My portal got me stuck underground [duplicate]

After feverishly mining my minimal 10 blocks of obsidian I made me a portal to the Nether. I thought to myself, 'Sweet, something new. This should be fun.' I wanted to jump in immediately but to be safe, I emptied my inventory of everything other than a sword, armor and a pick ax.

I got there and noticed it brought me to a cave. I knew I'd need some torches so I turned around and re-entered the portal and... I have no clue where I am but it's not the portal I entered in?!?!

What happened and how can I get home? I don't have a map because, as I mentioned, I left all my goods at my home base before going to the Nether. Now I'm stranded. How does this happen and how can I easily find my home base? Should it be close by? I tried to enter the portal in the Nether from various directions but that didn't help. I keep popping up in the overworld somewhere other than near my home but I can tell it is at the same location each time I go back to the overworld.

I'm lost... and I'm starting to feel cold. Can somebody help?


Solution 1:

Hit F3 to see your coordinates, and head for coodinates x=0, z=0. That will take you to somewhere near your initial spawn. From there you should be able to find your way home.

Or, chop down the tree you mentioned, build a chest, and put all your equipment in that chest. Hit F3, write down your co-ordinates, and die. You will respawn at your last bed or spawn point, after which you can find your way back to the chest with your stuff. This will leave you in the same spot that are now, but now you'll know the way back to your base.

Or, if you're really stuck, use a map program like Tectonicus to create a map of your world, and use that to find your way home.

Solution 2:

One of the curious features of the nether's spacial distortion is that sometimes two portals don't link up quite the way you'd expected they would. If a nether portal deposits you in the "normal" world somewhere unfamiliar, you're probably only a short distance from the place you expected to be; if you're underground, try digging your way up and out, and if you can't see a landmark when you emerge, either find or build something high enough that you can get a good look at the landscape. Shouldn't be too hard to find your way back, then.