "The first ham radio you should buy" by Ham Radio Crash Course: https://youtu.be/A4Udu-WdwK0 https://youtu.be/A4Udu-WdwK0 fwiw, I also got into radio for the same reason as you. A few years ago, on our trip to Isle Royale National Park, one of the other adult leaders had an emergency (broken foot; needing National Park Service rescue...) and we didn't have a ham radio. We did have a satellite communicator (Garmin inReach), so we weren't completely screwed. But from now on, I'd like to always have a ham radio (in addition to the inReach) on me for future trips.