Traditional kit - Ground Insulation.

[Quixoticgeek]

There are lots of people on this forum who use "traditional" equipment, i.e. wool blankets for bedding and the like.

What do you do by way of insulation from the ground? I'm a cold sleeper these days and have find that the insulation of my exped synmat 7 ul invaluable when sleeping out. Are wool blankets on a canvas ground sheet enough to keep you warm and dry? What are the other options?

Thanks

Julia

 

[tiger stacker]

Treated (oiled) leather was used too. Think cape wrapped round. I use my bivvy bag with the half rest, it does keep the chill away.

 

[Corso]

depends on how far back you want to go I suppose

I'd go the kephart route and use a cotton Browse bag and stuffed with leafs and other materials

otherwise there's the mors survival scarf...

 

[British Red]

A palliasse (sack filled with straw) was traditional. Filled with whatever was soft, thick and available. Bracken, heather, pine needles etc,

 

[Quixoticgeek]

I'm wasn't thinking what was used hundreds of years ago, was more interested in what those who favour "traditional materials" use today.

Julia

 

[British Red]

I use thick bracken over a bed of branches

shelter by British Red, on Flickr

 

[Toddy]

A bit of oilcloth (or modern groundsheet stuff) on top of whatever brash is available. Heather's good; it's springy. Leylandii's pretty good too (watch the direction you lay the branches so that the resin bits are pointed down into the ground) Leaf litter needs packed into something really, but you can tuck the groundsheet around a pile and that works. Bracken, rushes, meadowsweet, golden rod, ivy.....it all works, it just really depends on what's available, where you are.

Me ? these days I use a Downmat, full length and 9cm thick Best thing since sliced bread

M

 

[santaman2000]

I follow my dog's example; I dig down a few inches to get to cooler ground.

 

[Toddy]

Try that here and you'd better hope you can breath water

M

 

[santaman2000]

Try that here and you'd better hope you can breath water

M

Some spots here as well. LOL.

 

[GGTBod]

For some traditional luxury how about a reindeer pelt

http://www.militarymart.co.uk/index.php?_a=product&product_id=1398

or a sheepskin

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Super-Sof..._Garden_Rugs_Runners_Mats&hash=item233e215325

no affiliation at all

 

[sandbender]

+1 for a reindeer pelt, works directly on the snow if one is in a snowhole or quinze.

 

[nephilim]

Before selling most of my stuff due to financial issues last year, I had a canvas bag which was 2 metres long by 1 metre wide, sewn up on 3 sides, with an open side which was closed via toggles and eyelets. I stuffed it with ferns and lavender flowers and stalks (where possible) for a couple of reasons.

It was a good insulator and kept me nice and dry off the ground.
It has a scent which was relaxing and helped me get to sleep
It kept the bugs away

I used to sleep under a tarp with a wind break built from sticks and leaves. It did the job. When my family came along, that kind of stopped as the mrs didn't like camping in tents etc so yeah.

 

[Goatboy]

Oh lots of things can be used. (I tend to avoid bracken though due to my tick aversion). You could bury hot rocks just below the ground, though a nice wool blanket is pretty darn good. I got Belzeebob23 a lambskin coat from the British Red Cross shop (never been used) the took the arms and buttons off and it makes a slendifferous and very cosy sleep mat. being Calvanistic Scots though we use rocks for pillows - cant be too comfy, that would be wrong!

Also using your waterbottle drink bladder as a hot water bottle works really well and in winter stops it freezing over night. That way no melting snow in the morning for breakfast.
Also maybe not to everyones tastes (and some may need good aim and a "shewee" but sleeping with your wee bottle keeps you cosy.

 

[Big Stu 12]

I use a Sheep Skin all year round ..

 

[cranmere]

Back in the 1960s when I started camping the choice was either a convenitonal airbed or the foam mats that were just starting to come in and which were expensive. What I used to do was to put a thick layer of dry grass, dry leaves, bracken, or anything else similar that I could find, underneath my groundsheet.

 

[rg598]

Traditionally furs were used as ground insulation. When people became interested in travel by foot rather than by horse, we see the other options listed by Kephart. None of them are great. If you pile up enough of any insulation it will keep you warm. Carrying is going to be a problem though. There is nothing that can directly replace the Synmat in terms of insulation per weight ratio.

 

[big_swede]

Traditionally furs were used as ground insulation. When people became interested in travel by foot rather than by horse, we see the other options listed by Kephart. None of them are great. If you pile up enough of any insulation it will keep you warm. Carrying is going to be a problem though. There is nothing that can directly replace the Synmat in terms of insulation per weight ratio.

I think this statement is wrong. And the whole notion of traditional. Traditionally people didn't travel out of anything else but pure necessity. This travelling in nature as a pasttime is a rather new thing which came with the novelty of leisure time (and money to consume stuff they actually didn't need to survive or improve the farm).

Travelling by horse has never been a viable option for most people, unless you were a hun. People have always been walking, while shelter and supplies has been carried by horse or other pack animals. In more meta-civilised times people walked to a large body of water and took a boat. And most often travelling using the large networks of hostels, taverns and whatnot that provided roof above the head and warm food for the weary traveller. It's not by chance that travelling literature spellbound large audiences since mr Gutenberg started his machine, people were just not travelling in any greater extent. Not in the way we think about travelling at least. The journey man system made people moving around but usually not with any need for camping equipment. If somebody were far from hostel or similar they would just sleep in a barn or whatnot.

But yes, furs have been used for insulation and domestic bedding for as long as man has been on this earth. And, natural insulation is not as weight efficient as modern materials. But you may have noted that most people here does not give flying eff about weight effectivness. Nor about any other effectivness. So it's time to face that no matter how much you preach about modern materials, people here will not care about the technical specs. You would be better stating the obvious on a ultralight backpacker forum.

 

[Oblio13]

... Traditionally people didn't travel out of anything else but pure necessity. This travelling in nature as a pasttime is a rather new thing which came with the novelty of leisure time (and money to consume stuff they actually didn't need to survive or improve the farm)...

Here in North America, Indians and frontiersmen routinely made journeys of almost incomprehensible distances. I suspect that Europeans did much the same until the Medieval feudal system put an end to doing anything without the permission of lords and priests.

 

[santaman2000]

I think this statement is wrong. And the whole notion of traditional. Traditionally people didn't travel out of anything else but pure necessity. This travelling in nature as a pasttime is a rather new thing which came with the novelty of leisure time (and money to consume stuff they actually didn't need to survive or improve the farm).

Travelling by horse has never been a viable option for most people, unless you were a hun. People have always been walking, while shelter and supplies has been carried by horse or other pack animals....

Perhaps we read different posts from RGR598. I never gathered that he was talking about anything other than the same leisure travel you are.

In any case, if you use a pack horse (or wagon, or cart, or caravan) you're still traveling by horse. Even if you are personally walking. Not by "horseback" per se, but by "horse." And as Oblio inferred in his post, there were no such things as inns, tavern, or hostels in North America west of the Mississippi River. 10s of thousands moved all their worldly belongings thousands of miles across unsettled wilderness.

And I don't remember reading of such being used often along the silk road or the spice road between Europe and Asia.