My brother and I spent two days wild camping in the New Forest (you can see a couple of vids here):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gsg07MEyWw0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3RmrQo_-0o
I've never been wild camping in such miserable conditions but I've learnt some valuable lessons. We arrived on Friday around 4.30pm and all was dry but with the forecast for wet and windy weather to come over the weekend. After a swift pint at the Royal Oak (great beer) we hiked into the forest to our little camp ground. There was plenty of dry wood around and after my bro set his DD hammock up and I set my DD tarp up we collected enough for the evening meal and more for breakfast.
Lesson one: keep firewood dry, and make sure you have plenty of kindling and tinder for the next day. We forgot to cover our collected wood which made getting it lit the next day in the rain a lot harder. The flame has to work harder because it first has to dry the wood out before it catches the flame. When you have a critical mass of heat and fuel this isn't problematic but getting a fire going with damp fuel is almost impossible. While I persevered my bro found some hanging dead wood which I set about batoning into thinner pieces to expose the dry inside. We also scraped off the wet bark with our knives. Once we had a fist-full it caught easily (with the use of a couple of firelighters. I know this is cheating but I was grateful I'd brought them as back up to my pine cones that didn't burn with enough intensity to cause the kindling to catch).
Lesson two: be gentle with tent pegs. In my rush to put up my tarp I smacked the pegs that came with the DD tarp too hard and bent them. New Forest soil is notoriously flinty and has loads of tough roots just under the top soil. The next day I moved my tarp (more on that in a minute) and, using a wrist thick log as a hammer I more gently tapped them into the ground and they stayed just about straight. Next time I'll invest in half a dozen hardcore pegs. I also whittled two pegs from sticks. These were the heavy duty pegs that secured the paracord that the tarp poles in place. It was fun to do and they went in the ground with no problem.
Lesson three: choose your location wisely. I chose a spot under a tree in a body length sized indentation (perhaps caused by a fallen tree that had since rotted out). In the horrendous rain that followed my going to bed I was kept awake by the big splats of rain that collected on the leaves and branches and fell onto my tarp. I should have brought ear plugs and moved my tarp into the open where there rain drops are smaller having fallen straight from the sky rather than collecting and gaining volume on the tree leaves. I was kept awake all night by the noise. The next night when I moved I slept straight through.
I also awoke to see the formation of a little stream just in front of me. The ground was become sodden and wanted to flow downhill, right into the dell I was occupying. I moved to higher, firmer ground.
It never really gets that windy in the forest because there are too many trees to stop the wind picking up speed. So a tarp works quite well, even if you are facing the wind. I set my sleeping bag about a foot back from the entrance and stayed dry all night. In open country this could be problematic though. Pitching the tarp lower to the ground would help but would make getting in and out a bit harder. My was pitched high enough that I could sit up.
We did hear the sound of a tree or big branch snap off further into the forest during the night. It was a powerful sound. A dull crack.
I used my Snugpak Elite 3 sleeping bag, a poncho for a ground sheet, a Neo Air mattress (extra large) and I kept a spare poncho to wear in the downpours.
I started off wearing my Roamers desert boots but as soon as the ground got wet I switched to a pair of clumpy waterproof hiking boots. Less comfy but less likely to result in wet feet.
One thing I thought of was just how hard it is to do things in wet weather without adequate shelter. It's no fun being out in the rain doing menial tasks. I think prehistoric peoples built huts with internal hearths for this reason. The cooking and warmth generation needed to be out of the elements, which necessitated decent sized huts as we see in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon history.
I think that is all. It was a brilliant camp and the inclement weather actually made it more fun. It was a good test of our own personal resolves (I wanted to go home when I woke up on Saturday morning fatigued, with headache and facing a little stream and wet firewood) and made me appreciate the power of nature all the more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gsg07MEyWw0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3RmrQo_-0o
I've never been wild camping in such miserable conditions but I've learnt some valuable lessons. We arrived on Friday around 4.30pm and all was dry but with the forecast for wet and windy weather to come over the weekend. After a swift pint at the Royal Oak (great beer) we hiked into the forest to our little camp ground. There was plenty of dry wood around and after my bro set his DD hammock up and I set my DD tarp up we collected enough for the evening meal and more for breakfast.
Lesson one: keep firewood dry, and make sure you have plenty of kindling and tinder for the next day. We forgot to cover our collected wood which made getting it lit the next day in the rain a lot harder. The flame has to work harder because it first has to dry the wood out before it catches the flame. When you have a critical mass of heat and fuel this isn't problematic but getting a fire going with damp fuel is almost impossible. While I persevered my bro found some hanging dead wood which I set about batoning into thinner pieces to expose the dry inside. We also scraped off the wet bark with our knives. Once we had a fist-full it caught easily (with the use of a couple of firelighters. I know this is cheating but I was grateful I'd brought them as back up to my pine cones that didn't burn with enough intensity to cause the kindling to catch).
Lesson two: be gentle with tent pegs. In my rush to put up my tarp I smacked the pegs that came with the DD tarp too hard and bent them. New Forest soil is notoriously flinty and has loads of tough roots just under the top soil. The next day I moved my tarp (more on that in a minute) and, using a wrist thick log as a hammer I more gently tapped them into the ground and they stayed just about straight. Next time I'll invest in half a dozen hardcore pegs. I also whittled two pegs from sticks. These were the heavy duty pegs that secured the paracord that the tarp poles in place. It was fun to do and they went in the ground with no problem.
Lesson three: choose your location wisely. I chose a spot under a tree in a body length sized indentation (perhaps caused by a fallen tree that had since rotted out). In the horrendous rain that followed my going to bed I was kept awake by the big splats of rain that collected on the leaves and branches and fell onto my tarp. I should have brought ear plugs and moved my tarp into the open where there rain drops are smaller having fallen straight from the sky rather than collecting and gaining volume on the tree leaves. I was kept awake all night by the noise. The next night when I moved I slept straight through.
I also awoke to see the formation of a little stream just in front of me. The ground was become sodden and wanted to flow downhill, right into the dell I was occupying. I moved to higher, firmer ground.
It never really gets that windy in the forest because there are too many trees to stop the wind picking up speed. So a tarp works quite well, even if you are facing the wind. I set my sleeping bag about a foot back from the entrance and stayed dry all night. In open country this could be problematic though. Pitching the tarp lower to the ground would help but would make getting in and out a bit harder. My was pitched high enough that I could sit up.
We did hear the sound of a tree or big branch snap off further into the forest during the night. It was a powerful sound. A dull crack.
I used my Snugpak Elite 3 sleeping bag, a poncho for a ground sheet, a Neo Air mattress (extra large) and I kept a spare poncho to wear in the downpours.
I started off wearing my Roamers desert boots but as soon as the ground got wet I switched to a pair of clumpy waterproof hiking boots. Less comfy but less likely to result in wet feet.
One thing I thought of was just how hard it is to do things in wet weather without adequate shelter. It's no fun being out in the rain doing menial tasks. I think prehistoric peoples built huts with internal hearths for this reason. The cooking and warmth generation needed to be out of the elements, which necessitated decent sized huts as we see in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon history.
I think that is all. It was a brilliant camp and the inclement weather actually made it more fun. It was a good test of our own personal resolves (I wanted to go home when I woke up on Saturday morning fatigued, with headache and facing a little stream and wet firewood) and made me appreciate the power of nature all the more.
