Have Any of You Had to Survive?

S

Squeezymo

Joined
Feb 4, 2008
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I know we all take those steps to be prepared for the worst whenever we go out hiking or camping. Whether it's a fire starting kit and a knife to a 10 pound pack of accessories.

But have any of you actually been stranded where you ran out of food and water, and you had to find a way to boil water and find food?


I never have been put in a dire situation, but I always prepare. And I'm sure I am going to get a wide range of stories from maybe someone who ran out of water, to someone who ran out of food and water and was 20 miles away from a trailhead, to the guys that just go out without anything for the fun of it.

So, have any of you actually been put in a survival scenario?
 
Hiking Long Trail from MA to canada, I either lost some food or absurdly underestimated how much I needed to get through a 7-day period before my next mail drop. Day 4, I was out of food.

I had water purification system carried, so water was a non-issue and I can make fires from nothing, so even eithout the purifier, fire wouldnt have been a problem.

Food, however, was a big problem. 4 days is totally survivable without food, so i wasnt in any real danger other than some miserable days ahead of me, though. I survived on some begging from day hikers who always carry too much food, but pretty much starved the other 3 days. I was thru-hiking, so stopping to hunt or fish was really only going to delay my progress and throw off all my scheduled food drops. I ate some wild carrots as i passed through a pasture and found some blackberries along the trail.

What AMAZED me was the internal desire for food. I had been hungry before, but NOTHING like this. Every single thing I looked at, I wondered if I could eat it or cook it. I would have killed and eaten anything moving or dead that I could get my hands on, but wasn't quite at that real live-or-die sitation where I would begin actually digging for worms or lifting up rocks.

I wasn't in any real danger and don't really have much problem suffering through things.

I was 20, althletic, and ballsy. If I were doing it again, i would 100% be bringing along a small .22 pistol and ammo. If i had a .22 with me, I would have eaten like a wilderness king.
 
I have THREE blue eyed, blond haired Daughters. Trust me, I'm in lock down survival mode 24x7. ;)

As far as out in the woods.......not really. I fell through some ice once fishing with my Grandad when I was young. We were on a remote lake 3 hours from town by truck.

He stripped me down, used his axe and matches to build a fire, and wrapped me in his heavy wool flannel.

Pretty lame I know. I can tell you it felt like a million knives stabbing me when the wind hit my wet clothes. But Grandad saved the day however and I managed to escape with my life. ;):thumbup:
 
the only real survival situations i have been itno, have all been self imposed/practice.. i did SAR work for a few years and that was a regular excersize we did.... we had to be the ones lost and waiting to be rescued... that was fun.. of course i was the one loving it to no end... they always came for me last....:o

i have had a friend break his ankle, not too far into a 3 day trip... we had to get him out as best we can and get him to the ER..

i do a lot of naturalist/outdoor ed. work during the summer time.. a few summers back my older son got really ill, while hiking in a local state park... i had to rush him out (on my shoulders)and take him to the ER... we were there all damn night...........................turned out he was constipated and hadn't crapped in a few days....:( poor dude...:rolleyes:
 
I'll give it to you straight...
I live in new jersey.
I couldn't find enough woods for me to get in a survival situation... i could probably always walk to a taco bell or something.

:D

but, speaking of which I think a few dollars in quarters and singles would be really useful to have on any camping trip.
:D
just in case you do make it back to sivilazation, i think it'd be great to be able to get some food.
 
When I was in the Boy Scouts we did some 'self imposed' scenarios. And for the Wilderness Survival merit badge you had to survive for a weekend. And for Order of the Arrow... well, I can't tell you that, can I?
 
I got stranded in the Altamaha River swamps when my boat swamped due to a tremendous thunderstorm. It was scary. I got out, before dark, though.
 
Fiddleback said:
When I was in the Boy Scouts we did some 'self imposed' scenarios. And for the Wilderness Survival merit badge you had to survive for a weekend. And for Order of the Arrow... well, I can't tell you that, can I?
Click to expand...

Fellow Eagle Scout knifemaker here. Order of the Arrow was such a weird little mini-organization in scouts, wasn't it?
 
David Schott said:
Fellow Eagle Scout knifemaker here. Order of the Arrow was such a weird little mini-organization in scouts, wasn't it?
Click to expand...


Yea. Most of the boys in my troop weren't even interested for some reason. I was gung ho. But then, I was inducted right as I was done with Scouting, so I never saw a lot of action with the OA.
 
I have a heap of times that things coulda been worse but because I had the habbit of packing in case ... it wasnt a big deal

I think most of the survival situations are actually because people were under prepared , but its MHO only

I been in breakdowns that happened way out in the bush , and took a couple days to fix but because I was packed with weeks of supplies , its no biggie .

I been stranded a couple times and walked for a number of miles , but again because I had gear with me it wasnt a big deal

the funniest thing tho I reckon in a survival-ish situation was I made an impromptu neck brace for a guy who rolled his car and was looking in a bad way , I grabbed a magazine and stuck it in a stocking that was in his car , folded the mag over a few times and bent it into a u shape stuffed it into the stocking , tied it around his neck as a brace

that was all OK , it was when the ambos replaced it with a real one and looked at what id used they cracked up laughing

it was a penthouse magazine in a fishnet stocking .. apparently the poor guy got giggled at his whole hospital stay :)

but really survive as in be drinking water out of a muddy hole and spearing animals for food , eating gathered wild food , yams grubs lizards etc ?

that was the go when I went tribal to get to know my people ... but not "survival , that was LIVING :)
 
Stranded in the Mendocino National Forest with a dead battery and after a couple days ran out of food. Had to take my shotgun and shoot a couple quail and a squirrel. Not a big deal really - it was summertime and there was a truck full of gear. Just not enough food for an unexpected snafu.

I had a water filter break while traveling through Guatemala and had to resort to bleach. During the trip I spent five days on a log raft floating down a muddy river with plenty of cattle grazing in the area - didn't get sick, so I'm a strong believer in bleach.

I guess I would say I've been inconvenienced in the field - but never encountered an actual survival situation. Hopefully I never will. Truth is, I've faced much more dangerous "survival" situations in urban areas than I ever have in the field - maybe that's why I always feel safe when I'm way out in the field.
 
Six years of grad. school, 15k a year stipend and paid 6k in tuition. Starvation special ;)
 
Quote by Eatingmuchface:

"I'll give it to you straight...
I live in new jersey.
I couldn't find enough woods for me to get in a survival situation... i could probably always walk to a taco bell or something."

(Must be a real City Kid!!)

The Pine Barrens, also known as the Pinelands, is a heavily forested area covering 1.1 million acres (4,500 km²) of coastal plain across South Jersey.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Barrens_(New_Jersey)

He also much never read any of the "Tracker" books by Tom Brown as Brown says he learned all of his survival and tracking skills in the "Pine Barrens" from an indian.

Not a big Tom Brown fan, but I do know that there is a heavily forested area covering a million acres in South Jersey.

OMT
 
Does 5 years of marriage count??? My wife is amazing and extremely tolerant of my many flaws and nonsense, but she's a panicker, everytime I pullout a map she goes.."Oh god we're lost". I got fairly lost in the rainforest in Belize for about 4 hours a few years back ( my wife doesn't know we where lost...but the trail we where on was washed out and turned into about 8 game trails....I was a little concerned because that is not my typical hen-house to play in...the notion of making do and crashing a night in the jungle was nowhere near as frightening as the though of having to explain that to my wife..luckily with a little compass work and some luck both situations where avoided..1day however I'd sure like to do a jungle survival course...
 
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