A trip back to the woods for my nephew and I.
Very windy, which made several things a challenge - namely my nephew trying to build several shelters detailed in a ray mears book!
I challenged myself to _not_ use my knife at all for the whole 2 days, and only to use my hatchet (hultafor hultan) for everything, which went quite well. I did use a small flat grind knife to cut up the potatoes though, as it felt faintly ridiculous using an axe for that!
My other main task was completing the raised fire platform.
I dug down to below the hummus layer until I hit the clay later (about 30cm) - then I lined the hole with green logs about 4inch in diameter as a ‘foundation’. I then made a surround out of green logs about 6 inch in diameter, with stepped and pegged corners before filling it with clay (from where a tree had uprooted) to a depth of 2 inches.
The clay area is smaller than the underneath excavated hole, and I spent some time with a stick pushing the clay into the voids to make a barrier. When I am next there I will add enough clay to bring the level up to the top of the logs. I made a simple 3 stick pot hanger arrangement aswell.
This has given me a comfortable height fire platform to use when sitting, but more importantly had got the fire up off the flammable forest floor and made a fire barrier to prevent the hummus and roots catching fire. With care this means I _should_ be able to have a cooking fire all year round, if circumstances necessitate.
I was pretty done by this point, this took me almost the entire day working in fits and starts (I have arthritis and another musculoskeletal-skeletal health problem so sustained work is painful/difficult) so I relaxed with a book for a bit just soaking up the warmth of the fire and listening to the birds.
I did however, bake some bread and cooks sausage, mash, onion gravy and sweetcorn for dinner.
My nephew built a couple more wind breaks and did some whittling, he taught me something aswell he had read about - a basket made from sticks and cord - I neglected to take a photo but it’s essentially an upside down hollow pyramid shape. Very clever, we used it to gather some pine cones which are nice to put on the fire of an evening as they bring brightly.
So I taught him about safe fire handling and he taught me how to make a basket.
The entire axe thing was fine, I was surprised at actually what delicate tasks can be achieved with just an axe, I had always thought of it as a secondary tool for fire wood processing only but have now locked at it in a different light.
Again, a great bit of escapism and digital detox. I spent much more time sitting around doing not much this time though, just gently unwinding with the breeze on my face (and smoke in my eyes!)
Ed
Very windy, which made several things a challenge - namely my nephew trying to build several shelters detailed in a ray mears book!
I challenged myself to _not_ use my knife at all for the whole 2 days, and only to use my hatchet (hultafor hultan) for everything, which went quite well. I did use a small flat grind knife to cut up the potatoes though, as it felt faintly ridiculous using an axe for that!
My other main task was completing the raised fire platform.
I dug down to below the hummus layer until I hit the clay later (about 30cm) - then I lined the hole with green logs about 4inch in diameter as a ‘foundation’. I then made a surround out of green logs about 6 inch in diameter, with stepped and pegged corners before filling it with clay (from where a tree had uprooted) to a depth of 2 inches.
The clay area is smaller than the underneath excavated hole, and I spent some time with a stick pushing the clay into the voids to make a barrier. When I am next there I will add enough clay to bring the level up to the top of the logs. I made a simple 3 stick pot hanger arrangement aswell.
This has given me a comfortable height fire platform to use when sitting, but more importantly had got the fire up off the flammable forest floor and made a fire barrier to prevent the hummus and roots catching fire. With care this means I _should_ be able to have a cooking fire all year round, if circumstances necessitate.
I was pretty done by this point, this took me almost the entire day working in fits and starts (I have arthritis and another musculoskeletal-skeletal health problem so sustained work is painful/difficult) so I relaxed with a book for a bit just soaking up the warmth of the fire and listening to the birds.
I did however, bake some bread and cooks sausage, mash, onion gravy and sweetcorn for dinner.
My nephew built a couple more wind breaks and did some whittling, he taught me something aswell he had read about - a basket made from sticks and cord - I neglected to take a photo but it’s essentially an upside down hollow pyramid shape. Very clever, we used it to gather some pine cones which are nice to put on the fire of an evening as they bring brightly.
So I taught him about safe fire handling and he taught me how to make a basket.
The entire axe thing was fine, I was surprised at actually what delicate tasks can be achieved with just an axe, I had always thought of it as a secondary tool for fire wood processing only but have now locked at it in a different light.
Again, a great bit of escapism and digital detox. I spent much more time sitting around doing not much this time though, just gently unwinding with the breeze on my face (and smoke in my eyes!)
Ed
