Virgin Falls camping trip

Back at the first of November some friends, my Dad, brothers and myself took a trip to Virgin Falls state park.  We found it was a great place to hike.  There was a good amount of fairly difficult trails,  and a large cavern. Also the Caney Fork river was next to one of the camping areas.  The leaves were in their best color, and there were some good views.  We just camped over night but it was a very enjoyable trip.

This is Virgin falls, probably over 100 feet tall.

Here is my bag that I took. I added my leather sling bag to the back of my backpack for extra room.

 

                                                          One of the many rock overhangs.

 

 

 



 

Nothing like something warm to drink around the campfire.

 

 

 

 

All the wood was a little damp so the fire was a bit hard to keep going.

 

 

 

 

 

This is one of the views that we stopped for on our way out.  I definitely want to come back here again.  I am always excited to get to explore a new trail.

Camp

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Well I have not posted much lately, so here are a few things related to woodcraft and the outdoors that I have been doing.  The pictures are from a camping trip I took back in November.  I wanted to test out some new  equipment, build  a shelter at my camp site, and camp in colder weather.  I started out late so I ran out of daylight quickly, but I was able to build a shelter before dark.  The main idea behind the shelter was to use some cedar tree tops that I knew were in the woods.  So I tied a cedar pole across the two trees at the camp site, and leaned the cedar tops end first on the cross piece.  Then I trimmed all the twigs from the inside and made sure I could get in.  Then I covered the top with leaves and branches as needed.  During the night it kept the cold wind from coming blowing in, all except for a spot that had not been covered, and that kept my face cold.  I will need to improve this shelter in the future,  but it was not bad for being built in a short amount of time.  My fire was very cheery and was easy to start and easy to keep burning, this is not usually the case.  The fire kept heat coming into the open side of the shelter and made it very comfortable, if I had built the shelter a little higher it might have been even warmer.  It got quite cold and there were deer running around my camp all night long.  At one point I heard two raccoons chattering in the dark very close.  Deer were all over the place and I could see them in the moonlight.  The next morning I sat by my fire drinking cups of hot tea warming my insides and watching wildlife, the deer did not seem to notice my fire and walked by quite undisturbed.  A little later a group of turkeys came within just a few yards, it turned out that my shelter acted as a blind and concealed me very well. 

 

I have also been making alot of spoons, forks, and other utensils. This has kept me very busy. 

 

I have also been experimenting with a short bow that is attached to my back quiver.  I use it as a back up for any other bow I take out.  Well that is a little bit of what I have been doing in my woods, I hope you all have a happy new year.

 

 

 

 

Wooden cup

I had already been making spoons for a while, when I decided to make a wooden cup.

This is what I came up with.  It is a little small but I like it. This is the second one I made, the first broke while I was working on it.



 

 

 

I tried to make in the style of  a Kuksa, a Finnish cup. I do not know if I made it quite in that way or not.

 

 

 

I have not had a chance to use it  yet, but I hope to take it on my next camping trip.  If you have any special drinks or foods that you like to use a wooden cup for, I would like to hear about them.  I would like to eventually have a more primitive cooking outfit.

Favorite gear

In response to the request of the Weekend woodsman, I am posting three of my favorite woodcraft items.  I say "favorite", but I have many tools, weapons, bags, and other things that I enjoy.  It's hard to choose.  I chose these three because I have searched for something like them for a long time.  I have been trying out different camping gear for a while.  And I will probably find something in the future that suits me better.  I have posted some about these items before so I hope I am not boring you.

 

 

 

 

I searched a long time for a sleeping bag or bed of some kind that worked for me.  Every thing I tried was not quite right.  Then a friend of mine had a wool blanket very similar to this, so I decided to give it a try.  So I a bought this one for around twenty or thirty dollars.  It is thin but very, very warm and it is light.  It weighs about three and a half pounds.  I usually carry some other blanket or sheet with it, but it is just right by itself if its warm enough; like it often is where I live.

 

 

 

 

 

I like this knife because it  has most of the qualities that I want in a knife, plus it was made by a friend.  I like its size, shape, and color.  The blade has that feel like you can carve anything short of  granite.  I made the sheath out of cow hide and artificial sinew, and it holds the knife in just by being a bit snug around the handle. The handle is made of walnut.

 

 

 

It has a nice feel to it.

 

 

 

This backpack is one of my favorites.  I have several backpacks including a nice Kelty backpack on a pack frame, and the Swedish rucksack.  This pack however has some qualities which are especially useful to me.  I like its smaller size, especially since I do lots of short walks around our property and need something to carry books or my camera.  I also have a haversack that I use for this purpose more than anything, but if I need something a little bigger this is what I use. I also like that it is somewhat rigid and holds its shape, this makes packing and carrying so much more pleasant.  It also has many straps that I can use for strapping blankets to or other things that are to big to fit inside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I am not sure of the dimensions.

Thanks for looking.  I have many more projects that I have done that I will post as soon as I get the time.

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

Camping Gear

Here is some of my camping gear that I use.  I got the small green backpack recently, It is African I think,and It is rather small.  I like that it is small because it is easy to get through the woods,and it keeps it's shape very well.  I really like a backpack that is slightly rigid and holds its shape.  Another thing I like is when it is packed up it keeps the weight in line with may body so it does not throw me off balance.  It also has two small pockets on the side in which I can fit quite a bit of things.  I have taken this backpack on an overnight backpacking trip and it held every thing very well.

The olive drab wool blanket is my bedroll and it fits perfectly on top of the small backpack. Then I strap another bedroll on the bottom of the pack, this bedroll consists of a tarp for my shelter a flannel sheet and another small blanket. Also in the pic is my leather shirt and moccasins, my belt and pouches, bayonet, and canteen

 

Here is how the bed rolls look. I also have one of my quivers strapped to it.

In this picture I have the bayonet on the side, all I have to do is reach over my shoulder and there it is!



This picture is kinda blurry but It gives you an Idea of the size of the whole thing.

I'm wearing my army belt and pouches in these two pictures, they contain matches, small cord, pencil and paper, and glow stick.  I also have another pouch that contains a first aid kit, but since I had another first aid kit in my backpack I did not have that one on.  The two side pockets on the backpack contain things I might need to get at real fast.  Here is a list of things in the outer pockets on this

particular hike.

First aid kit.

Poncho.

Emergency blanket.

A snack.

Flashlight

It turns out that it started to rain and I had to use my poncho, thankfully I was able to get to it easily, my brother had trouble finding his and it took longer to dig through his pack and find it.  That is why it is good to put things that you might need in a hurry where you can get to  them.