(Shamelessly cut and pasted from another forum!)
I recently had the good fortune to win, in a raffle, a place on Wilderness Survival Skills' Wilderness Awakening course in North Devon. I already had what I consider to be a fairly strong base of skills in Bushcraft and survival but I found throughout the week that I was continually learning new things.
The drive down from Barnsley was the first test, it's a fairly long haul but the site was pristine and so quiet, with the sounds of the birds only being broken now and then by a chainsaw or the odd piece of farm machinery that the journey was well worth it. Upon meeting Joe and Glenn and awaiting the arrival of the other course members, we had a safety briefing and then carted our gear down to the piece of woodland that would be our home for the next five days.
Dinner on the first night was a simple but tasty sausage casserole that Antony had been making whilst we were moving down, and this really was an indicator of how good the food was going to be for the week. Each night we seemed to have another gourmet menu on offer such as pigeon pittas and spanish omelettes! We were never short of food although Joe said that as the days went by we were, as a group, eating less and less. Maybe it was because of the heat, the weather was absolutley fantastic for pretty much the whole week.
We collected fire wood on the first night, plenty to keep the main fire going where a massive kettle was permanently perched so that we could brew up whenever we felt like it. There was always a pack of biscuits squirreled away somewhere for a bit of dunking too, chocolate hob nobs seemed to be a favourite due to the high energy chocolate and the slow energy release of the oats (if you like!). Bashas were put up and we had a moment round the fire where we discussed what we wanted to get out of the week, everybody had different aspirations.
The next morning we carried out a sit spot exercise. I had no idea quite how much I would learn from just sitting, but I gave it a go. It became more apparent at the end of the week, but I'll come back to that. After safety briefings on knives and saws, we were let loose on the woodland to make a simple pot hanger and tea stick. We also started construction of our debris shelters which would be our homes for the remainder of the week should we choose to sleep in them. This choosing to do something is a great thing that the guys allow on their courses, the opt out clause is there for anybody who wishes to not do a certain thing such as gutting fish or prepping rabbits just after having their first field expedient shower of the week! There is no shame in opting out of anything and nobody is put under any pressure to give something a try if they don't want to. Saying that, pretty much everybody did a bit of everything and everybody prepped an animal of some sort for food.
After further instruction on making withies and fire lighting techniques, we were set off to make our own fires with wood we collected, tinder bundles we had made and embers we made from charcloth and traditional flint and steels. Everybody succeeded, a testament to the instruction from the guys. We were tasked with collecting the wood to make our own bow drill sets after being shown various sets made by the instructors, and we were all to try and make fire with our bow drill sets at the end of the week. The option was there to use a second person for a tandem effort, but the hope was that everybody would achieve an ember by themselves.
Throughout the week various other subjects were covered in great detail and as an ex-Serviceman myself who used to run courses on military subjects, I could see that a lot of effort had gone in to the models and training aids and that the guys really knew their subject matter well. Some of the subjects we covered were trapping and snaring and the legalities of the traps used, water collection and purification, wild food foraging, weapons for hunting in the bush (such as catapults, throwing sticks, bows and atlatls), cordage making, spoon carving which teaches you safe carving techniques and much, much more. Often things would crop up that weren't strictly on the syllabus for this course and yet the instructors were more then happy to discuss and explain things. After my early success with the bow drill (I have done it in the past) I was tasked with mastering the hand drill for my final test and had one on one tuition with Antony and the use of his own hand drill sets. This was not on the syllabus at all but highlights the flexibility of the instructors and also their willingness to share knowledge and teach new skills to people.
After working on the group shelters throughout the week, just finishing off bits here and there and adding more thatch, we finally had homes to be proud of. I had slept in a poor effort of a debris shelter a number of years ago and even though it was poorly made I was incredibly warm. The chance to make a group shelter, and to have first hand experience of people that had made them before on hand to aid us was brilliant. The main structure went up quickly, the thatching was a bit slower but we got there in the end. To go to sleep with a small fire in the middle of the shelter was an experience I had longed for, it really was back to basics stuff.
Eventually, after lots of instruction, test day came. This is a series of tests to see how much knowledge has been retained and is a confirmation more than a test. There is no pass and fail here, just do the best you can but I think some people were surprised how well they did at certain things. A plant ID stand, an awareness stand where you have to spot objects on a trail and the fire bow test all makes for a pretty good assessment of how well you have done throughout the week although I think most people already knew what they had achieved.
The final sit spot was definitely an eye opener though, even though I think I saw more animals on my first sit spot at the start of the week. A squirrel had climbed a tree a few metres away and I had seen rooks and livestock in the fields across the stream I was sat beside, but after seeing another course member wandering on the other side of the stream I joined him and we watched a trio of buzzards flying around. I could not sit still by the stream, I constantly felt like I should be doing something but I didn't realise that until the end of the week. The last sit spot highlighted this as I sat in the same place for half an hour watching the world go by. At this point, I had re-tuned myself into the wilderness and away from the hectic run around attitude of society today. It was strange, but I could feel myself in a better frame of mind for being in the woods that week, I was stress free and had very few worries at all as life had become much simpler.
I recently had the good fortune to win, in a raffle, a place on Wilderness Survival Skills' Wilderness Awakening course in North Devon. I already had what I consider to be a fairly strong base of skills in Bushcraft and survival but I found throughout the week that I was continually learning new things.
The drive down from Barnsley was the first test, it's a fairly long haul but the site was pristine and so quiet, with the sounds of the birds only being broken now and then by a chainsaw or the odd piece of farm machinery that the journey was well worth it. Upon meeting Joe and Glenn and awaiting the arrival of the other course members, we had a safety briefing and then carted our gear down to the piece of woodland that would be our home for the next five days.
Dinner on the first night was a simple but tasty sausage casserole that Antony had been making whilst we were moving down, and this really was an indicator of how good the food was going to be for the week. Each night we seemed to have another gourmet menu on offer such as pigeon pittas and spanish omelettes! We were never short of food although Joe said that as the days went by we were, as a group, eating less and less. Maybe it was because of the heat, the weather was absolutley fantastic for pretty much the whole week.
We collected fire wood on the first night, plenty to keep the main fire going where a massive kettle was permanently perched so that we could brew up whenever we felt like it. There was always a pack of biscuits squirreled away somewhere for a bit of dunking too, chocolate hob nobs seemed to be a favourite due to the high energy chocolate and the slow energy release of the oats (if you like!). Bashas were put up and we had a moment round the fire where we discussed what we wanted to get out of the week, everybody had different aspirations.
The next morning we carried out a sit spot exercise. I had no idea quite how much I would learn from just sitting, but I gave it a go. It became more apparent at the end of the week, but I'll come back to that. After safety briefings on knives and saws, we were let loose on the woodland to make a simple pot hanger and tea stick. We also started construction of our debris shelters which would be our homes for the remainder of the week should we choose to sleep in them. This choosing to do something is a great thing that the guys allow on their courses, the opt out clause is there for anybody who wishes to not do a certain thing such as gutting fish or prepping rabbits just after having their first field expedient shower of the week! There is no shame in opting out of anything and nobody is put under any pressure to give something a try if they don't want to. Saying that, pretty much everybody did a bit of everything and everybody prepped an animal of some sort for food.
After further instruction on making withies and fire lighting techniques, we were set off to make our own fires with wood we collected, tinder bundles we had made and embers we made from charcloth and traditional flint and steels. Everybody succeeded, a testament to the instruction from the guys. We were tasked with collecting the wood to make our own bow drill sets after being shown various sets made by the instructors, and we were all to try and make fire with our bow drill sets at the end of the week. The option was there to use a second person for a tandem effort, but the hope was that everybody would achieve an ember by themselves.
Throughout the week various other subjects were covered in great detail and as an ex-Serviceman myself who used to run courses on military subjects, I could see that a lot of effort had gone in to the models and training aids and that the guys really knew their subject matter well. Some of the subjects we covered were trapping and snaring and the legalities of the traps used, water collection and purification, wild food foraging, weapons for hunting in the bush (such as catapults, throwing sticks, bows and atlatls), cordage making, spoon carving which teaches you safe carving techniques and much, much more. Often things would crop up that weren't strictly on the syllabus for this course and yet the instructors were more then happy to discuss and explain things. After my early success with the bow drill (I have done it in the past) I was tasked with mastering the hand drill for my final test and had one on one tuition with Antony and the use of his own hand drill sets. This was not on the syllabus at all but highlights the flexibility of the instructors and also their willingness to share knowledge and teach new skills to people.
After working on the group shelters throughout the week, just finishing off bits here and there and adding more thatch, we finally had homes to be proud of. I had slept in a poor effort of a debris shelter a number of years ago and even though it was poorly made I was incredibly warm. The chance to make a group shelter, and to have first hand experience of people that had made them before on hand to aid us was brilliant. The main structure went up quickly, the thatching was a bit slower but we got there in the end. To go to sleep with a small fire in the middle of the shelter was an experience I had longed for, it really was back to basics stuff.
Eventually, after lots of instruction, test day came. This is a series of tests to see how much knowledge has been retained and is a confirmation more than a test. There is no pass and fail here, just do the best you can but I think some people were surprised how well they did at certain things. A plant ID stand, an awareness stand where you have to spot objects on a trail and the fire bow test all makes for a pretty good assessment of how well you have done throughout the week although I think most people already knew what they had achieved.
The final sit spot was definitely an eye opener though, even though I think I saw more animals on my first sit spot at the start of the week. A squirrel had climbed a tree a few metres away and I had seen rooks and livestock in the fields across the stream I was sat beside, but after seeing another course member wandering on the other side of the stream I joined him and we watched a trio of buzzards flying around. I could not sit still by the stream, I constantly felt like I should be doing something but I didn't realise that until the end of the week. The last sit spot highlighted this as I sat in the same place for half an hour watching the world go by. At this point, I had re-tuned myself into the wilderness and away from the hectic run around attitude of society today. It was strange, but I could feel myself in a better frame of mind for being in the woods that week, I was stress free and had very few worries at all as life had become much simpler.
He made the hand axe in no time at all and made it look so easy. He was gonna smash it up to make something else but we all stopped him, I think he takes these sort of things for granted but to us it was a work of art!
His haunting flute playing on the first morning was amazing, his send up of a cuckoo had me fooled at least!
