- Joined
- Jul 31, 2007
- Messages
- 1,421
I posted this on the contest thread, but I thought I'd post it here as well to received extra feedback from people.
I had a BLAST
Woohoo! Well, I'm alive, that's a good thing. I was able to get out last night and I had a great time. I wish I would have taken more pictures, but I'll post what I've got.
I took a little notebook to keep track of some thoughts and what I spent my time on.
I decided to "force" myself into staying the entire night by having my wife drop me off at the beginning of my hike, and not coming back to get me. So, basically when I was done, I'd have to walk home. I figured this would make it more realistic in that if I was stranded out in the woods, I would be just a 20 minute walk from my car. So, from my camping spot to my house was about 3 miles, which would have been a PAIN in the wee hours of the morning. I wanted to make sure I stayed the whole night! However, being 1 month out from 2 surgeries, I didn't want to get hurt and be stuck, so I did take my cell phone, which I normally would anyways. I liked the physical condition of my body, in that I'm still a month or two away from having my full strength and stamina back, so I thought this would add to the "survival" situation, as if I was hurt, or had minimal energy to exert. This helped me think more critically of my gear and my choices that I made. I'll explain more as I go through the night below.
Thursday - Perfect weather, no clouds, very little wind, no rain at all, but everything was VERY wet from rain from the previous days.
3:30pm. 45F. My wife dropped me off, this was her best concerned face! She was a little nervous, as we are somewhat unfamiliar with the place I was going, this was my first time camping by myself anywhere, and she was concerned my body might not be up to it physically. She loves me, so she let me go!
It was about a 20-30 hike to my spot, I had been to this area before, but not to this exact spot. I just walked until I found a nice place.
4:00pm. Started setting up camp.
Took me 30 minutes to get my tarp setup, a small reflector fire-ring setup, and a few other things setup. This was my second time using this tarp, and I'm not sure how much I like it yet. It's light, but it took up a lot of space in my pack. This is one of the items that I wouldn't normally take with me on a hike, but I took as a little extra protection from the elements. However, once I was out, I depended primarily on my space blanket, trash bags, fire, and clothing for protection and warmth. I was laying next to the fire most of the night and not under this tarp. If it would had been windy or raining, I would have been under it for sure though. A nice poncho/tarp might be a good alternative. The tarp did keep a lot of moister off my gear.
My fire pit worked great. I made it on a small slope, and setup some tall rocks in the back to try to reflect some heat towards my shelter. I think it was too far away from the tarp however to notice any heat being reflected into it. Having one high wall helped out a lot. Once my fire was going, I was able to prop wet ground wood up over the fire to dry out. This was especially great since just about everything was wet from a few days of rain. I also made the fire pit longer than normal, so when laying next to it, it would heat my body better.
4:30pm. I started gathering firewood. I had about 30 minutes of actual light left, so I was scrambling. This is where I started using my kit. I wanted to rely only on the mini-flashlight from County Comm as my light source. I EDC a Nitecore D10 (which is amazing), but I decided not to use it. This little light worked fine, and I managed not to lose it. Though I did drop it in my fire once! This is one item that I definitely wanted to upgrade, but it did work well. I held it in my mouth most of the time, which worked ok. Some thoughts on upgrading below.
I found a great firewood score, and though it wasn't very far from my camp (maybe 100 yards), it was very difficult for me to drag it back. Basically some huge branches had broken out of a tree, but that were still stuck in the tree. I started break some branches off, but decided I wanted the whole thing. This probably wasn't a good idea. It was getting pretty dark, and I wanted fire! The heaviest part of the branch was about 15 feet high, stuck on another branch, leaning against the tree. I started to pull on it to try to shake it loose, only to release a branch that was under tension, which came and knocked me in the face, popping a lens out of my glasses, and scratch my face a little. I luckily found the lens, it was fine, and it popped back in place just fine. An eye wound not have been good. I still wanted the wood, so I tried to carefully pull it down. I managed to get it out, but I needed to take all the branches off before I could move it. Most just broke off, while the larger ones wouldn't budge. This branch was 8+ in diameter. I got my pocket chainsaw (which I do often carry with me on hikes since its so small) and tried to section it up. But I just didn't have the energy to do this. I couldn't saw very hard for very long at all. Eventually out of frustration I just dragged the whole thing back to camp, getting poked along the way as the branch shifted around. Once back I decided to persevere and at least cut it in half. This took me about 10-15 minutes to do, working in little shifts. After this, I decided to burn it into sections over the fire, which worked perfectly and forced me to conserve my wood usage.
Once I gather enough wood to get a good fire started, I took some semi-dry branches and split them with my new Breeden Blackwood (5.5 blade). I then used them as a fire floor. This worked great, and I use this technique at home too. I don't think I would have been able to do this with my SAK Farmer, which is my kit knife. Maybe some smaller branches, but I was using some 3-4 branches. This wasn't absolutely necessary, but helped quite a bit.
I used a PJCB from my PSK, my firesteel from my PSK, and my Farmer to start the fire. I had made some dry wood shavings to use as secondary tinder with the Farmer, it made nice thin, wide curls. I then piled on some small twigs (you can see how much moss there is here, which keeps things pretty wet), which I had pilled up earlier. Unfortunately they were already damp from being on the grass, so it took a while for them to start burning. But soon I had raging inferno!
I continued to gather some more wood, hoping that I had enough to last the night I went to rest under my tarp for about an hour, I was exhausted.
I'm not sure if it was the pocket chainsaws fault or not, but man I was hating that thing. The wood was very hard, and really pretty thick, more on this below.
6:00pm. Even though I hadn't really done much, it felt great to just lay down. I nodded on and off for about an hour, and decided that if I was going to gather more wood, then I should do it early on. The if you think you have enough, get three times as much saying echo'd in my head. So I went back to the same tree and got another branch that was a little thicker, but shorter. Dragging this one back wasn't any fun either. There was no way I was going to try to saw it in half, I just layed it over the fire to burn in half.
7:30pm. I was starting to get a little cold, so I decided to break out my space blanket. I have several of these, but I'd never needed to use one before, so I had never opened one before. Man do they ever fold down small! This was my favorite piece of gear. It did a good job of keeping my body heat in while in my shelter, it kept my dry from the wet ground, and when next to the fire, it reflected more than enough heat. I was just amazing at the difference this thing made when huddled by the fire. It's like when someone first gets glasses, and they keep putting them on and off, amazing at the difference. I kept putting it up and down feeling the difference that it made. I guarantee I'll always have one of these with me. I'm very glad I decided to get a slightly larger kit box, so that I would have room for one!!!
Throughout the rest of the night, I kept using small rocks that I set next to the fire to keep my hands warm (I was wearing leather gloves the whole time, except when I was trying to sleep). My gloves got cold quick, and carrying around a small hot rock was great to keep them warm when making a side trip, or just sitting around.
8:30pm. I had made it a few hours, and I was starting to get bored. It was also a little eery, being in a new place by myself at night. I haven't had enough time in the woods at night yet to that comfortable with it, several times I swear I heard some tree zombies.
One thing that helped me pass the time was to set time goals. I brought a package of ramen noodles, a can of tuna, and some homemade hot chocolate mix. I was craving this very early on, not because I was hungry, but because I was anxious to have something to do. But I set a time goal of 9:30pm before I could crack everything open. This allowed me to continue some much needed rest, and to progress through the night. I continued to do this throughout the night in my trying-to-sleep/tending-the-fire pattern. I'd make myself try to sleep for at least 1.5 hours before I'd get up to tend to the fire. I'd sleep for about 30 minutes on the middle, and I had to wait before I could move on to the next thing.
10:00pm. Decide to make some food! I used my metal cup to do all of this, and it worked fine just to set them on some hot coals. Doing this didn't get anything to a rolling boil though, but enough to sterilize water. I also had some water purification tablets in case this didn't work out well. Thankfully, I didn't have to use them. I was going to use some of the wire in my kit to have it hang over the fire, but this was easier, and worked just as well. I really needed a lid, so I'm going to add some aluminum foil. This would also work well to boil water, although the cup is multitudes easier. I usually have my cup and a nalgene with me, so I didn't think using my cup was a stretch.
1:00am. Having waited an hour an a half, and my feet being quite cold, I decided to get up and warm up. After feeding the fire, I decided to whittle with my Farmer for a while. I'm not much a whittler, though I'd like to be. I usually get frustrated quickly since I can't make anything. But, I told myself I'd whittle for at least 30 minutes. I spent some time making fuzz sticks, some with tiny thin curls, and others with thin wide curls. I spent a lot of time just slimming down one piece of wood, until I decided to make it into a mini-sword for my son. It didn't turn out awesome at all, but he likes it! This ended up keeping me bust for well over an hour.
Overall, I slept maybe 4 hours, which is pretty good considering the situation. I normally don't sleep much in the woods though.
5:00am. 26F. I kept hoping that the sun would rise... but it didn't for another 2.5 hours! At this time, my feet were COLD. I fed the fire with my shrinking pile of wood, and I stood very close to it to try to warm up my feet. I was pretty tired, and kind of in a want-to-sleep-more-trance when I realized I was probably a little to close to the fire! Yup, my pants had melted! I just happened to look down and noticed some slight smoke coming from them. I was very frustrated with myself for letting this happen. This pants were awesome! I decided to take my shoes off and warm my feet safely, while letting my socks dry out and warm up. I'm not sure how much longer I needed it would have been for my pants to ignite, but I think I was pretty close. I was wearing all synthetic clothing, which just melts and burns pretty fast. That mixed with my hairy legs would not have been fun.
I spent a long time laying next to the fire on top of my trash bag and space blanket. I tucked just a little of the blanket under me, and used the rest to reflect heat back at me. I stayed perfectly warm this way. When the wind picked up, I tucked the ends down around my head and feet. I know I would have survived without my tarp with the weather conditions that I had.
I had a BLAST
Woohoo! Well, I'm alive, that's a good thing. I was able to get out last night and I had a great time. I wish I would have taken more pictures, but I'll post what I've got.
I took a little notebook to keep track of some thoughts and what I spent my time on.
I decided to "force" myself into staying the entire night by having my wife drop me off at the beginning of my hike, and not coming back to get me. So, basically when I was done, I'd have to walk home. I figured this would make it more realistic in that if I was stranded out in the woods, I would be just a 20 minute walk from my car. So, from my camping spot to my house was about 3 miles, which would have been a PAIN in the wee hours of the morning. I wanted to make sure I stayed the whole night! However, being 1 month out from 2 surgeries, I didn't want to get hurt and be stuck, so I did take my cell phone, which I normally would anyways. I liked the physical condition of my body, in that I'm still a month or two away from having my full strength and stamina back, so I thought this would add to the "survival" situation, as if I was hurt, or had minimal energy to exert. This helped me think more critically of my gear and my choices that I made. I'll explain more as I go through the night below.
Thursday - Perfect weather, no clouds, very little wind, no rain at all, but everything was VERY wet from rain from the previous days.
3:30pm. 45F. My wife dropped me off, this was her best concerned face! She was a little nervous, as we are somewhat unfamiliar with the place I was going, this was my first time camping by myself anywhere, and she was concerned my body might not be up to it physically. She loves me, so she let me go!
It was about a 20-30 hike to my spot, I had been to this area before, but not to this exact spot. I just walked until I found a nice place.
4:00pm. Started setting up camp.
Took me 30 minutes to get my tarp setup, a small reflector fire-ring setup, and a few other things setup. This was my second time using this tarp, and I'm not sure how much I like it yet. It's light, but it took up a lot of space in my pack. This is one of the items that I wouldn't normally take with me on a hike, but I took as a little extra protection from the elements. However, once I was out, I depended primarily on my space blanket, trash bags, fire, and clothing for protection and warmth. I was laying next to the fire most of the night and not under this tarp. If it would had been windy or raining, I would have been under it for sure though. A nice poncho/tarp might be a good alternative. The tarp did keep a lot of moister off my gear.
My fire pit worked great. I made it on a small slope, and setup some tall rocks in the back to try to reflect some heat towards my shelter. I think it was too far away from the tarp however to notice any heat being reflected into it. Having one high wall helped out a lot. Once my fire was going, I was able to prop wet ground wood up over the fire to dry out. This was especially great since just about everything was wet from a few days of rain. I also made the fire pit longer than normal, so when laying next to it, it would heat my body better.
4:30pm. I started gathering firewood. I had about 30 minutes of actual light left, so I was scrambling. This is where I started using my kit. I wanted to rely only on the mini-flashlight from County Comm as my light source. I EDC a Nitecore D10 (which is amazing), but I decided not to use it. This little light worked fine, and I managed not to lose it. Though I did drop it in my fire once! This is one item that I definitely wanted to upgrade, but it did work well. I held it in my mouth most of the time, which worked ok. Some thoughts on upgrading below.
I found a great firewood score, and though it wasn't very far from my camp (maybe 100 yards), it was very difficult for me to drag it back. Basically some huge branches had broken out of a tree, but that were still stuck in the tree. I started break some branches off, but decided I wanted the whole thing. This probably wasn't a good idea. It was getting pretty dark, and I wanted fire! The heaviest part of the branch was about 15 feet high, stuck on another branch, leaning against the tree. I started to pull on it to try to shake it loose, only to release a branch that was under tension, which came and knocked me in the face, popping a lens out of my glasses, and scratch my face a little. I luckily found the lens, it was fine, and it popped back in place just fine. An eye wound not have been good. I still wanted the wood, so I tried to carefully pull it down. I managed to get it out, but I needed to take all the branches off before I could move it. Most just broke off, while the larger ones wouldn't budge. This branch was 8+ in diameter. I got my pocket chainsaw (which I do often carry with me on hikes since its so small) and tried to section it up. But I just didn't have the energy to do this. I couldn't saw very hard for very long at all. Eventually out of frustration I just dragged the whole thing back to camp, getting poked along the way as the branch shifted around. Once back I decided to persevere and at least cut it in half. This took me about 10-15 minutes to do, working in little shifts. After this, I decided to burn it into sections over the fire, which worked perfectly and forced me to conserve my wood usage.
Once I gather enough wood to get a good fire started, I took some semi-dry branches and split them with my new Breeden Blackwood (5.5 blade). I then used them as a fire floor. This worked great, and I use this technique at home too. I don't think I would have been able to do this with my SAK Farmer, which is my kit knife. Maybe some smaller branches, but I was using some 3-4 branches. This wasn't absolutely necessary, but helped quite a bit.
I used a PJCB from my PSK, my firesteel from my PSK, and my Farmer to start the fire. I had made some dry wood shavings to use as secondary tinder with the Farmer, it made nice thin, wide curls. I then piled on some small twigs (you can see how much moss there is here, which keeps things pretty wet), which I had pilled up earlier. Unfortunately they were already damp from being on the grass, so it took a while for them to start burning. But soon I had raging inferno!
I continued to gather some more wood, hoping that I had enough to last the night I went to rest under my tarp for about an hour, I was exhausted.
I'm not sure if it was the pocket chainsaws fault or not, but man I was hating that thing. The wood was very hard, and really pretty thick, more on this below.
6:00pm. Even though I hadn't really done much, it felt great to just lay down. I nodded on and off for about an hour, and decided that if I was going to gather more wood, then I should do it early on. The if you think you have enough, get three times as much saying echo'd in my head. So I went back to the same tree and got another branch that was a little thicker, but shorter. Dragging this one back wasn't any fun either. There was no way I was going to try to saw it in half, I just layed it over the fire to burn in half.
7:30pm. I was starting to get a little cold, so I decided to break out my space blanket. I have several of these, but I'd never needed to use one before, so I had never opened one before. Man do they ever fold down small! This was my favorite piece of gear. It did a good job of keeping my body heat in while in my shelter, it kept my dry from the wet ground, and when next to the fire, it reflected more than enough heat. I was just amazing at the difference this thing made when huddled by the fire. It's like when someone first gets glasses, and they keep putting them on and off, amazing at the difference. I kept putting it up and down feeling the difference that it made. I guarantee I'll always have one of these with me. I'm very glad I decided to get a slightly larger kit box, so that I would have room for one!!!
Throughout the rest of the night, I kept using small rocks that I set next to the fire to keep my hands warm (I was wearing leather gloves the whole time, except when I was trying to sleep). My gloves got cold quick, and carrying around a small hot rock was great to keep them warm when making a side trip, or just sitting around.
8:30pm. I had made it a few hours, and I was starting to get bored. It was also a little eery, being in a new place by myself at night. I haven't had enough time in the woods at night yet to that comfortable with it, several times I swear I heard some tree zombies.
One thing that helped me pass the time was to set time goals. I brought a package of ramen noodles, a can of tuna, and some homemade hot chocolate mix. I was craving this very early on, not because I was hungry, but because I was anxious to have something to do. But I set a time goal of 9:30pm before I could crack everything open. This allowed me to continue some much needed rest, and to progress through the night. I continued to do this throughout the night in my trying-to-sleep/tending-the-fire pattern. I'd make myself try to sleep for at least 1.5 hours before I'd get up to tend to the fire. I'd sleep for about 30 minutes on the middle, and I had to wait before I could move on to the next thing. 10:00pm. Decide to make some food! I used my metal cup to do all of this, and it worked fine just to set them on some hot coals. Doing this didn't get anything to a rolling boil though, but enough to sterilize water. I also had some water purification tablets in case this didn't work out well. Thankfully, I didn't have to use them. I was going to use some of the wire in my kit to have it hang over the fire, but this was easier, and worked just as well. I really needed a lid, so I'm going to add some aluminum foil. This would also work well to boil water, although the cup is multitudes easier. I usually have my cup and a nalgene with me, so I didn't think using my cup was a stretch.
1:00am. Having waited an hour an a half, and my feet being quite cold, I decided to get up and warm up. After feeding the fire, I decided to whittle with my Farmer for a while. I'm not much a whittler, though I'd like to be. I usually get frustrated quickly since I can't make anything. But, I told myself I'd whittle for at least 30 minutes. I spent some time making fuzz sticks, some with tiny thin curls, and others with thin wide curls. I spent a lot of time just slimming down one piece of wood, until I decided to make it into a mini-sword for my son. It didn't turn out awesome at all, but he likes it! This ended up keeping me bust for well over an hour.
Overall, I slept maybe 4 hours, which is pretty good considering the situation. I normally don't sleep much in the woods though.
5:00am. 26F. I kept hoping that the sun would rise... but it didn't for another 2.5 hours! At this time, my feet were COLD. I fed the fire with my shrinking pile of wood, and I stood very close to it to try to warm up my feet. I was pretty tired, and kind of in a want-to-sleep-more-trance when I realized I was probably a little to close to the fire! Yup, my pants had melted! I just happened to look down and noticed some slight smoke coming from them. I was very frustrated with myself for letting this happen. This pants were awesome! I decided to take my shoes off and warm my feet safely, while letting my socks dry out and warm up. I'm not sure how much longer I needed it would have been for my pants to ignite, but I think I was pretty close. I was wearing all synthetic clothing, which just melts and burns pretty fast. That mixed with my hairy legs would not have been fun.
I spent a long time laying next to the fire on top of my trash bag and space blanket. I tucked just a little of the blanket under me, and used the rest to reflect heat back at me. I stayed perfectly warm this way. When the wind picked up, I tucked the ends down around my head and feet. I know I would have survived without my tarp with the weather conditions that I had.
LOL
