Kipping out in the wilderness

[Tony]

What’s the longest you’ve been out away from the world? I’d count backpacking, walking etc but especially bushcrafting, just relaxing with nature and enjoying time away from it all, or, hard travelling across hard terrain, whatever has taken you away from the normal life in the suburbs :chill: . I appreciate that for may of the busy people on here it might just be a week, often found by going on a course, but for some it’s probably much longer.

Tell us about it and your experiences from your sojourns…

 

[Adi]

Whilst on exercise in the Army we quite regularly spent 28 days in the field. In Kenya we spent 6 weeks in a self constructed camp at Archers Post.

I spent 6 weeks up in the Kimberly’s in Australia back in 1986 and spent 4 months in the birch forests of Siberia in the Evenkia region back in 1996

 

[leon-1]

Whilst on exercise in the Army we quite regularly spent 28 days in the field. In Kenya we spent 6 weeks in a self constructed camp at Archers Post.

I spent 6 weeks up in the Kimberly’s in Australia back in 1986 and spent 4 months in the birch forests of Siberia in the Evenkia region back in 1996

That brings back memories, as does Kathendini,Gathiuru and the Dol Dol. I have also spent 5 weeks in the Ulu Tutong in Brunie.

Most of the time now though it is normally a max of 2 weeks

 

[Ranger Bob]

Month's expedition in northern Mongolia............Fantastic

 

[jakunen]

What’s the longest you’ve been out away from the world?

Personally I'd say that's the wrong way around mate!

My longest trip was a fantastic 17 days wandering around in the Highlands on a "Let's find a few distilleries" walk quite a few years ago.

We had a rough itinerary, with a few planned stops and just rambled along from spot to spot, enjoying the breathtaking views, breathing air so clean it did actually seem to taste sweet, listening to the breeze gently brushing the heather, the brooks burbling through the rills, the larks singing from the clear blue skies, foraging most of our food along the way.

We didn't find too many distilleries as we couldn't find too much enthusiasm for leaving the places we pitched out tents...

Maybe one day I'll do it again and few a few of them...

Sadly the are no photos, so I just have to rely upon my memories when I want to remember the trip. But sitting on the patio during the summer with a 'wee dram' in hand, it brings a smile to my face just walking through the trip in my mind.

 

[greg2935]

Memories are better than photos, they mature with age!

 

[jakunen]

Memories are better than photos, they mature with age!

Very true mate. I hardly take any pictures at when i go 'home' to Croatia now, not just because I've been there so often, but because your eye often captures a picture far better than a camera ever will...

 

[Paganwolf]

the longest I did was a month in the jungles of sarawak it was fantastic also did a month in srilanka shouldnt think about it i want to go back now

 

[Hoodoo]

I've done a couple 3 week trips alone, backpacking in Montana. Numerous 2 week backpacking trips alone. I have spent months at a time living out of a pack, combining hitchhiking, hopping freight trains, and backpacking in wilderness. I was a young fella then.

 

[Celtic Dragon]

Longest for me was a week, then a days break then another 6 days when I was a army cadet playing enemy. This was probably my first taste of a simplified kind of bushcraft. Carried a weeks rations, ammo, and got a water drop every 36 hours, and slept under a basha. I thorurily enjoyed it, although I was told I needed a shower at the end of a week.

There is a photo of me infront of a chopper just before I got airlifted onto the training area. I look like something out of Bravo 2 Zero

 

[george]

8 months in the forests of Sulawesi (though with one or two 3 day trips in to town to resupply) then 2 weeks off then 6 months in the mountains of Irian Jaya.

George

 

[maddave]

28 days for me when backpacking across europe.

 

[bambodoggy]

I did Outdoor Ed at college in Norfolk....the last month of the trip the whole year group moved enmasse to the Gower in South Wales and lived there....in tents....or in my case in my hooped bivvi bag..... I remember when I went home afterwards feeling very odd having four walls around me....not quite claustrophobic but a similar feeling for a few days until I got used to it again.

Done various 2 and 3 week trips with the TA as well.....

 

[Pict]

Ten days in Canada with almost no food. Fantastic trip, took the wife. It's a long story.

Eight days in Pennsylvania, Saint Anthony's Wilderness near the Appalachian trail, again almost no food but that time we did it on purpose!

Seven days in Alaska, Wrangell/St Elias National Park awesome. Lots of food!

Most of my trips in Brazil are one to three nights due to a hectic work schedule. Mac

 

[jackcbr]

A poor 2 nights on a course last year. But one day... Oh yes, one day!

 

[ikesdad]

Too many weeks to count in the military.

 

[JonathanD]

I spent six months in Africa on a herpetology field trip catching and recording snakes. Absolutely the best time of my life and great stories to tell too, from hearing the guttural growl of a lion right by us when we were a good mile from the nearest town, being 20ft up a tree and having two mambas race out of a beehive straight along the branch I was at the end of after my colleague banged on the bottom with his grabstick, to finding a 1970s star wars action figure in the middle of the desert with no trace of people for hundreds of miles. Weird. I'm lucky that my job takes me off on these expeditions to record animals, and bushcraft is a major part of it, but that Kenyan trip was the longest and the hardest to come home from.

 

[Miyagi]

I voted for 22 nights or more.

This doesn't count time in the cuds, on exercise etc., just the amount of times I've lost my keys...

 

[gregorach]

Depends what you mean by "away from the world"... I spent 8 months living in a shack on a fairly remote farm in Australia once. If you mean without a roof, then a couple of weeks.

 

[malente]

nine nights, 10 days on the West Coast Trail (Vancouver Island, BC Canada). aahh the memories...