Minimalist camping without a fixed blade

[pinnah]

Thomas,

I wonder to what degree we're talking across generational divides. Here's my take on the history of the sports in North America:

50s - Mountaineering is on the lunatic fringe. No sturdy locking folder widely available. Military gear is common. Fixed blades and BSA knives are only options.

60s - Modern backpacking starts to emerge thanks Dick Kelty and others. Harvey Manning recommends a scout knife in Freedom of the Hills, writing, "For special purposes a hunting knife is superior, as are double-bitted axes, cavalry sabers, Gatling guns, and dynamite, but a modest mountaineer contents himself with a modest blade." The Buck 110 is introduced. SAKs become common, as are BSA knives.

70s - Backpacking goes more mainstream thanks to Earth Day and a whole lot of experimentation on a whole lot of fronts. Early Winters imports the Opinel. LNT doctrine worked out by NOLS, among others.

80s - Light Alpinist mountaineering becomes more common thanks to Chouinard, Messner and others. Steady advances in backpacking equipment including legitimate internal frame packs, GoreTex and fleece.

90s - UL backpacking emerges thanks to Jardine and others

00s - Bushcraft and Survival revival emerges due to... I dunno... the Walking Dead maybe?

As I see it, I see the modern Survival movement is focused on scenarios in which fuel or stoves are not available. The Bushcraft movement seems to be different, more of an intentional eschewing of fuel and modern gear.

I can certainly understand if somebody came of age in the 60s or had military training or if they were committed philosophically to either the modern Survival or Bushcraft movements, they would consider a fixed blade essential.

I think Leghog made one of the best points in the thread in a while when he noted the difference between Survival (the movement, school of thought and marketing term) and survival (doing what is needed to stay alive and to thrive in the backcountry.

Allinists, LNT backpackers (post NOLS) and UL backpackers (post Jardine) are all interested in survival (small s) and are good at, even if they don't pursue Survival (big S).

I think we all get a bit emotional about gear we trust our lives to. Heck, I used to run a website about Nordic Backcountry gear.

So our words prick at each other's emotions. When i say a fixed blade isn't needed, it challenges both your heros and your experiences that lead you to trust your life to your fixed blade.

Conversely, when you insist a fixed blade is essential, it challenges my heros and my experiences that lead me to trust my life to my stove and clothing (and my folder).

I'm not sure where that leaves us.

I can't agree that fixed blades are essential. Too many of us survive (small s) just fine with out them and too many of us have dealt with enough what ifs to doubt the reliability of our alpinist LNT kits.

 

[AreBeeBee]

No, it was fixed. It's on the cover of the mag. I read it first as a hard copy, and remembered it as I was reading through this thread. It is a saw-back, Kabar-ish looking knife that may in fact have a hollow handle. Something I would have no confidence in... and yet! The guy lived and the bear died!

Thank you Aias.
I'm off to the next gas station.

Actually, I think you'd find that knife most easily at Horror Fright, er, Harb... I saw one in that place that was a dead ringer for the knife from the story. And yes, it has a hollow handle (store matches and fish hooks in there for survival, you know!).

Which is really, really funny, considering all fuss and fiddle we make on BF over high/medium/low/contemptible quality knives for backwoods/survival/bushcraft/etc/etc/etc. And here the guy saves his own life from a bear with something none of us — and I mean none — would even want to touch, let alone take into the woods where bears abound.

Kind of puts all these pages (25 and counting) inbto perspective.

(And yes, I'll take a fixed blade of appropriate size and weight on a hike or trek where it seems possible I might need it. Just because.)

 

[stabman]

Thomas,

I wonder to what degree we're talking across generational divides. Here's my take on the history of the sports in North America:

50s - Mountaineering is on the lunatic fringe. No sturdy locking folder widely available. Military gear is common. Fixed blades and BSA knives are only options.

60s - Modern backpacking starts to emerge thanks Dick Kelty and others. Harvey Manning recommends a scout knife in Freedom of the Hills, writing, "For special purposes a hunting knife is superior, as are double-bitted axes, cavalry sabers, Gatling guns, and dynamite, but a modest mountaineer contents himself with a modest blade." The Buck 110 is introduced. SAKs become common, as are BSA knives.

70s - Backpacking goes more mainstream thanks to Earth Day and a whole lot of experimentation on a whole lot of fronts. Early Winters imports the Opinel. LNT doctrine worked out by NOLS, among others.

80s - Light Alpinist mountaineering becomes more common thanks to Chouinard, Messner and others. Steady advances in backpacking equipment including legitimate internal frame packs, GoreTex and fleece.

90s - UL backpacking emerges thanks to Jardine and others

00s - Bushcraft and Survival revival emerges due to... I dunno... the Walking Dead maybe?

See, it's phrasing like this that interjects a confrontational tone into things.
You were going along with your logical progression of things, then throw in that, which makes it sounds like "juvenile fantasy time."

You could have said the popularity of shows like Survivorman.
Or concerns over self-reliance brought to the fore by the media-inspired panic leading up to Y2K.
Or the need to find a connection to the past, given the nature of the impersonal and highly automated world we now live in.
Or just because people might like doing things in a way that feels more in line with our imaginings of ancestral practices.

But you went with The Walking Dead.

 

[BBuser]

Well, it's like anything else. Some folks take what is actually a very good concept with worthwhile goals behind it and then promptly go off the deep end into absurdity. Carrying your own poop? I mean, what the heck is that about?

I've read it's a requirement on wilderness Grand Canyon hikes. Apparently the lack of rain prevents or delays decomposition. I don't see the point in rainy eastern forests, just bury it like a cat. There's a long waiting list for Grand Canyon permission--I'm not on it.

 

[pinnah]

Sorry.

I actually take the Walking Dead very seriously.

Google cyber war and electrical grid. Estimates I've heard for bringing the US back online from a fullscale cyber take down of the grid are 6 to 18 months. We could global warming and financial system collapse as cultural fears.

And yes, I alone can be insulting, right? ;^)

 

[stabman]

Sorry.

I actually take the Walking Dead very seriously.

Google cyber war and electrical grid. Estimates I've heard for bringing the US back online from a fullscale cyber take down of the grid are 6 to 18 months. We could global warming and financial system collapse as cultural fears.

And yes, I alone can be insulting, right? ;^)

Nope, others can too.
When the conversation becomes "smelly hippies" versus "zombie survivors," can't go many positive places from there.

I can't take the Walking Dead or other large-scale disasters all that seriously around here.
Ice storms that put the grid down for a couple of weeks? Sure, that's realistic enough.
Financial collapse? Humans survived previous ones.

Maybe a full-scale cyber attack would wipe out my student debt and credit card debt too...that'd be pretty great.

 

[leghog]

I have to admit, I don't go in the snow. Do what you must.

But the LNT stuff seems somewhat inconsistent. Why bury your own pooh, but carry the dogs?

because you don't usually control where your dog shits.
Why carry in mined hydrocarbons, when burning some deadfall is environmentally neutral?[/QUOTE]Because stoves leave no trace but wood fires do.

 

[22-rimfire]

...Maybe a full-scale cyber attack would wipe out my student debt and credit card debt too...that'd be pretty great.

It might for a short time. But banks ultimately win. Take the great depression, many people lost their homes to banks just doing what banks do. Hey. It's business right? That makes it all impersonal. But if you remember the movie with Jimmy Stewart movie "It's a Wonderful Life"..... it becomes personal.

A full scale cyber or emp attack where electric grids are down for years is in fact one of the worst possible things that could happen to a western civilization. Electricity is life. I suspect the LNT movement would suffer a major set back. Think I want a fixed blade and my SAK...

 

[leghog]

Not evidence like the footsteps walking up to the site, or the depressions where your sleeping bag was, or the rope scores around trees where your hammock was hung.

That's precisely why I don't use a hammock, and why public lands are beginning to ban them. Face it many strive to make as little impact as possible while some others don't seem to even consider their impact.

 

[leghog]

And I guess all that kit came to be leaving no trace?

No more trace than someone's 50 pounds of kit and their big honkin' fixed blade.


So that being "equal", let's consider the trace left by the users using their kits.

 

[mtangent]

because you don't usually control where your dog shits.
Why carry in mined hydrocarbons, when burning some deadfall is environmentally neutral?

Because stoves leave no trace but wood fires do.[/QUOTE]

I carry a wood stove: Vargo titanium. I burn twigs lying on the ground. When I finish, there is less than a handful of charcoal left behind. This is in hardwood forests that have suffered bushfires for millennia. The soil is not burned, no stone rings are left. Really, there is no trace. The little fold up stove is very light, & I carry no fuel, so it is probably lighter all up than any other set up.

 

[leghog]

Well, it's like anything else. Some folks take what is actually a very good concept with worthwhile goals behind it and then promptly go off the deep end into absurdity. Carrying your own poop? I mean, what the heck is that about?

So then, what do you do when you shit on a talus slope above the tree line, or in two feet of snow, or a pristine beach, or a mangrove swamp?

 

[leghog]

Where trees and vegetation takes years and years to grow an inch, a little damage lasts a long time. Same goes for coral reefs where if every diver chips a little off, in no time everything is battered. ...

A reason I almost never wore gloves with SCUBA. Much less temptation to touch.

 

[leghog]

Distributed vs condensed.

Have seen a cool approach in Sweden.
There was a group of islands in a lake. Complete with rare birds and what not.
The island which was chosen to be open for camping rotated every year. This way the impact was condensed to one island at a time but spread out over all island over the years and gave each island a lot of time to recover.

Many public lands here open and close sites (and sometimes trails) because of overuse and so the land can heal in a few years vs decades.

 

[leghog]

I've read it's a requirement on wilderness Grand Canyon hikes. Apparently the lack of rain prevents or delays decomposition. I don't see the point in rainy eastern forests, just bury it like a cat. There's a long waiting list for Grand Canyon permission--I'm not on it.

My sister just returned from a Grand Canyon hike with an old college friend she hadn't seen in decades. I was green with envy.

 

[Thomas Linton]

Thomas,


Conversely, when you insist a fixed blade is essential, it challenges my heros and my experiences that lead me to trust my life to my stove and clothing (and my folder).

Where did I do that?

I don't regard myself as the final arbiter of anything except my right to life. I simply have opinions. I operate according to those opinions. No more. No less.

 

[stabman]

A full scale cyber or emp attack where electric grids are down for years is in fact one of the worst possible things that could happen to a western civilization. Electricity is life. I suspect the LNT movement would suffer a major set back. Think I want a fixed blade and my SAK...

People would be leaving one hell of a trace.
Imagine 7.4 billion people all trying to live without most of modern technology.
Goodbye trees.
Hello a few billion rotting corpses.

 

[GREENJACKET]

Greenjacket,

Kinda sounds to me like we're in complete agreement on the main principle and that our differences lie mostly in having different circumstances and life experience that shape our choices.

I'm the entirety of the work force on my ranch, with the exception of getting neighbors to help a few times a year for the biggest jobs and helping them in turn. Because of this, I tend to have the view that problems I'm not prepared to solve on my own, probably won't get solved at all.

I agree with you on some of the designs around. There's a lot of gimmicky "features" out there. Admittedly, I own some examples of this myself, but that's more about being a bit of a collector. The blades that actually get carried when I'm on foot with a purpose, as opposed to going to a site to mess with my knives, tend to be drop or clip points of pretty boring appearance. My friends are sometimes shocked by how much I paid for "such a plain knife". As opposed to visible "features", I paid for things less able to be seen. Stellar reputation for using excellent and appropriate steel for a given type of blade with an outstanding heat treatment (so it doesn't need to be thick and heavy to be strong but will still hold an excellent edge) and/or warranties without all the fine print. Any tool can break, but experience turning wrenches over the years has taught me that, the shorter the warranty text on a tool brand, the less likely you are to need that warranty in the first place. I'm willing to pay a premium for these non-visible features if it's to be my "uh oh" wilderness tool.

Sure different experiences but I doubt on most knife things that far apart.
I do like to try to tackle a problem before calling in the experts. Hate practical things defeating me, but then on certain things others have more skill than I. Some craftsmanship takes apprenticeship to master. A best London gunmaker, or a top knife knifemaker. Met and know a few.
I'm not really a knife collector but picked up a few over the years. Sold a few too. Lost a couple. The design has to fit to what feels right and I think would work. I do like to buy into steel, new steels, and the expertise and reputation of a knife that takes my fancy. You hope a knife has some luck built in based on reputation. Most of my knives are factory but I have a few custom. I have equal amount of folders to fixed. I've always been a fan of Chris Reeve, even more so after meeting him; but then he is a friend of a friend (I carried a Project II for seven years when in the military, and a big fan of the large Sebbie). Recently bought a couple of Survive Knives GSO's as I liked what they were doing. The Skrama I liked so much that I thought it needed a wider audience and gave it some push with a review (for the price and utility its a bargain).

There are a lot of knives to choose from now. Hard to find a badly made knife, easy to find one that isn't that great in use. Plenty that are asking for a lot of money, and possibly for what??? Tend to stay away from gimics.

Its a good hobby. I quite enjoy sharpening.

 

[GREENJACKET]

A reason I almost never wore gloves with SCUBA. Much less temptation to touch.

Correct.
Sometimes a wetsuit isn't enough. I'm just a fair weather Padi Diver, and done just enough to be competent, never owned a pair of gloves (had blue hands though). Would do more if I lived somewhere hot.
I hear Lionfish, which are a menace in places are good to eat. Easy to prepare too, cut off all spiny fin bits, then prepare and cook like any other fish.

 

[GREENJACKET]

Zombie apocalypse. I live on a tiny island with 68m people. I'd swop a big blade for a boat.