Idiots for the day, French division

The New York Times has an article by Aurelien Breeden about people who didn't know what they were doing, and paid the price:

The family from France was so enthralled by their last visit to the American West that they started planning another almost immediately. On Facebook, they posted pictures of the vast blue skies, the rugged ocher canyons, and the endless strips of asphalt that had captivated them.
This year, David and Ornella Steiner, a couple from a quiet town near Reims, about a hundred miles east of Paris, returned, started their trip in Seattle, Washington before heading to Santa Fe, New Mexico. A picture posted on 2 August 2015 on Steiner’s Facebook profile showed the vivid electric blue water of a natural pool in Yellowstone National Park.
But it was at the White Sands National Monument (photo) of New Mexico, a region where beautiful landscapes can conceal dangers quick to surprise even the most prepared visitor, that the Steiners’ new trip took a terrible turn. Last week, the couple was found dead in the desert, apparently from heat-related exhaustion during a hike. Their nine-year-old son, Enzo, was the only one to survive, found alive by park rangers who believe his parents sacrificed water to save him.
The French Foreign Ministry said that the boy arrived in France over the weekend with his grandmother, who had flown to Albuquerque, New Mexico to bring him home.
Kim Duntze, who worked with Ms. Steiner at the Reims town hall, said in a telephone interview that news of the couple’s death had shocked her co-workers, who all knew about the trip because Ms. Steiner had been planning it for over a year and had discussed it frequently at the office.
“They had fallen in love with the area,” Duntze said. “It was their dream project.”
The bodies of Steiner, 42, and his wife Ornella, 51, were found by park rangers last week during a routine patrol. Sheriff Benny House of Otero County told The Alamogordo Daily News that two empty twenty-ounce water bottles were found with the bodies, but that the boy told investigators the bottles were full when the family started the hike.
“The father and mother would take one drink while they made the child take two swallows of water,” Sheriff House said. “It might have been why the child fared so well due to his smaller stature, plus he probably consumed more water than they did.”
Duntze, who is a deputy mayor at the Reims town hall and who worked with Ms. Steiner on youth policies, said that Ms. Steiner did not strike her as someone who would take inconsiderate risks. “When Plan A didn’t work, she always had a Plan B and a Plan C,” Duntze said, adding that Ms. Steiner was also very protective of her son and would not have put him in harm’s way. Ms. Steiner also had two older children from a previous marriage, Duntze said.
But Sheriff House said the investigation showed that the family arrived at the White Sands National Monument around midday, when temperatures peak, and set out shortly before 1 pm on the Alkali Flat Trail. Temperatures on the trail, a 4.6-mile loop that leads hikers through stunning white sand dunes with no water, no shade and sparse vegetation, can sometimes exceed a hundred degrees.
“Heat-related illness is common in warm weather and can be fatal,” the National Park Service warns on a page of its website devoted to the trail. “Hike during cool times. Carry food and at least two quarts of water.” A woman from Iowa died while hiking the monument in 2011, as did a Japanese businessman in 2009, according to The Alamogordo Daily News.
Sheriff House said the family had not signed in on a register at the entrance to the trail. After Ms. Steiner was found unresponsive by park rangers on a routine patrol, tracks led them to Mr. Steiner and his son.
Sheriff House said the investigation showed that Ms. Steiner began to slow during the hike, but told her husband and son to continue, after which Mr. Steiner also began to slow down, appearing disoriented, and collapsed. The boy stayed beside his father until he was found by the park authorities and taken to a nearby medical center to be treated for dehydration.
A preliminary autopsy report by the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator indicated that the couple died of a heat-related illness, Sheriff House told The Alamogordo Daily News.
The Steiner family lived in Bourgogne, a small suburb of Reims, where David Steiner ran a local public relations firm. Alain Steiner, Steiner’s father, told the daily Le Parisien that the couple often traveled abroad and that his son was passionate about photography.
“For a week everything went well,” the elder Steiner said. “I spoke with my son over the phone every day. The trip was supposed to last five weeks,” he added.

Rico says there's not a lot of deserts in France, but they didn't do their homework...