Solo Winter Bushcraft Trip – Old School Camping and Cooking – Sleeping in a Wool Blanket
#bushcraft #camping #survival #primitivetechnology
This time I set out on a more primitive approach than usual. Can you be fed, warm, rested and comfortable, traveling the winter woodlands without a modern tent and sleeping bag? Without freeze dried meals etc. Im bringing the basic bushcraft tools as always and I try to live 19th century life in the woods. Wool blanket, and a rein-deer skin for sleeping.
I was hoping for colder temps but managed to get through it. Just under freezing and then up over the melting point is the worst conditions when wild camping. The fire is called Nying. I have done them several times before and they worked great. But before it was colder outside. This log needed some extra preparations to work as a long fire. Some extra cutting away of damp material in the beginning. Still I had to feed it for an hour before it burned on its own. I took it where it was off the ground but it was a bit too moist. The positive thing is it smoldered and glowed giving just about the right amount of heat into my shelter. It had just glowing embers and some tiny flames now and then. You also have to scrape these things on the sides with the axe a couple of times if they don’t burn enough. In the morning I scraped them clean and used them almost like a table with a fire on top. Next time Im out in this weather doing this type of fire Im taking dead standing. Saves a lot of work getting the fire going.
You see these big roaring flames over logs online. The reality is these big roaring types of fires work badly as long fires. The big burn makes the material carbonize too fast, creating too much conduction and air move around you when you are laying still. It will make you too hot for a minute and then you will freeze. Sure you see big flames in this video but that’s just in the beginning when igniting the fire. You want a calm slow burning fire in the night. The ideal for a long fire is to have candle size flames. And for that you need the Nying fire. Other models does not work as good IMO because of the shape of the whole radiating structure (again, just my opinion). That’s it. That’s the whole secret to sleeping good all night and not tend the fire too much. I was amazed how comfortable it was under the wool blanket. Slept in wool base layer. I didn’t even need reinforcement clothes except my hat and wool mittens. Got some chills on my back but just turned over and went back to sleep. Good to notice is my canvas lavvu poncho was perfect for this. If my shelter behind me would have been bigger I would have been much colder!
Then on to some interesting cooking. Sluring is perhaps the most common food in Scandinavia for hundreds of years amongst woodsmen working with timber etc. Fat, protein, salt and some vegetables containing carbs and vitamins. That is what you need to survive long term. Modern recipes from old times sometimes don’t really make sense to me so I did Sluring my way. Originally they used what they had so I think the variation of this recipe in reality was as big as the amount of chefs. You can see me separate things and that might look a bit unnecessary but its just the way I cook to get perfect result. If I only had the pan I would have just thrown everything in there in stages which Im sure they did a lot back in the day when they where tired, cold and hungry. In recipes online you see they used Barley grain but then you need to boil or put it in water for a bit longer so I just went with the Barley flour instead. Because I believe they just used what ever cereal they had. And with flour you can bake cakes on hot stones, in a pan (remember the kolbulle I did before? same type of old time woodsman food) or whatever so I felt it was how I wanted to go. This dish was ok to eat. I really felt the somewhat unappetizing amount of fat was needed in my body when working with big logs in the cold. But if I would have to live on this for months at a time I would probably go insane.
This time I was out on my friends land again so please note you need land owners permission in Sweden, to do some of the things I do in this video.
Thanks for watching!
Gear: Polish Lavvu canvas poncho, wool blanket, mora knife, hultafors Åby axe, vintage US ACME cold handle pan, vintage Old trangia pot, steel bottle from Urberg, fork I carved, handmade kuksa, vintage oil lantern, vintage norwegian mountain pack, rein-deer skin, box of matches, bahco saw blade,
Food: Danish Old School Bread my wife baked from a Camilla Plum recipe. Butter, sausage, potatoes, carrot, celeriac, onion, salted pork, Barley flour.