Canadian wilderness with Mors kochanski

[Stuart]

I lot of people have been asking me to post some information on the trip Jed, Dave and myself took to canada to learn winter bushcraft with Mors Kochanski last Febuary.

now that my computer is working properly again I can finally get some pictures up.

firstly the Man himself Mors:

one of the many skills we learnt was making snowshoes:

I got the chance to do somthing I had wanted to do for ages, sleep out a night at -20 without a sleeping bag.

Mors explaining how much firewood i would need (in total i used 10 logs the size of the ones on the ground in the picture for one night) to keep me warm

and I slept warm and comfortable getting up only a few times during the night to adjust the fire

my memory card was damaged on my return journey and I lost many of my photos so these pictures were taken and displayed here with the kind permission of Steve, Jed, and Dave

I will get some more pictures up in the coming days

 

[Fenlander]

Nice pictures Stuart! He looks very different without a beard I can see now why you insisted on us having such a large fire on Sunday night

 

[OldJimbo]

Excellent!
Snowshoe making is a vital skill. Around here it can snow feet in hours. I notice that those don't have toe holes, but fast building is as important as elaborate.

Isn't it amazing just how much wood it takes to build a fire that is sufficient at those temps!

You sure had a memorable experience!

 

[TheViking]

Absolutely stunning pics Stuart. I like the place.

 

[BorderReiver]

Great pictures Stuart.

How often did you have to attend the fire?Did you stay warm all over,or did you have to keep turning the cold side to the flames?

 

[sandbender]

Memory cards are practically indestructible, just because camera and PC are seeing nothing on them, doesn't mean your files are not there and recoverable, seek help before taking any more shots or formating the card.

 

[tomtom]

Wonderful images Stuart, thanks for showing us!

 

[george]

good pics Stuart. looks like you had a great time.


Interesting choice of hat the man wears though!

george

 

[Mutley]

Very good pictures! Looked great.

Nice log fire from toe-to-head, looks real cosy.

 

[Viking]

10 logs sounds like you had to take down a small forest to sleep one night...

 

[OldJimbo]

I was wondering about the hat too..As with everything about the guy, I'm suspecting there's more to it than first meets the eye.

 

[Stuart]

How often did you have to attend the fire?Did you stay warm all over,or did you have to keep turning the cold side to the flames?

I got up about 3-4 times during the night to adjust/add to the fire, when it really got going I had to lay with my back to the fire as it was uncomfortably hot to face it, but as it died down I found that I naturally turned over in my sleep to face the fire and later would wake when my back started to chill and rise to add more wood.

Memory cards are practically indestructible, just because camera and PC are seeing nothing on them, doesn't mean your files are not there and recoverable, seek help before taking any more shots or formating the card.

unfortuanatly the cold made the card very brittle and it snapped, I sent it to a data recovery company but they told me that they had been unable to recover any of the data

10 logs sounds like you had to take down a small forest to sleep one night...

one tree was sufficant to provide 10 logs

Interesting choice of hat the man wears though!

he seems to like that style of hat has he can pull it forward to form a peak to shade his eyes and pull the back down to cover his ears

 

[Hoodoo]

Stuart, that must have been a fascinating class! Wonderful pics. -20 without a bag is quite an accomplishment! That is a boatload of wood.

I really love those snowshoes. I've always wanted to take a stab at making some and those look really cool. An online tutorial would be nice.

Mors looks like a real character. I was in a sporting goods store this summer and and got in a conversation with one of the clerks, on old guy with a lot of years in the outdoors behind him. We were discussing an article in Field and Stream on a survival kit. The little red handled mora like the one around Mors' neck was featured and this gentleman was telling me that it was not a true survival knife. I explained to him that it was actually an excellent woodcraft knife and he seemed interested.

Mors is a classic example of a survival expert who shows that it's not the knife you carry but the knowledge you carry that counts. Personally though, that little red handled model is not my favorite...

 

[Mike Harlos]

Thanks for posting those pics!!

I head off in 4 weeks for the summer outdoors survival skill course with Mr. Kochanski. Judging by the ages of the participants in the pics, I think I'll be the token old guy (46). I'm really looking forward to it, with nervous anticipation!

Mike

 

[OldJimbo]

You're going to have a great time!

One question I've wondered about that someone could ask. What brand of axe does Mors use and why does he like it?

 

[Stuart]

whilst we were there he was using an old swedish army issue axe, as with most of the stuff Mors chooses he uses it because its cheap and functional though he does wish it wasnt painted green!!!

I head off in 4 weeks for the summer outdoors survival skill course with Mr. Kochanski. Judging by the ages of the participants in the pics, I think I'll be the token old guy (46). I'm really looking forward to it, with nervous anticipation!

you will really enjoy yourself

one or two of our group we around your age, but we were the first all british group Mors had ever had (well there was a 1 canadian)

 

[Moonraker]

Thanks for posting these really interesting photos Stuart.

I would really recommend having a go at retreiving your data using a great programme called PhotoRescue. It works on both Macs and Windows and often retrieves things other methods (even expensive date retrieval services) can not get. It is not too expensive and you can try it out first if I remember to see what it can recover before buying.