begin at the lookout tower travel east 7 units and north 4 units where are you

Answer 1

This sounds like a right triangle

c^2 = a^2 + b^2

You have the two sides and are missing the hypotenuse which is the shortest length between two points.

c^2 = 4^2 + 7^2
You square each number add them and then take the square root to find c.