Camping with knives

Bill Siegle

Bill Siegle

Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Oct 3, 2000
Messages
6,955
My son and I went camping up at Clackamas Lake a little south of Mt Hood in OR this weekend. Had a great time as I knew we would. Bugs were ever present but a little DEET kept them from over eating. Did the usual camp stuff like hiking,swimming(a week prior there was ice!), and fire watching :) Course there were knives! My son carried his new My 1st Victorinox SAK and loves it. He was cutting up tons of nylon string from the prepackaged firewood. I had my usual Ontario RAT folder in the pants and my new Koster Bushcraft on my Maxpedition Fatboy. Also took along a camp chopper of my own make that I like to call the Bulldozer. It pretty much plows through everything :) The Ontario worked great and so did the Koster. Mostly they were used for cord cutting and shavings for firestarting. The Bulldozer was the goto blade for firewood breakdown. With the addition of some found wood on the trail near our campsite we were good to go for testing media :thumbup: The big guy even makes great curly shavings for the fire but it is a little heavy as a carver. Really excells at the jobs you would usually use a hatchet for but this one has a 9 1/2in blade and is 5/16 thick! For me it is a little more usful than a plain ole axe. I based it loosely on the Himilayan Imports Bowie.
Knives+of+Clackamas+Lake.JPG
 
Nice set of knives and it sounded like a good trip. Your son is a lucky kid.

That Bulldozer sure is pretty :)
 
Sounds like you had a great time, certainly had all the bases covered with that trio:)
 
If the Bulldozer is based on the AK Bowie I bet it's one hell of a chopper. :thumbup:



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Sounds like a great time. That Bulldozer is huge! Looks great.

Thanks for sharing.
 
HOLY COW, Bill!
As the pic loaded, all I saw was the "big-un" and thought, "ok, it's big."
After I scrolled through and read the other posts I scrolled back up and saw the Koster BC underneath it:eek:. Man, that is one big hunk o' knife!

I like the swell at the rear of the handle. Very convenient on a chopper.

Sounds like a great time. I miss the Northwest. Best place I have ever been for outdoors stuff.
 
Looking forward to my own camping trip this weekend with my son! I know I am taking 5 or 6 of my knives. I would love to had been there to enjoy your work myself buudy!
 
My son is 8 3/4 now and we have been working on him and knife use/safety for a while now. Figure with all my steel around I owe it to him to show him how to use em as opposed to how I learned......wanna see the scars? :) Yes the Bulldozer is a great chopper and butt ugly enough not to worry about using it. I think the finest grit I used on the blade was a worn 36grit and only an 80 grit "shoeshine buff" on the handles. Figured if I am gonna beat on it, pretty won't last long. I used the Koster and the folder about equally for some carving and fuzz sticks. I could add food prep as I made a peanut butter sandwich with the folder and opened a pouch of chicken with the Koster. Either one coulda stayed home but I like having too many blades around :D
 
Man, I keep coming back to look at that blade! Makes me want to trade in my BK7 for something that looks that good. I'd love to come up and check out your shop sometime!
 
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