Snow caves are neither fast nor easy to build. They are by no means the preferred snow-based shelter solution for daily travel, or even for stranded, emergency shelter. The builder must have a shovel-—preferably a large one-—and be equipped with...
Shelter. We humans need it. Not blessed with fur, fat or any of the other animal protective designs we are on our own; it's up to that big brain of ours to figure out how to deal with the elements....
It was twenty below inside my new Stephenson tent. I had been using the cutting edge Model 2R since summer. This, instead of my long practice of lean-to shelters with a fire out front. Military shelter half, tarp, that sort...
Greetings and Happy New Year to my colleagues and readers here on the Blog My freezers are packed with moose and deer and elk—the results of a long and plentiful autumn of hunting and wandering my beloved backcountry in my...
I'm finally getting around to revising my twenty year old essay on what constitutes a rambling man’s Possibles Pouch,,,,what it is, and what goes into it, The concept is to store close at hand everything needed to operate efficiently, and...
Most Significant Improvements To Backpacking In The Last Sixty Years
I looked at my Favorite Designs List, above, and had to admit that Lists are fun! So let's make some more! In over sixty years of backcountry rambling I've used an ever-evolving array of equipment. The gear available in the...
Our Road Trip has taken a turn into the past. It's a wandering road, revealing nuggets of events that inform the present. We've had a glimpse at the Roots of a life-long passion for wild places, a passion that became...
May, 1981. Colorado High Country. Paul Ramer and I are course-finding for the proposed Colorado Haut (High) Route for backcountry skiers along the Continental Divide; we are skiing a section west of Berthoud Pass. (Some readers will recall Ramer backcountry...
1956. I was ready for sleep. The rabbit, cooked over the open fire, was eaten. So were the potatoes—baked in the coals with a mud coating to keep the skin soft. The bunny had been fetched with my trusty single...