Frontier Camping

I went camping this weekend with a group of folks that dress (and camp) in the style of the revolutionary war. There were about 50 of us from all across the state. Most had their authentic style tents made of thick canvas and outfits made with antique buttons and various animal skins; however, I had to camp with the other less exciting folks in a modern tent area called "St. Louis".

The weekend was eventfull. I got to participate in tomahawk and knife throwing contests, watch demonstrations of black power musketry and even demostrate my own fire starting abilities. Not that I'm bragging (much) - but I should point out that among the moderns, I placed second in the 'hawk throw and first with the knife. The fire craft was new to me and I must say the most unexpected thing I may have done in several years.

With propane, lighter fluid .. even charcoal and matches unavailable, I was certain to be out of my element. The frontiersman camping fellowship, as they are called, use the "birds nest method". This involves making a nest of sorts out of dry grass and other twig like material. Into this nest, you are to drop a piece of very dry cloth that you have managed to spark with flint and steel. After accomplishing this task, the frontiersman will pick up the nest and hold it to his face like some strange pipe and blow "long and smooth" into the center - therby encouraging the flame. As long as the nest is only smoking, you should continue to blow ... but when it bursts into flames, you should drop it onto your remaining sticks and logs.

If you missed the image, I'll recap: I started a fire in my hands - on purpose!

The strange part about it was that while I was out there among the men with names like Grey Owl, Bald Eagle, and Large Mouth Bass; I felt a need to accomplish this challenge. The need to overcome my feelings of inadequacy - even after seeing others fail to get fire at all was overwhelming. So I tried it ... and threw down a flaming nest in under 30 seconds - noone bothered to time me since it was my first try. Even the guy that lent me his flint had been asking me if "knew how to use it" because if not I wold just "knock the heck out of it and ruin it". I was happy to hand it back to him only having struck it 3 times.

Grey Owl is a good friend of mine. He told me that when he tried to make a fire like this in his frontier adventure (sort of like an initation challenge) he was so nervous that he couldn't get his nest to flame at all and kept having to re-spark his cloth over and over. This weekend he did it in 14 seconds flat and beat out all of the "old timers".