I had something similar with a friend who was backpacking alone. They went offline after a “quick stop” and hours passed – no updates, nothing. I remember refreshing messages in a café, trying not to spiral, while also not wanting to look controlling. Turned out their phone died and they changed routes last minute. Since then, we just use simple opt-in location sharing when traveling. I also looked into tools like GEOfinder phone number geolocation not for tracking daily life, more like a backup when communication drops unexpectedly.