Category Archives: hiking/backpacking/camping

Chillin’ in the woods

As I was throwing stuff together for todays walk a shower hit. This was the turn for the worse I was expecting for the week.

It was definitely feeling a bit chillier.

But the cold and rain were not going to put me (or Dolly) off going on our walk.

By the time we hit the A47 I’d decided our destination would be back to the woodlands at Roydon Common.

Dolly was off lead for the majority of this walk, and she was really well behaved.

We explored a couple of side paths.

Which gave me a better picture of the woods. I collected a little birch bark to use as tinder.

Some of which I used to start the fire in today’s stove. Oh the stove I was using was the Kelly Kettle Trekker.

Part of these brew stops is getting Dolly used to being off lead, not wandering off, and chilling out.

I enjoyed using the Kelly Kettle. Well playing with fire (responsibly) is fun.

I didn’t mess around I used my bic lighter to start the fire. The wood I was using was some kindling I bought recently from a petrol station. Plus some twigs I’d gathered over 10 years ago!

Dolly is really sure now that she likes beef jerky! As if there was any doubt. But the jerky does make a nice treat for her during our brew stop. Plus I can have a bit too.

We had been very lucky with the weather because our walk and brew stops had no sign of rain. In fact there was some hint of the sun breaking through and blue skies!

In our wandering some of the paths we followed were definitely deer paths. I even saw a Muntjac ahead of us at one point. One such path revealed what was a “pond” that was obviously a source of water for the local wildlife. Surprisingly it was close to the actual main path, but not visible from that path.

Yeah we had a fun chill walk in the woods again.

Games and woods!

Last night was once again club night.

With no Anthony to troll him this week Marcin was going to have a stress free evening.

It was good to see and play some games with Jonathan. It’s been way too long since we last sat at table and played a game.

We started off with a game of flip 7 which I won comfortably. Somehow Marcin reached the heady heights of 26 points and never managed to add any more to his total.

Our next game was Rebel Princess. Which Marcin redeemed himself by winning easily. Luckily he didn’t manage to keep a zero points score. Can’t have him matching my zero score in the last game.

Our final game was Wild Gardens. It’s an interesting action selection, resource gathering, contract fulfilment game.

This one took nearly two hour to play. It could have been quicker but when one player has ap what can you do?

Marcin won this game to.

It was a fun evening apart from the ap inflicted player dragging the game out. Plus it was really great to see Jonathan again.

Thursday evening I caught the Met Office YouTube channel warning that after the weekend the weather would once again get worse.

So I mentally made a plan to go out with Dolly on my day off.

On our way out I needed to get some petrol inside the car, otherwise we weren’t going to get very far.

At the petrol station while paying I picked up a packet of beef jerky to use as a dog treat on the walk. Which wasn’t a bad option considering there were no actual dog treats to be bought.

We then headed off towards Roydon Common. But instead of parking at the first car park we carried on to the second car park.

This was a much smaller car park that was also in the woodland that I was aiming for on our previous walk.

We were seeing wildlife almost instantly. The woods were alive with bird song. I was pleasantly surprised seeing a butterfly fluttering across the path a couple of times. It was a brimstone I think.

The woods seem to be crawling (at l ast five) with Muntjac feeding just off to the side of the path. Dolly never even noticed them as they froze hoping not to be seen. Pretending to be a statue by the Muntjac allowed me to get the phone out for a photo.

The path we were on was the one I was hoping to connect up to when we came here previously.

Instead of connecting up with our previous route we cut across to edge of the wood that bordered the common.

It was on this return leg that we stopped to have a brew.

For this brew stop I was using the Boundless Voyage Titanium Cookware Set with the Phantom – Ultralight Stove.

While I was waiting for my water to boil I gave Dolly some water and we shared the jerky. By share I mean I had a couple of pieces and Dolly had the rest.

It was this return leg that I tried Dolly off the lead. I was forced earlier to briefly take her off so we could get over a fence using a sty and dog hole in the fence too far from the sty.

Dolly was really good off the lead. Didn’t run off, stayed close.

I think she enjoyed the little bit of extra freedom.

As we got close to the car park I put Dolly back on her lead. I’m glad she was. There was an owner getting out of his car, his dog not on a lead or his control. He had no idea I was there or with a dog. A fecking idiot. Luckily nothing happened but I hate stupid dog owners like this.

But that last bit aside Dolly and I had a great walk in the woodland. Plenty of little paths for us to explore on return visits.

BCB Crusader Mk1 Cooking System

Here we are with my second new setup for making a brew whilst out on a walk or even a meal. But this is equally at home on a backpacking trip also.

The BCB Crusader Mk1 Cooking System isn’t the lightest cooking system by a long shot.

There are two versions of the cook system from BCB. The main difference between the two are the crusader cooker and cup. The Mk1 crusader cup has a capacity of 750ml, whilst the Mk2 has a capacity of a litre. I also think the Mk2 crusader cup is lighter. The crusader cookers are also very different. The Mk1 is much shorter and meant to be a solid fuel only stove. While the Mk2 is taller, more ventilation, and can use multiple fuel sources. Whether that’s solid fuel, alcohol burners, or even a fire.

I’ve gone with the Mk1 version because it is a shorter form factor compared to the Mk2.

A brand new Mk1 cookset from BCB comes in at £95. However you can pick used ones (army surplus) much cheaper. For your money you get the following: “Plastic Mug & Water bottle (Osprey / NATO), Crusader Cup Lid, Crusader Cup, Crusader Cooker, Zulu Belt pouch, Fireball Flint and Striker” (plus some solid fuel blocks).

It is possible to use a Trangia with the Mk1 Crusader cooker if you use an alcohol stove cross stand (see the photos below).

Ok the water bottle has a capacity of a litre, and its companion plastic mug has a capacity of 500ml.

Compared to the Boundless Voyage titanium cook set in the previous post this is heavier. For starters it has the water bottle and mug which the other set doesn’t have. Oh and the handy ferro rod. And to be fair you would need to have if using the other set. Otherwise I don’t think the difference in weight if considering just the cooker and crusader cup, although heavier is too big.

The advantage this has over the Boundless Voyage setup is you can use just solid fuel tablets with it, with no need for a meths burner. Saving a bit of weight there. Granted not a great deal. But still.

For the record I also have the Mk2 crusader cooker. So for me that is also an option. But also shows you can just buy the bits of this system that you want quite easily. It’s also possible to replace the plastic crusader lid with a third party (usually custom made, see photo above) metal lid.

What I like also about this setup is it’s literally bombproof. After all this is designed for use by the British Army. It’s meant to be able to take a lot of abuse.

Well that’s the brief look at the BCB Crusader Mk1. I think I have at least one other newish one to share in another post. So more to come.

Boundless Voyage Titanium Cookware Set

This is the first in a series of posts where I will look at recent purchases that can be used as a cookset for backpacking/camping. These are cooksets for a single person, not intended for cooking for multiple people.

I think any of these cooksets covered in this and future posts would be great in a day pack for a walk, or possible backpacking trip.

Yet again a YouTube video got me ordering more gear.

This time it was the Boundless Voyage Titanium Cookware Set.

What do you get for your money? For starters you get an 800ml canteen cup aka a pot, a mesh storage bag, a lid for the pot, and what they describe as a wood stove. Like some of the canteen sets out there this cooker allows you to have a fire to do your cooking. However for me that would be a last resort.

The problem for me with using this type of cooker/stove with a fire is the scar it would leave behind. Not very leave no trace. Yes you could use something to place this on to try and avoid that. But I think it would still leave a mark on the ground.

My preference for heat source would be a Trangia or some other alcohol/solid fuel stove. The stove then acts like a windshield and pot support.

The lid itself for the canteen isn’t very tight fitting.

What I like about the pot is that you have the handles on the side plus the handle to hang it with. Although to be fair I’m more likely to be using this handle to remove the pot off the heat than hanging it over an open fire.

I’ve not weighed it but it is listed as weighing in at 230g.

To this cook set I’ve added the Goshawk OP-100 alcohol stove, a folding titanium spoon, and a BCB Fireball Flint and Striker.

Plus at just shy of £38 (from Aliexpress) this isn’t bad value for a cookset.

This is a nice compact cook set that doesn’t take up much space. The only thing I’d need adding to this is a cup of some sort.

Hello is there anybody out there?

Wow I can’t believe it’s been so long since I posted last.

I have been rather tired and dozing off in the afternoon once home from work, and then getting to sleep early. But that’s just getting older.

There has been some gaming but not much. I got to spend a rather pleasant afternoon Saturday gaming with Ben and his family.

We played the newly arrived expansion for Tokyo Highway, Rainbow City.

We jumped in with using the additional rules for missions. Which makes the game a bit more gamery!

It was a big hit with Ben and his family.

We also played Tonga Bonga. Which was great fun. I did like the mechanic of placing money on your ships to tempt people to place their die on your spaces over others. That and placing your dice gets very very tactical.

The afternoons gaming was finished with a very cut throat game of Big Shot. That I really liked. I do like the auction mechanic it uses.

I liked both the (to me) new games. They weren’t heavy by any means. But still very fun.

Tying myself in…

A few weeks back I asked Dave if he’d use his wood crafting skills to make me a practice board for tying knots.

In one of the posts was a 5mm hole that allowed me to thread through some 5mm bungee cord to create a loop to simulate a tent/tarp tie off point.

The idea is that whilst I’m chilling at home whilst I have something on tv playing I can have this out and practice my knots. Practice makes perfect they say.

Knot practice board

Back in a previous post I wrote that I personally only needed to know and practice five knots.

This board allows me to practice those five knots.

I’m tempted to ask Dave to add a horizontal bar connecting the two vertical ones maybe 2 or 3 inches from the base.

But I do love what he has made for me.

Coffee camping/hiking/backpacking

Yesterday morning the latest YouTube video by Chef Corso on his outdoors eats channel dropped. It was about a subject very close to my heart and I take very seriously. Coffee.

I’ve been on a very long coffee journey.

I grew up drinking instant coffee, Camp coffee. I even remember vaguely that my folks had a coffee percolator. They were a thing at one time in the seventies.

But let’s jump forward a few decades to the noughties, and married life. That’s when I started to take coffee seriously. I made a pretty mean latte.

When I was able to get out I tried lots of different solutions for coffee whilst out on the trail. Instant, liquid coffee, coffee grinds in a MSR Mugmate coffee filter (which is still an option).

In the years since moving back to my home town, caring duties, my coffee knowledge widened. I really like getting my coffee from small coffee roasters. Beans are described liked fine wines. Being single source and a higher grade they taste amazing usually. I find that these better quality beans I can also drink black.

I love my Aeropress. But now days my preferred method of making a coffee is using a Hario V60 pour over. It produces great consistent cups of coffee. I also make my own cold brew. Which I tend to make during the Summer. It’s so refreshing on a hot day.

Now the options for a really amazing coffee whilst out are numerous. Below is a brief summary of the ones I currently have and used.

Obviously no matter what way you decide to make your coffee you need to start with a quality bean. You will taste the difference. So splash out and treat yourself.

I prefer taking beans (less messy if the bag bursts) and grinding the beans myself. For this task I have a Hario Mini Mill Plus.

As a camping option for making large quantities of coffee I have a Hellery Camping Coffee Percolator Pot. It makes a reasonable coffee. I get that nostalgic glow when using it.

I also have a mocha pot for possible camp use. They are fine. There is definitely an art to getting a great cup of coffee out of them.

You can take your Aeropress (if you have one). It makes great coffee and is easy to clean.

Along similar lines you could take a cafetiere. Or like I have for the Jetboil (and a rival) the coffee press accessory. It makes fine coffee as long as you use the correct grind and seep it correctly. Pain to clean.

My preference at the moment is the MERMOO YILAN Collapsible Pour Over Coffee Dripper Cone. It comes with a storage bag that you can fit some filters in to. There are other brands that do their version of a pour over cone. You could even use a V60.

You can make cold brew coffee whilst camping or on the trail. I have a 32oz wide neck Nalgene water bottle for this and cold brew filter bags that hold the coffee grinds.

At a push and in a hurry I’ll use coffee bags. They are better than instant.

If you take your coffee seriously one of the above options that I have briefly mentioned should get you a great coffee fix away from civilisation and out in nature.

Planning a walk with Nath

With the impending visit to Nath I have warned him that we will be going for a walk whilst I’m there.

I have an idea of where we will be walking after getting a 1:50k os map of the area and finding a woods not far from Nath’s.

The plan is that we’ll stop brew up, even have something to eat.

With that in mind

New gear arrivals in last six weeks or so (not everything I’m sure):

  • 32 OZ, Wide Mouth, Nalgene bottle
  • 50PCS Cold Brew Coffee Filter Bags
  • Snow Peak Folding Nylon Cooking Ladle
  • Toaks titanium 1350ml pot
  • CAMPINGMOON Compact Foldable Stove
  • Hellery Camping Coffee Percolator Pot
  • 1:50k os maps for eTrex 32x gps
  • Belgian military hooped bivy
  • DD Hammocks lightweight hammock and under quilt (not sure if mentioned before)

I’m taking the BRS 3000T stove for this trip. I’ve not used it and it needs an outing.

The Nalgene bottle is for making cold brew whilst at Nath’s and when I go away whether camping or in hotels. Hence the filter bags.

For me to turn my dried bean and veg bags into a soup or stew for me and Nath my current pots just weren’t large enough. I think the largest was 900ml. So I got the larger 1350ml Toaks pot. That should be big enough cooking for two. Hence why I got the Snow Peak ladle. The percolator is for camping trips.

I’m hoping that the woodland walk and a bit of chill time will help Nath with all life has thrown at him recently.

Obviously a lot of this stuff will be used when camping or even backpacking. But with me using a campsite for next years UKGE, getting bits in that will make that trip as “glamorous” as possible. Or my take on it using a mixture of backpacking gear and camping gear.

Knots for tarps and other bits!

I think one of the things I miss about living in Farnborough and thinking about it Crook, is being close to land you can wild camp in, practice setting up hammocks etc.

Back in Farnborough I could be walking the wolf pack, stopping for a brew in a quiet spot within 10 minutes of leaving the house. 30 minutes or more and I could be at Frensham Little Pond doing the same.

My old stove talk videos were filmed in the woods around Farnborough. And I often just chilled out in a quiet corner with the wolf pack and a brew.

In fact back in 2008 when I was told I was at risk of being made redundant, and because of this shocking bit of news given the option to take the rest of the day off. I didn’t even think twice I took them up on the “kind” offer.

Within an hour and half I had taken the train home, thrown a brew kit in the car, found a quiet spot at Fleet Pond with the wolf pack and was contemplating life, the universe, and the days events over a hot brew.

In fact apart from one other occasion during the redundancy process for signing some papers I never returned to the office. I wasn’t required to. That bit was a blessing because it was at this time Kate decided she no longer wanted to be married to me. It would have been hard to go into the office each day, concentrate on work, and pretend life was good. When it obviously wasn’t. The redundancy process spared me from all that.

But here in Wisbech I’m not so lucky on that front. I’ve yet to find those spots of refuge.

Up to an hour away is Sandringham which I think if I wild camped there might see my sleep interrupted by armed officers. My other option is around a similar traveling time, possibly a bit longer Thetford.

I do plan to explore Thetford a bit more in the future. It does seem to be a popular spot for some YouTubers to show off their bushcraft skills whilst wild camping.

There are some interesting wooded areas nearer (but still not local) that need to be investigated for suitability.

But it’s only when you no longer have it that you truly miss what you once took for granted.

In the meantime as I try and find spots that I can do a quick on the spur of the moment wild camp I’m practicing my knots.

When it comes to using a tarp and hammock I don’t like using cord with plastic (or metal) tensioning bits on them. They break, limit what the cord can be used for, etc, etc. I’m of the school that prefers to tie knots.

For me the knots I need to know when using a tarp or plan to use with my hammock are the following:

  • Bowline
  • Clove hitch
  • Prusik knot
  • Trucker’s Hitch
  • Tautline hitch

So how would I be using these knots when setting up my tarp?

The bowline I’m using to attach the paracord to a tie on point of the tarp. Or giving me a loop to use for tying one end of the paracord round a tree for creating a ridge line between two trees.

The clove hitch I use to secure the paracord to my trekking poles.

Whilst I use a truckers or tautline hitch to go round the tent peg (or tree) and tension the line.

Where does the prusik knot come in? That’s for when I’m using a ridge line I can use this knot to attach a tarp or bug netting to it. I do carry a couple of pre-made prusik loops for quick and easy use. I know these prusik loops are not intended for mountaineering and climbing ropes. So the knot I’ve used for them is the common overhand knot instead of the more appropriate double fisherman’s knot for joining two ends together.

For me those 5 knots allow me to do everything I need to do with a tarp or hammock.

I’m also in this downtime prepping meal ideas.

My current experiment/idea involves soaked, then cooked, and then dehydrated beans! Which I will added freeze dried garden peas, dried carrot, dried sweet corn, dried shiitake mushrooms, and/or sliced dried mushrooms (that I dried in the dehydrator).

The idea is that these packets can be added to vegetable stock and some herbs/seasoning to make either a bean soup or stew that requires minimal cooking.

My Take On Overnight Oats

My old camp routine when I was doing something like the TGO Challenge, out in the Lakes, or Brecon Beacons, used to see me brave the elements to answer the call of nature. Followed by breaking camp and going on my way. So I could easily be hiking by 6am or 6:30am. Rarely would I go back to sleep or have a leisurely breakfast and brew before breaking camp.

Often all I’d have as I set off would be some Jolt gum to give me a caffeine hit.

I wouldn’t stop for breakfast and brew until around maybe 8:30 or even 9am. I’d find a spot to rest, breakout the cooking kit and get a brew made. Breakfast would be maybe a cold pop tart, or muesli bar of some kind.

Back then I’d never even heard of overnight oats. It was working at Huntingdon Regional College (now no longer as it swallowed up in a merger of colleges) when I first come across overnight oats. My then line manager Venessa used to bring them in for her breakfast.

Thinking about it, with a vegan colleague/friend I got exposed to one or two new food experiences whilst there.

But it wasn’t until I left that I first made my version of over night oats.

Just after adding water but before stirring

This is what I put in my overnight oats. You will notice I don’t list quantities. Everything is based around how much oats I am using. Then I judge the rest by eye.

  • Oats
  • Raisins
  • Sultanas
  • Chai seeds
  • Dried cranberries
  • Diced Dehydrated Dried Apple Flakes
  • Dried Goji Berries
  • Dried Sweetened Blueberries
  • Sun Dried Sour Cherries
  • Sweetener of some kind, ones I’ve used in past sugar, agave nectar, and honey
  • Pinch of salt
  • Sweet cinnamon

To make this into a recipe that can be used out on the trail (that sounds so pretentious) instead of adding regular milk and letting it soak overnight in the fridge. I use powdered milk, and add water.

When making this for the next morning I usually add roughly the same amount of water/milk (maybe a little bit more) as I have dried ingredients. Give it a good stir, and put the lid on. After a couple of hours I might add a little bit more liquid or check in the morning adding more liquid to get a consistency I like.

Vacuum packed ready to go

As you can see from the list of ingredients I like my over night oats to be fruity and a mixture. I love the texture that the chai seeds add.

The container I’m using is a Vadasz garlic & dill sauerkraut container that holds 400g of said product. My overnight oat portions fill approximately half of the container.

The nice thing is about repurposing this container is I get to eat the original contents first. So well worth the nearly £4 I paid for it.

False Dawn

Well that’s the shortest return ever!

I was minutes from my destination. The phone signal had almost disappeared. So I decided to call Mum to let her know I was virtually there.

That’s when things changed.

I was going to have to turn back.

But before I did I stopped at a parking spot I had spotted on the drive in for a break and something to eat.

After having driven for so long I needed this before repeating the journey.

After a coffee, and a rehydrated 6 Bean chilli I made my way back home.

Yes I’m very disappointed that the plans did not go as intended. But as Jack Reacher says “Plans go to hell as soon as the first shot is fired.”

At least I knew that the food side was working.

Boiling water, rehydrating my home made dehydrated chilli in the Ziplock Aluminium Foil Bag, and using the pot cozy worked well. I liked using the UCO Collapsible Cup. Using my old sea to summit folding bowl to eat the chilli from. Ok I used the bowl because I had some tortillas chips, grated cheese and squeezy sour cream on top. Not easy to do if eating from the bag.

I also started the over night oats. Which by this morning were “perfect”. I might add a little bit more milk powder in future.

I had intelligence about where I had planned to leave the car. It’s a totally viable spot. It’s hard to judge the suitability of a spot when all the map shows is the letter P. So it’s good to know that this is a great spot to leave the car.

My adjusted plans for my week off will see me spend time playing with kit whilst doing this son carer thing.