Camping Tips: Got Any?

[shawnbebout]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

I am not saying "Dont take a jacket", I am saying take a wool blanket as if you know how to use it, it can be a multi- use item. Kinda like using a platypus as a drinking system and hanging it from a tree for a quick shower?

As previously stated, you can wear it as a cloak, use it as a blanket, use as a pillow, make a bedroll out of it, even a backpack/bedroll if you wanted. There are many of uses for it. If you are car camping/rv'ing you could carry all these different things, great. But if you plan to hike and don't want to spend hundreds of dollars on a sleep system, then yes this is useful.
Lets say you are hiking and want to take a only a few things. With a Military poncho, an good emergency blanket, a poncho liner and a wool blanket you can have a multi layered system for sleeping? You have a waterproof outer shell when you button the poncho length ways. You can then add the poncho liner and have a bag down to 50 degrees (from what I have learned). If you need to go lower temperature rating you need to go, the more you add. Add the emergency blanket between the poncho and liner, for a lower rating. If you really need it, add the poncho, em blanket, liner and wool blanket. Then you will be able to withstand very cold nights. So you are carrying one thing that has multiple uses. I have all this stuff and buy learning how to put it together, I don't have to buy a bunch of different bags.
Look up Dave Canterbury on youtube for a better understanding on how to use one thing for multiple things. He only owns a survival school and teaches classed. Plus if you ever watch dual survival, he is on there along with Cody Lundin.
Best tip....Keep your mind open so you can learn.

[Yukon Jack]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

I am not saying "Dont take a jacket",

The guy in the video should have brought a jacket

[Logtec]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

I buy 8-10 "grave candles"(the one you leave on graves) from the dollar store, they burn for about 24hrs,
I place them around the site and a few on the table. It's enough light to see but not enough to attract all the bugs in the area. It also makes for great mood lighting around the site.
I use a head lamp for cooking etc..

[kcscout]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Something my son's scout troop does for clean up is 4-5 buckets where they have one bucket soapy water, one with hot / warm water, one with a little bit of clorox for sterilization, and the final one with just cool water for a final rinse. Of course not sure how the kids always seem to get grass and dirt in the buckets, but they usually work well for cleaning and sterilizing your cookware, plates, etc. and change daily.

[Jarrod01]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Lots of camping tips The first thing that you have to know is find a camping place that will suit your taste and the personalities of your camping buddies. If they are adventurous, then find a place where a lot of activities can be done.

[frank6160]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Save a saltine cracker box to hold a loaf of bread and keep it from getting smashed.

[patches19]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Hey Y'all
If you tend to have to pee during the night (like me) bring a one liter gatorade, powerade, or other lightweight plastic bottle with you to be your 'pee bottle' for nighttime use. for any of you hardcore go-lights, your pee bottle can also be your water bottle, just give it a boiling water rinse in the a.m. (this is especially helpful in the winter when you don't want to leave your shelter to pee!- but be sure to dump it or keep it in your sleeping bag cause it's no fun to thaw a frozen pee bottle...)

[patches19]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Thanks for the welcome! I don't blame you for the distinction of pee bottle from water bottle, I don't double dip in that area either but urine is sterile (especially with the boiling water rinse) so as long as you do not allow mold to occur it should cause no health concern. It's something I have considered for a lengthy winter backpack but have yet to put it to use. thanks for the feedback!

[patches19]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Haha, I appreciate the nitpicking, its making me think more deeply than I had before about this practice. I really can't blame you for avoiding drinking urine at all costs, I'm in no rush to either but such a small amount may not bother me. But (as you said, there is always a but) now that I am thinking about it with more detail-- let's say that you are carrying 2 nalgenes (which is common practice for extended backpacking trips) and no gatorate bottle. One of those can remain as your 'purely water' bottle, but the other is your pee and hot-drink bottle. So when you use your hot drink bottle to pee into but then empty and FILL it with boiling water in the morning, which would soak any bacteria in boiling water and certainly kill it, just as boiling water disinfects other sketchy water, and then you add coffee or tea to that boiling water. I think that would definitely take care of the bacteria AND the taste.

But you also have a great point about the fuel situation. Boiling 1 liter of water every morning is not exactly a great way to conserve fuel. So, in order to save fuel but still practice the 2 nalgene method, or even 1, you could simply drop some Aquamira in to your water bottle and let it sit for 20 or so minutes. I'm a diehard believer in the power of aquamira after using it for 23 days of backpacking and canyoneering in and around the Dirty Devil river of the greater Canyonlands area. This would allow you to boil as much or as little water as you need in the morning and conserve you fuel while still sterilizing your pee bottle's water and flavoring it as you wish (after the 20 minutes with aquamira)

I guess I'm just trying to say there are plenty of ways around the potential health concerns that are both fuel efficient and not. It is all a matter of personal preference and the systems that the individual finds most convenient and suited for them.

How about a new topic? ----- Helpful camping knots??

I can be a knot geek but for simply camping I think one of the best knots I've learned is actually just a hitch, the trucker's hitch. it's awesome for tying down a tarp or a rainfly or making a hammock nice and tight. It creates a sort of 3:1 advantage within the rope so its super helpful for getting lines tight but being able to release them with ease.

[tplife]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

He's quite correct, normal urine is sterile. :eek:

[Logtec]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Hey Y'all
If you tend to have to pee during the night (like me) bring a one liter gatorade, powerade, or other lightweight plastic bottle with you to be your 'pee bottle' for nighttime use. for any of you hardcore go-lights, your pee bottle can also be your water bottle, just give it a boiling water rinse in the a.m. (this is especially helpful in the winter when you don't want to leave your shelter to pee!- but be sure to dump it or keep it in your sleeping bag cause it's no fun to thaw a frozen pee bottle...)

Why don't you stay in your tent, unzip the door and pee outside?
The ground will absorb the pee in the summer, you can cover the wet spot with dirt, in the winter it will just freeze and can be kicked away or covered in the morning.

[Logtec]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

good point patches - urine is usually sterile in the bladder but - (there's always a "but" isn't there?) unless you have a kidney or bladder infection then it will be loaded with bacteria. Urine can also pick up bacteria on it's way out of the urethra and as it passes the external genitalia which might be quite full of bacteria on an extended backpacking trip with no bathing. Sure boiling water might kill that bacteria but then you would have taste issues with some of the urine leaching into the plastic while the bottle is a urine bottle, and the urine would leach back out into your drinking water when you next make the bottle a drinking a water bottle again. The boiling water rinse also sounds like a waste of fuel. You would have to boil some water with precious fuel just to rinse the bottle out and that boiling water then becomes useless. Another point - when your doctor asks you to give a urine sample - one of the main things they are looking for is bacteria 0 signs of infection. If urine was always sterile, doctors wouldn't routinely run that test.

You can do your own bottle test. Take a plastic water bottle from the store, empty it out, pour in anything you want - orange juice, fruit punch, coffee, coca-cola, whatever. Leave it for a few hours. Then empty it out and pour boiling water in it, swish it around, empty it out, rinse it out, and so forth. Now fill it will drinking water again. You will still taste the coca-cola or fruit punch or whatever had been inside.

For a winter backpacking trip, I think you'd be a lot better off using your cook pot as a pee jar if you don't want to walk out into the cold night to pee directly onto the ground. You'd also save some fuel - it would take less boiling water to clean your metal pot than to rinse your plastic bottle and you could do this immediately before cooking something so you save some fuel by not having separate operations.

I realize this is being nitpicky. I guess the bottom line for me is I just don't like the idea of drinking my own pee - even if I'm dying in the desert.

Totally agreed.
All of my Nalgene bottles smell like drink mix, no matter how many times they have been washed.

[05Kingquad700]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Why don't you stay in your tent, unzip the door and pee outside?
The ground will absorb the pee in the summer, you can cover the wet spot with dirt, in the winter it will just freeze and can be kicked away or covered in the morning.

That makes for one funny story. I had taken my son, his friend and my father in law camping. Early spring in the rocky mountains. It was down near freezing at night. My boy, Caleb had to pee in the middle of the night. So he did what was described above. He stepped outside the tent and let it fly. Well, Caleb getting in and out of the tent woke the whole tent up and the my father in law (John) decided he had to pee as well. Now John subscribes to the theory of sleeping in his underwear in his mummy bag. So he steps outside and steps right into Caleb's pee. He took to cussing about stepping in someone Else's pee, and we just started laughing. He had to walk over to the water bottle and wash his foot in the middle of the freezing cold night. Then his foot was wet, so he tracked dirt back into the tent and into his bag. The whole time in his tighty whites!!!! It was awesome, and we still laugh about it today. And Caleb knows now to take a few steps away from the tent and be careful of where he relieves himself.
I just put some tennis shoes on and go outside the tent. It is never that cold that I can't go out, but I am a 3 season camper.

[patches19]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

Haha that is a great story, I'm sure its one y'all won't forget any time soon! As far as summer camping goes I'm all for stepping out of the tent and 'relieving' myself under a starry sky. However, the time the pee bottle really came in handy was during a two week backcountry skiing trip in Wyoming where the temperature was around -12 degrees F at night and we were staying in quigloos. Getting out of the quigloo required putting boots on in a tight space with bulky puffy layers on and then scooting down snow stairs. I was all for not loosing the warmth of my sleeping bag in those temperatures so that's where the pee bottle came into play.

Also, one thing about peeing right outside the door of your tent is that many critters enjoy licking up the salt in your pee so it can bring those curious little guys right to your front door in the middle of the night. It created quite a scare for myself and a friend who woke up to a large deer outside the tent in grizzly country. We were convinced it was a griz at first and that is absolutely not a fun way to wake up haha.

[Sonar83]

Re: Camping Tips: Got Any?

We take an extra tarp 8x10 or 10x12 and with paracord hang it up so we can get some shade during the day!