Last winter trip

 

One More Trip with Night Frost

After the last trip outdoors, it was important for me to get one more winter trip in – with night frost. There were several things I wanted to test after the previous cold night:

• Try a different tarp + plash-palatka setup

• Build a bed and get away from the frozen ground

• Test a wool sheet and a cotton sleeping bag, which I plan to upgrade with oilskin

• Heat stones under the bed and use a water bottle in the sleeping bag

Since the last trip, I’ve slowly built a bed. I’ve been walking around the forest collecting dead branches instead of cutting fresh ones from trees. When I’ve felled trees, I’ve also deliberately saved poles for building projects later.

It’s simply two long poles with crosspieces lashed onto them. I wanted to insulate the bed with straw or spruce boughs – but both require a bit of a trip, since there isn’t much of that on my own land. Coincidentally, the recycling station had a large pile of good hay – so I brought that home instead. It gives the same effect, and I don’t have to take anything from nature.

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Setup

I had a plan to angle my rain capes and change the shelter setup that way. But it didn’t work at all. So instead, I just pitched it like a tent. Unfortunately, without the possibility of fully closing the shelter.

As a summer setup, this will be really great – there’s a lot of space inside. During the night, we had both snow and, from around 4 a.m., plenty of rain. The shelter handled it perfectly, and no water came in where I modified the tarp so it could be connected.

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Warmth During the Night

I heated granite stones on the stove, full blast. I placed them under the bed in the hay so they were insulated. I positioned them from hip level and upward to provide warmth under my core.

I filled my Pathfinder steel bottle with boiling water and put it inside a wool sock. It worked perfectly to be able to move it around inside the sleeping bag during the night. After getting up to pee, I pushed it down to my feet, for example.

All in all, I was able to stay warm quite comfortably – at one point, I was even too warm. These are good lessons to have learned, because they give me knowledge if it gets even colder:

• I could sleep wearing long underwear.

• The stones under the bed could be even hotter or more numerous (I could heat them in a fire instead of on the stove).

The wood stove still doesn’t provide much noticeable heat because the shelter is open. But when I felt the air under the “roof,” where it was more trapped, it was clearly warm – all the way through the 5-meter-long shelter.

I had arranged things so I could reach both firewood and the stove from the bed, which meant I could tend the fire from inside the sleeping bag. I could actually have placed the bed slightly closer to the stove if I wanted.

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Food

This time I also tested the stove for cooking. A late serving of mac and cheese, eaten from the warmth of the sleeping bag. Really nice to warm up that way. It’s the cheapest ready-made mac and cheese from Lidl, and it works fine. I had the Pathfinder cup standing on top of the cast-iron pan. The heat distribution was good enough that nothing burned on the bottom.

Breakfast was the full works – and I didn’t eat again until the evening. A chunk of butter went into the cast-iron pan, then I fried some spicy chorizo. In the seasoned fat, I fried a couple of eggs. Finally, a few wholegrain tortillas went in; they soaked up the remaining fat and became nicely crispy.

Super delicious breakfast. And in true hobbit style, it was followed by a serving of porridge. Oats, whole milk powder, sugar, cinnamon, salt, and dried fruit (orange and raisins).

There’s simply nothing better than sitting in a good shelter and hearing the rain on the tent fabric. I heard the tawny owl call it a night, and the light slowly appeared while I was cooking and eating. And while I drank my coffee, daylight fully arrived.

Next trip, I think it’ll be mushroom risotto.

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New Gear

I have plans to modify the sleeping bag and the wool sheet. The sleeping bag will be turned into a swagman roll (Helikon Tex). It will get an oilskin outer layer, and I’ll cut and sew it. It needs to function both as a poncho and a sleeping bag.

The wool sheet works fine as a base layer. It will be turned into a Kephart roll. I already had the idea (to make a bivy bag / cowboy roll). But after reading Kephart’s 100-year-old book on outdoor life, I got ideas for additional functions. So the base layer will also be covered with oilskin. It should be usable as a camp bed, stretcher, hammock, and bivy bag. It’s going to be a wild project, but I’m looking forward to making it.