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Went to the local Sasquatch woods this week... A bit cold but a nice walk.

Saturday I taught what in the UK would be considered a bushcraft class. My fire lighting kit took a beating and not much was left, even my char cloth was damp-ish. What a perfect time to see if it still works when it is really needed. I went out for a little woods walk today and put what was...

Well at medieval events over here in eastern Canada I seem to be the firewood guy. Most medieval reenactors over here fall into some pretty tight categories. The geek and intellectual sort who use keyboards for a living and are not so great at manual labour. The army guys who just like to fight...

Some of us outdoor enthusiasts from Canada who also happen to be medieval reenactors got together to do a little hike on the Bay of Fundy coast only we did it in medieval clothing and gear. Some of the newer members do not have their full kit yet and some of the older members opted for modern...

I have been pretty busy this winter with projects for reenactment stuff and just generally to stay sane. We have had 11-12 feet of snow this winter and the first 5 feet was fun, after that I just wanted it to end. First, reproduction of an ancient shoe with an important sounding name, my...

Or as I now call it SCHPRUUSSS BAER... I came across this mid 1700's Canadian Recipe for Spruce Beer and had to give it a brew up to see how it tasted. I tried this Scots Pine Beer from Scotland and did not really get on with it. That being my only experience I figured that my Spruce Beer...

I mentioned that I had some film footage of a trip I guided for a friend from Yorkshire back when I posted the trip report; http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=110268 but I just got around to making a small short video today. Nothing special but if you read the trip report...

I made a leather costrel over the course of a few weeks. It involved shaping the leather wet over a form and then letting it dry, sewing it together and hardening it with beeswax. The lanyard is braided with strands of jute that were first twisted into cords. The bung is carved from maple and...

I made my girlfriend a little birka type pouch for reenactment and it was a pretty straight forward project. She wanted something big enough to hide a computerized super phone in. Normally I do not use patterns and sort of do things by the seat of my pants and I guess I sort of did that with the...

My girlfriend asked me to make her a pair of medieval style hunting boots, the ones that they show in the illuminations that come up to the knee. Well I decided to do medieval uppers and a more modern sole so instead of turn shoe type I sewed in a welt an put two layers of good thick 6 oz...

My girlfriend and I do medieval reenactment and I thought I would make her and I a set of eating knives. I apprenticed as a blacksmith long ago so tried to remember everything I could about metallurgy for this project and set about making a his and hers set of high carbon blades. First I...

I got it in my head recently to make a pair of leather trousers, not for motor biking or anything but for when hanging out with the viking and medieval people that make up so much of my leather business. So about 10 hours of research later, enough to make my archeologist cousin proud, I...

Not the kind you put powder in, the sort they had way before that... I had this horn kicking around for about 15 years that I have tried to sell to one of the viking people I know to make a drinking horn from. Apparently that is too much work or something? It sat around unsold for 15 years...

Well Simon came over to do another trip with me and while the weather was for the most part excellent he did have to put up with an incredible string of bad luck that I seemed to be going through. These little adversities did not put a damper on his vacation but they did test my patients at...

Sort of a bastardized version of one dug up in some place called Birka in Sweden, I wanted it to look a bit beat up. The first thing I did was cut out the leather and soak it in cold water and scrunch it all up in a ball. Letting it dry for 24 hours I wet it again and made the pouch, let it dry...

A local group that does sword fighting etc. asked me to make them a sword baldric thingie for their champion fencer. The belt is three layers thick at the buckle and where the sword part attaches. Anyone that hand sews thick leather knows what a pain in the butt multiple layers are. I broke a...

Made a little single fold knife sheath tonight. Actually a really fun project with less needles poking into fingers than most of my leather projects. I used British Tan dye on it but it sort of turned out ox blood? Either the dye has gone off, I am colour blind or I forget what British Tan...

I spent the better part of my time off this week making a pair of boots. The project started off innocently enough as most boot projects do. With the pieces all laid out, I figured I would be done in a few hours. All the bits and bobs later it really did not go so fast as I remembered. The...

I am new here and would not really call myself a bushcrafter. More of an outdoor guy. I have been reading a few of the primitive living threads and that got me thinking about how I stack up after the better part of 40 years experience, the first part of my life following my grandfather through...

I filmed this a few years back when that Ed Wardle guy was popular for 15 minutes on youtube. It got a few laughs but I was not a forum member back then. Maybe BCUK will see the humour too? All the talk on the wilderness living threads made me think about some of the more miserable trips I...