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- Jul 14, 2010
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Ok, I do apologize, but there are no pics in this post. I forgot the camera and my phone died long before we got there, but I wanted to share this weekends experience anyway. I promise pics next time.
A little backstory first. I broke my hand 7 weeks ago due to stupidity. I have my hand back now, but not all the way. This last week, I have teaching my daughters Shyann and Sierra, how to use a fire steel and build a fire from scratch. They are 8 and 5. Now the camping. . . . . .
We headed out after loading my Pathfinder to the gills with stuff
for an overnighter in the Cherokee National Forest, I was trying to get to a spot that I camped at when I was a kid, only to find out it has all been bought and posted no trespassing. This is around 1400 acres by my estimate. So, we found a suitable location, Campsite 4B in the Citico Creek Area. Not really much of a site, but it has a good access to the woods, so there we are. We got to the campsite around 4pm, setup our tent :barf: fired up the grill for some steaks. At 4:40pm, I had a Ranger in the camp asking about where I got my wood for the fire, was I green cutting, $250 dollar fines, trash, where's your beer, etc. I was not green cutting, I was scavenging downed wood, blah, blah, blah, no beer, kids. Well after a 20min Health and Welness inspection, he was off. While all that was going on, my girls were building their fire ring. They collected rocks and arranged them, gathered wood, tender etc, everything I had shown them to do. On the way to the woods, I stopped and bought a bag of cotton balls for a buck. I gave them the CBs and told them to build to where it could be called a fire and let it go out, so you can do it all over again. They were in heaven. Moms getting camp set, kids are playing with fire, Dad heads to the woods to scavenge.
I find several downed Pine trees, but one inparticular, caught my attention. I dug around in it for a few secs and found the outer completely rotted, but a hard dense core about 2" in diameter. What would have been fatwood in a year, but not quite there yet. So, I backtrack to the stump where this big guy had been achored and paydirt, fatwood. Took a few pieces back, played around, dug the whole stump up and relocated it an area I could get back to later, for more harvesting.
About the hand. I wanted to get out and do a little truck camping to see how my hand was going to do. It done poorly. Batoning was real tough, chopping was out of the question, basic whittling and carving was doable, but with little to no fine control. All in all, I was one handed, and I am glad it was not a tough situation. I could manage all tasks, but I was wrought with pain for all of it, and could not really complete the task at hand. I did chop, I did baton, I did make a bow drill kit, I did strike steel, I did everything. Only it hurt and took about 3 times as long to do anything. Hand, Epic Fail.
Dinner and night falls, the kids fell out around 10pm, me and mama, around 11pm. We set everything for the night, and went to bed. Around 8am I hear the girls get up, chatting, the like. I checked in, how'd you sleep, you hungry, thirsty, gotta pee, No We're Fine was the reply. Ok, stay close to the tent, don't get into anything, I lay there massaging my aching hand for a min or two and must have dozed off again, because I woke to "AWWWWW RIGHT!!! WOOOHOOO!!!! YEA!!!!!!!"
I sat straight up, and the color of my usually white tent was a bright yellow and orange color. I throw my boots on and jump from the tent to see a 6' tall roaring fire in the fire pit. I flipped out on 'em. First from sheer fright, second from the fact that they disobeyed my primary fire law. See, I love to teach my kids all kinds of things, but there is usually a list of boundaries that go with each lesson. With fire, the FIRST and BIGGEST boundary is, no firecraft when Dad or Mom is not around. I am really anal about fire, I don't trust it, and I never turn my back on it. I taught my girls the same thing. So, I flipped out, shouted, and the like, took up their firesteels (I made them some cool paracord necklaces to keep them on) and they read them the riot act about making fire while unsupervised, and so on. I had to backtrack later, after I had cooled down, and observe what they had really just done.
They got up, got some juice, and some breakfast bars, went and collected, wood, tender, cleaned up the fire pit, setup their material just how I showed them, took a cotton ball (regular, no PJ), and made a daggone towering inferno. Neat and well contained. In 45 min. I had to tell 'em good job on the fire, but they lost their firesteels for a week, and were threatened with the dreaded Butt Busting (I have only had to do it twice, but it left an impression) should they make a fire without me or Mom there to supervise. Whew, my heart could have jumpstarted a station wagon when I saw that fire!! I laugh now, but the repercussions could have been devastating, I am glad no one got hurt, nothing was destroyed, because the did exactly as they had been taught to do, almost. I hope you have enjoyed the story, and I know, without pics it didn't happen. Moose
A little backstory first. I broke my hand 7 weeks ago due to stupidity. I have my hand back now, but not all the way. This last week, I have teaching my daughters Shyann and Sierra, how to use a fire steel and build a fire from scratch. They are 8 and 5. Now the camping. . . . . .
We headed out after loading my Pathfinder to the gills with stuff
for an overnighter in the Cherokee National Forest, I was trying to get to a spot that I camped at when I was a kid, only to find out it has all been bought and posted no trespassing. This is around 1400 acres by my estimate. So, we found a suitable location, Campsite 4B in the Citico Creek Area. Not really much of a site, but it has a good access to the woods, so there we are. We got to the campsite around 4pm, setup our tent :barf: fired up the grill for some steaks. At 4:40pm, I had a Ranger in the camp asking about where I got my wood for the fire, was I green cutting, $250 dollar fines, trash, where's your beer, etc. I was not green cutting, I was scavenging downed wood, blah, blah, blah, no beer, kids. Well after a 20min Health and Welness inspection, he was off. While all that was going on, my girls were building their fire ring. They collected rocks and arranged them, gathered wood, tender etc, everything I had shown them to do. On the way to the woods, I stopped and bought a bag of cotton balls for a buck. I gave them the CBs and told them to build to where it could be called a fire and let it go out, so you can do it all over again. They were in heaven. Moms getting camp set, kids are playing with fire, Dad heads to the woods to scavenge.I find several downed Pine trees, but one inparticular, caught my attention. I dug around in it for a few secs and found the outer completely rotted, but a hard dense core about 2" in diameter. What would have been fatwood in a year, but not quite there yet. So, I backtrack to the stump where this big guy had been achored and paydirt, fatwood. Took a few pieces back, played around, dug the whole stump up and relocated it an area I could get back to later, for more harvesting.
About the hand. I wanted to get out and do a little truck camping to see how my hand was going to do. It done poorly. Batoning was real tough, chopping was out of the question, basic whittling and carving was doable, but with little to no fine control. All in all, I was one handed, and I am glad it was not a tough situation. I could manage all tasks, but I was wrought with pain for all of it, and could not really complete the task at hand. I did chop, I did baton, I did make a bow drill kit, I did strike steel, I did everything. Only it hurt and took about 3 times as long to do anything. Hand, Epic Fail.
Dinner and night falls, the kids fell out around 10pm, me and mama, around 11pm. We set everything for the night, and went to bed. Around 8am I hear the girls get up, chatting, the like. I checked in, how'd you sleep, you hungry, thirsty, gotta pee, No We're Fine was the reply. Ok, stay close to the tent, don't get into anything, I lay there massaging my aching hand for a min or two and must have dozed off again, because I woke to "AWWWWW RIGHT!!! WOOOHOOO!!!! YEA!!!!!!!"
I sat straight up, and the color of my usually white tent was a bright yellow and orange color. I throw my boots on and jump from the tent to see a 6' tall roaring fire in the fire pit. I flipped out on 'em. First from sheer fright, second from the fact that they disobeyed my primary fire law. See, I love to teach my kids all kinds of things, but there is usually a list of boundaries that go with each lesson. With fire, the FIRST and BIGGEST boundary is, no firecraft when Dad or Mom is not around. I am really anal about fire, I don't trust it, and I never turn my back on it. I taught my girls the same thing. So, I flipped out, shouted, and the like, took up their firesteels (I made them some cool paracord necklaces to keep them on) and they read them the riot act about making fire while unsupervised, and so on. I had to backtrack later, after I had cooled down, and observe what they had really just done.
They got up, got some juice, and some breakfast bars, went and collected, wood, tender, cleaned up the fire pit, setup their material just how I showed them, took a cotton ball (regular, no PJ), and made a daggone towering inferno. Neat and well contained. In 45 min. I had to tell 'em good job on the fire, but they lost their firesteels for a week, and were threatened with the dreaded Butt Busting (I have only had to do it twice, but it left an impression) should they make a fire without me or Mom there to supervise. Whew, my heart could have jumpstarted a station wagon when I saw that fire!! I laugh now, but the repercussions could have been devastating, I am glad no one got hurt, nothing was destroyed, because the did exactly as they had been taught to do, almost. I hope you have enjoyed the story, and I know, without pics it didn't happen. Moose
, if ya know what I mean. Moose
