...particularly re cold weather.
This is a somewhat light-hearted rant about all the advice one gets from "experts" - particularly the most famous (obviousy this excludes any gems from me...) Is "accepted wisdom" really that?
PART !.
First of all - don't go into the snow in bare feet. I'm sorry, but even putting a pair of woolen socks over your tootsies isn't going to stave off frost-bite for more than a few minutes. The counter-argument is that bare feet will let you have a better understanding of the terrain. Well, in snow/ice let me save you the trouble - it'll be cold, and quite possibly slippery. And in bare feet, you're more likely to sink into the snow as your toes will have dropped off, and your weight will be spread across a smaller surface area.
Second. Fitness.
Now everyone will tell you that you need to be fit - a lean, mean fighting machine - to go into the Arctic. What rubbish! Anyone seen Arctic/Antarctic mammals? The healthy ones all have a thick layer of blubber, both to insulate their vitals from the cold and as a built-in energy reserve. The skinny ones are those about to shuffle off this mortal coil. Fact. Because your cold sensors are outside the fat layer, you will still feel the cold, but much more importantly, your core will be much better protected if you're carrying a healthy layer of blubber. IN fact, in the cold, this should be Rule 1.
Same with exercise. Have you seen the stats of the number of people dropping dead during exercise through heart failure or strokes? It's horrific! Don't do it, unless you want to add to the morgue count.
One thing most agree on is that the most important thing you should do in any survival situation is to think. But if the body is shutting down because Mr Skinny is going into hypothermia, thats just not possible. And the more you exercise, the less blubber will be available in a survival situation. What people tend to forget is that one's body adapts to carrying more weight - leg muscles, back muscles etc grow to accommodate the extra load just through simple everyday activity. And most of the additional weight is life-saving blubber. So survival rule number 2 - Be fat - be safe.
Third. Fires and Fire-lighting.
Be honest, now - when was the last time you saw someone lighting his cigarette by rubbing two sticks together, using a flint and steel striker - or even a firesteel? So why insist on carrying such stuff into sub-zero weather, when a few Bics and a petrol lighter or two will actually work much better? When you're dehydrated, do you start by cutting down trees, sectioning them, splitting to get at some dry wood, create some feather-sticks from the dry wood, some larger pieces as tinder, create a birch-bark bowl then set about melting some snow in it? Or do you just fire up a stove and put some snowballs into the pan?
Part 2 to follow - deals with - inter alia - the idiocy of thinking a quinzy/snowhole is a good idea........
This is a somewhat light-hearted rant about all the advice one gets from "experts" - particularly the most famous (obviousy this excludes any gems from me...) Is "accepted wisdom" really that?
PART !.
First of all - don't go into the snow in bare feet. I'm sorry, but even putting a pair of woolen socks over your tootsies isn't going to stave off frost-bite for more than a few minutes. The counter-argument is that bare feet will let you have a better understanding of the terrain. Well, in snow/ice let me save you the trouble - it'll be cold, and quite possibly slippery. And in bare feet, you're more likely to sink into the snow as your toes will have dropped off, and your weight will be spread across a smaller surface area.
Second. Fitness.
Now everyone will tell you that you need to be fit - a lean, mean fighting machine - to go into the Arctic. What rubbish! Anyone seen Arctic/Antarctic mammals? The healthy ones all have a thick layer of blubber, both to insulate their vitals from the cold and as a built-in energy reserve. The skinny ones are those about to shuffle off this mortal coil. Fact. Because your cold sensors are outside the fat layer, you will still feel the cold, but much more importantly, your core will be much better protected if you're carrying a healthy layer of blubber. IN fact, in the cold, this should be Rule 1.
Same with exercise. Have you seen the stats of the number of people dropping dead during exercise through heart failure or strokes? It's horrific! Don't do it, unless you want to add to the morgue count.
One thing most agree on is that the most important thing you should do in any survival situation is to think. But if the body is shutting down because Mr Skinny is going into hypothermia, thats just not possible. And the more you exercise, the less blubber will be available in a survival situation. What people tend to forget is that one's body adapts to carrying more weight - leg muscles, back muscles etc grow to accommodate the extra load just through simple everyday activity. And most of the additional weight is life-saving blubber. So survival rule number 2 - Be fat - be safe.
Third. Fires and Fire-lighting.
Be honest, now - when was the last time you saw someone lighting his cigarette by rubbing two sticks together, using a flint and steel striker - or even a firesteel? So why insist on carrying such stuff into sub-zero weather, when a few Bics and a petrol lighter or two will actually work much better? When you're dehydrated, do you start by cutting down trees, sectioning them, splitting to get at some dry wood, create some feather-sticks from the dry wood, some larger pieces as tinder, create a birch-bark bowl then set about melting some snow in it? Or do you just fire up a stove and put some snowballs into the pan?
Part 2 to follow - deals with - inter alia - the idiocy of thinking a quinzy/snowhole is a good idea........
