Camping in coldest wintertime, I mean freezing!
- Thread starter Alba
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forestwalker
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Coldest as in -30 -- -40 C? BTDT. Proper kit, thinking before you do things, etc is the key points. Unless you are used to it you do not fear touching bare metal, do not habitually add long loops of cord to all zipper pulls, do not consider all plastics to be fragile, etc.
What kind of conditions in terms of temperature and wind have you thought of? The experience I have had with the Finnish Defence Forces and their winter camping equipment is that the tent should be quite low and wide for many persons and even lower and wider for fewer people. Portable stove will surely help but I quess with proper sleeping bags you can manage without it. Anyway a stove will require multiple persons to operate it throughout the night.
north Canada was my coldest, - 35, we had white out going back to the village and i got mild frost nip on my thumbs and face, not nice when it thores out...
i was forced to sleep in a snow hole to small, there was not enough snow and we hit the rock, we could not move as the instructor needed us in that area, this meant there was an upper and lower shelf inside, i was on the lower level, NEVER AGAIN!!!! cold air sinks, my buddy was toasty though as my body heat was keeping him warm.
drink loads, just breathing in that temp dehydrates you...
take 2 spare of every thing you will really need, and take a whole bunch of torch bulbs, they just kept breaking for me, i used 5 torches up and the 5 spare bulbs, the cold just ruins them, and batteries need to be kept warm or the charge just falls out of them.
also as above, plastic kit just shatters with the slightest bit of abuse, metal just sticks to any skin, try your kit in use with a pair of gloves on, with mittens over the top because thats what will be happening.
if your talking about the uk then some good kit is required but not loads, depends what temps you want to go down to, i perfer to winter camp as you get less people in tents hanging around areas and sites, its also great to weak up to snow in the morning, even better to wake up and its still snowing, its like a fire, get a brew done in bed and watch the bush TV, then have a snooze, cant beat it.....
regards.
chris.
i was forced to sleep in a snow hole to small, there was not enough snow and we hit the rock, we could not move as the instructor needed us in that area, this meant there was an upper and lower shelf inside, i was on the lower level, NEVER AGAIN!!!! cold air sinks, my buddy was toasty though as my body heat was keeping him warm.
drink loads, just breathing in that temp dehydrates you...
take 2 spare of every thing you will really need, and take a whole bunch of torch bulbs, they just kept breaking for me, i used 5 torches up and the 5 spare bulbs, the cold just ruins them, and batteries need to be kept warm or the charge just falls out of them.
also as above, plastic kit just shatters with the slightest bit of abuse, metal just sticks to any skin, try your kit in use with a pair of gloves on, with mittens over the top because thats what will be happening.
if your talking about the uk then some good kit is required but not loads, depends what temps you want to go down to, i perfer to winter camp as you get less people in tents hanging around areas and sites, its also great to weak up to snow in the morning, even better to wake up and its still snowing, its like a fire, get a brew done in bed and watch the bush TV, then have a snooze, cant beat it.....
regards.
chris.
forestwalker
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Also find a head torch that has a separate battery pack, one that you can keep inside your clothes. My old Petzl Arctic is antique by modern standards (classic light-bulb vs diodes), but was in every other way ideal; a neck-pouch for the batteries, possible to turn on and off with mittens on (no fiddly buttons), and very safe against accidentally being turned on. Still looking for the ideal replacement.
Sheer bloody luxury, we used to dream of having mild frost nip
- 40 in a snow trench up above the arctic circle was the coldest, but I wasn't cold, I found the experience quite pleasant. Getting up in the morning and trying to lace my boots and put my skis on, that wasn't so pleasant.
I found that the wind was the really scary thing, if you were in an exposed area then it seemed to rip the heat from you.
Less cold but altogether more of a challenge were hiking trips in Scotland in the winter, the weather could change so quickly and you could end up with more damp which was a problem.
The last winter here in Hungary and over in Transylvania has been really really cold.
You can read some useful articles about sleeping out and dressing for really cold conditions over on Paul Kirtley's blog.
A Winter Camping Trip in the Northern Forest.
Winter Clothing for the Northern Wilderness part 2
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Camped and bivied while snow on the ground, but nothing to match these hardy characters.
Quite lovely waking up to a pure white snow driven landscape, one of those special things in life.
Alex
Quite lovely waking up to a pure white snow driven landscape, one of those special things in life.
Alex
Sandbender, i agree the wind is the killer, thats what gave me the frost nip on the way back in to the village, and again colder wet air is much more to contend with and makes life much harder...
Norway was bad for weather conditions, quite a wet climate even when -18 to -20 ish, it was not the cold but the wet air which caused all the problems.
never had the chance of a winter trip in scotland yet, but its on the cards at some point..
Norway was bad for weather conditions, quite a wet climate even when -18 to -20 ish, it was not the cold but the wet air which caused all the problems.
never had the chance of a winter trip in scotland yet, but its on the cards at some point..
My first experience of sleeping out when cold went fine - until I put my boots on in the morning.
they'd got saturated during the day's walk and the leather froze overnight, effectively converting them to absolutely rigid boots. Gave me bleeding raw sores within 5 minutes of setting off.
they'd got saturated during the day's walk and the leather froze overnight, effectively converting them to absolutely rigid boots. Gave me bleeding raw sores within 5 minutes of setting off.
I like sleeping out in the woods in winter but the coldest I slept out in was errrm on my balcony about 5 or 6 weeks ago when it was -25 (I just wanted to know how my sleeping bag would cope so I slept out there
Balcony sleeping is not that hard core but it was the coldest I slept out in
so I slept out thereBalcony sleeping is not that hard core but it was the coldest I slept out in
I was half in a -35 chest freezer on friday looking for some stuff in work... -10's fun, -30+ must be a challenge, to say the least...
Coldest I have slept in debris shelter without a sleeping bag is - 25C. Not the best sleep in the world but manageable. Coldest with a sleeping bag -40. Now that was chilly.
forestwalker
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
My opinon on (cold) temperatures is:
0 to -10 C Wet. You will be able to have bare hands a lot of the time, but any snow will be wet, skiing will at times be a
bother due to buildup, etc. But being able to work in comfort with bare hands is nice. But wet clothes is a fact of life:
having an outer snow-resistant layer (e.g. cotton anorak and pants) makes life easier, but they will, perversely,
be both wet and froozen stiff. Actually moderna materials actually may make sense at these themperatures.
-10 to -20C Ideal. Less risk of betting wet, a bit colder, but easy to deal with if you have the proper kit. Still possible to work
with bare hands, just not for long, and metal will stick. Plastic may still be durable, but it is time pack away the
membrane based garments.
-20 to -30C If you have the kit and experince this is quite ok, no real hardship, but you have to think about what you are doing.
You can get into trouble, of course, but you have a margin.
-30 to -45C Rougher. Stilll perfectly doable, but you have less margin for making mistakes. Almost all plastics are fragile, and
bare skin can get frostbitten easilly. With crappy kit you can be in trouble fast, same with poor skills. Feet and
hands are the common problem areas.
-45 and colder Know Thy Stuff. Becuse you have very little margin.
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The actual camping, being in a camp or sleeping out part isn't so much of a challenge. It is what comes on either side of the camping and sleeping part which people need to get right. Watching the folks who regularly spent a lot of time in those conditions it was clear that everything was thought out in advance, how their gear was packed, what was in their pockets, the routine needed for the simplest tasks. These people can live and work out in the open up there quite happily. For someone from milder climes who isn't used to the environment things can go wrong very quickly.
I have some Russian friends whose home town is a little north of Kazakhstan, they would often leave their toddler to sleep in the baby carriage out on the terrace at -30 without a second thought.
forestwalker
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
All the small oopses. Leaving boots to get filled with snow overnight. Putting things down in deep loose snow. Trying to pack a sleeping bag into a compression stuff sack at -35 C. Deep froozen batteries.
There was a very good thread a year or so ago on clothing.
Very helpful.
Something I use in the cold are my 'arm warmers'. I made them by cutting the toes off a pair of thick warm socks and pulling them up my arms. The heel part of the sock should be on the elbow to allow more movement and range of motion. They're particularly useful when doing hard work where you may be sweating around the torso but cold in the extremities - they help maintain the equilibrium.
Randall
That's a neat idea, I wear meraklon wristies a lot in winter and it's amazing what difference they make, I like the idea of taking it further up and I have a pair of merino socks which are begging for the treatment
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