A knife a water bottle and a flint.....?

I would bring a credit card and walk to Ellensburg. There I would find shelter at my cousins house.
 
Depends on whose definition of "thrive" we're going by, I suppose. Will we be building housing complexes with indoor plumbing, electricity, and satellite television? Not so much.
Is it possible to accomplish all your basic needs though and still have time to spare for making your situation better? Absolutely, if you know how to manage your time, use a little common sense, and work with what's already there rather than trying to build everything "from scratch".
You can spend an hour making shelter, or you can spend 30 minutes scouting the area for a nice overhang/windbreak. You can spend 5 minutes whittling out a forked stick for a support, or a minute breaking off a forked branch. So on and so forth.
Throw in the benefit of having 3 items of your choice, and it almost seems too easy. Then again, I'm comfortable outer doored, and grew up in a rural setting "making do".
I'll grant you that the majority of people today would be in one sorry state usually, but 1 in 50,000 is kind of pushing it a bit. :p


Gautier
 
Munky said:
I would bring a credit card and walk to Ellensburg. There I would find shelter at my cousins house.
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I'm a CWU Alumni...I'm sure a few old friends would put me up as well:D Well, if the "Tav" (great Burgers) or Horseshoe-Tavern are still open, a cold beer is always good despite the season!

ROCK6
 
ROCK6 said:
Hey FLIX, how do you like that Guyot? What size do you have and do regular Nalgene-compatible nesting mugs still work with it? ROCK6
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ROCK6,

I haven't bought the Guyot yet, but I intend to. Doc and Kevin Estella both have it and can give you their impressions. (IIRC, they both like it.) My one remaining concern is that it might be too heavy for a regular water container. That would certainly be mitigated by its usefulness as a boiling container and the ability to nest a cup with it.

I also think the word "thrive" might be a stretch. Given that the hypo states that the duration is thirty days, and that rescue is not an option, that means that you'd have a lot of time to improve your camp and increase the comfort level.

Unlike the typical survival situation, where food is not really a big concern (Sorry Bear!), a month in the bush would test your hunter/gatherer skillset.

-- FLIX
 
Hunt and gather? You mean this isn't where we sign up for the Jenny Craig bootcamp? I was planning on dropping all this winter weight. :p


Gautier
 
1. Becker Crewman with Vic Swisstool in sheath pouch (I think that's allowed). This would cover rough and fine cutting tasks and would let me harvest any man made materials I might find (like wire fence).

2. Firesteel - mine has a capsule of vaseline cotton balls attached to it.

3. metal pot of at least 2 quarts

Is it cheating if my bootlaces are unusually long pieces of paracord?;)
 
Foilist said:
1. Becker Crewman with Vic Swisstool in sheath pouch (I think that's allowed). This would cover rough and fine cutting tasks and would let me harvest any man made materials I might find (like wire fence).

2. Firesteel - mine has a capsule of vaseline cotton balls attached to it.

3. metal pot of at least 2 quarts

Is it cheating if my bootlaces are unusually long pieces of paracord?;)
Click to expand...

Bootlaces sound good to me. I was thinking the same thing. I have to make a bow somehow, and I'd rather not risk having to attempt making cordage from branches cause I'm not that good at it :o.
 
thrive – verb (used without object), thrived or throve, thrived or thriv·en

1. to prosper; be fortunate or successful.

2. to grow or develop vigorously; flourish:

I chose the word "thrive" to describe this situation mainly because you better thrive if you HAVE to stay put for 30 days in late fall in washington state.

Setting up a shelter and base-camp isn't going to take you guys 30 days, come on! It will take maybe an hour or two to make a good sturdy shelter. Then afterwards, with nothing to do, you will have plenty of time to find water nearby if you haven't already done that. Even after your water discovery, you will have time to make a spear or do whatever you want to pass the time. Essentially after the first initial 3-5 days, you will probably have a routine going as to when and how you get water and food. Once that pattern is setup, you will have time to "flourish" or "thrive" by using your freetime to set up your own log cabin or heliport for the rest of the 27-25 days remaining.
 
Large blade
1 quart pot and lid
Magflint block

Everything else can be improvised.

Skam
 
1. Chopper, perhaps a battle mistress. Uses are nearly unlimited, game prep, making a shelter, chopping wood for a fire, spear fishing, digging, and anything else you can think of.

2. Medium to large titanium pot. Good to carry and purify water in. Can be used to make soups, and boil anything you can find.

3. Mag block with flint, easiest way to start 500+ fires.
 
I'm surprised that even though in the "boundaries" that I set in the OP that only one person has put in the altoid psk as an item.

Here is what is inside my altoid psk:

1. 50lb spiderwire fishing string
2. small tube with:
-fishing hooks
-fishing string
-6 strike anywhere matches with strike pad
-2 needles and thread
-fishing weight
3. generous piece of firestick
4. lantern flint striker/lighter
5. box of 20ct. wind/waterproof matches
-5 spare flints inside of match box
6. one pill sized "just add water and cloth appears"
7. cotton balls
8. small "eye brush" I borrowed from GF for an extended amount of time until she forgot about it, for cleaning out my knife.

After that, I would have my other two items, my emerson commander, and my metal cup/pot.

I don't want this to turn into a "psk war," I'm just surprised that nobody else has posted on this except for the one person mentioned. Keep the replies coming, J.
 
I have a question. What if you had a knife that would make fire? Would that count as one item or two?
 
MTF3 said:
I have a question. What if you had a knife that would make fire? Would that count as one item or two?
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It's still one, even if you had a knife sheath with a fire steel and sharpener slot on it, I am counting it as one. You wouldn't pull that stuff out of the sheath right before a trip like this, right?
 
Funnily enough, I accidentally answered this question in the "ten items" thread...so here we go again:

3/4 to full size axe. This is a tough one for me - staying put the big axes are nice but some stuff is pretty awkward to do with a three foot handle! I guess a 3/4 would do me.

A big stainless steel pot - my favourite pots for base camp are the Lee Valley compost buckets! They are thick stainless steel with a tight fitting lid, and a heavy wire bail for a handle. I like BIG pots for base camp because you can boil a lot of water at a time, and I just hate cooking things. So I just chuck whatever I can get in a pot, boil it, and have stew. I THINK if I drink the broth I'm not losing nutrients...I think.

A flint or mag block. You can find really hard rocks to spark with but a mag block is easier for me.


Now, for ME:

Step one is build a fire

Step two is build a quickie shelter to last the first week

Step three is to look around and find some water and food! Much as I hate to admit it I would probably do better on wild plants than on the animals I might manage to kill. Naturally it's a good idea to set snares but I find this kind of thing really hard with improvised cordage. I would almost trade the mag block for a roll of tie wire...guess I better attach a mag block to my axe sheath so that can be one item!

Step four is to start work on a better shelter. I don't know about the rest of you guys but I am not interested in spending a month in a debris hut. They are okay for a night but there is no work space in them. I would probably get going on a little log structure if I had sufficient food to maintain the effort. Partly I think it's worth doing because in a week, you can have a good simple hut built that is much more comfortable than a hasty shelter, and partly I think it's good to have time-consuming projects on the go to keep your mind focused on a series of problems you CAN solve. If you aren't having too much trouble staying fed - and really this whole part of the world is pretty lush and there is a fair amount out there to eat - then I would say get to working! I think it's psychologically helpful.

Of course I have never been left in the bush in those kind of circumstances - but I have worked in the bush and if I don't set myself a good working pace I get a little depressed.
 
FLIX said:
ROCK6,

I haven't bought the Guyot yet, but I intend to. Doc and Kevin Estella both have it and can give you their impressions. (IIRC, they both like it.) My one remaining concern is that it might be too heavy for a regular water container. That would certainly be mitigated by its usefulness as a boiling container and the ability to nest a cup with it.
-- FLIX
Click to expand...

Hey Rock and FLIX,

I bought the Guyot, but I haven't used it yet. I can't see any problems, though, As far as being heavy, it's not going to be heavier than a Nalgene AND a cooking pot.

Doc
 
DOC-CANADA said:
Hey Rock and FLIX,

I bought the Guyot, but I haven't used it yet. I can't see any problems, though, As far as being heavy, it's not going to be heavier than a Nalgene AND a cooking pot.

Doc
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Thanks Doc...I just ordered one (for Christmas, honest!). I still like the idea of a nesting cup/pot, but if you can set the larger stainless bottle over some coals on the edge of the fire to boil...that's a lot more water purified than just a cup. Gives your water bottle more versatility. We have a mobile firepit in the backyard (worked to do some Dutch/cast iron cooking), so maybe I'll try it out.

ROCK6
 
This is a good thread. Giving it some thought I would take my Fallkniven F1 and it's sheath w/pouch containing diamond stone, ceramic rod and firesteel. Second would be a Swedish military mess kit,it seems a pretty practical choice. Third would be either an axe or a tarpaulin for shelter.

TWBryan
 
Hey ROCK,
Here's a link to k_estela's post and the picture of the Guyot in the fire, in case you missed it. The plastic cap is easy to remove (with supplied Allen wrench).

Doc
 
I have greatly enjoyed reading this thread, thank you. I personally am not a very experienced wilderness man but I enjoy preparing myself by gaining large amounts of knowledge, then sometimes using it on modest excursions outside the city.

Hearing about the various carrying styles of favorite tools is great, though ultimately for this thread I think the "knife with 9 things clipped onto the sheath" choices confuses the discussion. Granted, the alternative is probably 95% of the posts being knife/flint/tarp or whatever, but still.

I enjoy the challenge of picking 3 basic items and seeing what remains when people are forced to truly strip down to basics and separate themselves from their EDC comfort zone. Perhaps a better way of looking at it would be if you were locked up in a Turkish prison it was release time. The guards had an assortment of tools (not yours) spread out on a table and gave you the privilege of choosing three before they teleported you out into a terrain of your choice. What would you grab?

For a forest terrain that didn't require excessive logging, I think I would pick:

1. Larger knife such as an A1
2. Magnesium block
3. 2 quart pot

Carry on my friends.
 
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