In Nature with children

My boy and his cousin proud of their fishing spears

We all know that taking children out into nature is good for them, it gets them away from the screens and computers, their mobile phones and X boxes. To me though there is something more, to best describe my feelings on this I would say that nature teaches children something. I struggle to describe what that is but it's meaningful. Being out in nature brings them a sense of achievement, it allows their imagination to flourish, their in built ability to discover to thrive.

I have a 5 year old son and a 2 year old daughter both of them have been camping out with me and taking day trips regularly since week or two old. They are comfortable outdoors and enjoy it, it has certainly enriched their lives so far. I believe that it has taught them confidence and perseverance, humility and compassion. Certainly in Leo who has much more ability to express his feelings with words. In the weekend just gone we had slept out in hammocks during the most impressive display of thunder of lightning storm I had ever camped out in. Thankfully it lasted only the night and we awoke to glorious sunshine. The three kids, Leo, Lexi and their cousin Tristan were not at all afraid of the thunder storm, they slept well and the most magical thing for me about the entire experience wasn't until Leo took himself to his hammock the next night. As I kissed him goodnight whilst he was snug and comfortable suspended between trees, he looks straight at me and as softly as you can imagine he says "Daddy, I love sleeping out in the nature." These are words I've longed to hear from my son, I've always seen his enjoyment and passion for learning all I can teach him... Sometimes more than I can teach him recently but to hear him say it outright is so special as a parent and as a student of nature.


We too feel this, sometimes Prehaps without even noticing. Simply taking ourselves away from modern trappings, time constraints, financial stress and lack of social interaction too.
I have always found that I've eaten better in terms of set meals, I am not for example too busy at work at skip lunch to ensure jobs are done like I do in the modern world.
Social time around the fire without my mobile phone to interfere.
Waking up feeling refreshed not worrying about the day to come. These small things that are often so much a part of our lives that we don't often consider the detrimental effects on our mind set.

It makes me think to the many documentaries and study I've seen about so called primitive communities, they generally seem happier with their lives although in some respect harder and living closer to the edge as it were. They sing they dance, smile and seem to be at far more peace than the modern man.

So I come to what it is me and my kids do when we're out and about because this is a subject that may concern some people.
I have already mentioned their ages, but this does not scare me at all. This weekend gone had Leo pointing a stick using a mora knife I then split it and made it into a primitive fishing spear. It had Lexi getting to grips with the knife too! A few minutes was enough to satisfy her curiosity. They were helping to collect fire wood and they built up the fire using small kindling sticks.
We made mallets and they used them to help me split wood with my hatchet.

Little things done in a safe manner expel the curiosity and entertain them. It starts to build on skills for life, something that the scout association is now pushing out with mass advertising and training programmes into what this means to scouts.

Possibly the best moment was teaching them about shelter building and making model shelters in the woods. The principles they built them on are the very same principles when building a full sized shelter. Fantastic skills that also require patience and willpower to carry on until there done.

 The tarp set up, this one is what my Partner Nicole slept in the weekend. It was her first time in a hammock.

The kids safe learning about fire, Leo's excitement when the small sticks burst into flame.

 This is the shelter builds. A fantastic task in the woods.
An hour to kill some time and the kids enjoy it.

You will want to find a decent spot with the right resources and follow all the sames principles as you would with a full sized shelter.



Hopefully this helps you, whether your a scout leader or parent or teacher etc. Enriching young people's lives by being out in nature is something that has been pushed a lot in recent and there are many ways to get them involved.

A Journey with(out) a Purpose

Okay, so there wasn't really any purpose for these journeys. The Journey itself was the purpose, as well as brushing up on some navigation skills.

The Map and Compass has been my least practised skill since I got into the outdoors and Bushcraft so it was well over due to actively take a map and compass and see if we could walk on a bearing correctly or would I totally mess it all up.

In Hindsight moving away from my Bike may have been a good idea! However with an Ali Frame as apposed to a Steel Frame I was fortunate not to stray off course. I believe the effect on the compass would be worse on Steel.

So with the help of Shane Gadd and Spirit Meets Adventure we set out on our bikes with map and compass in hand and just went wherever it seemed right. through the heart and the outskirts of Tilgate Forest, staying away from the usual trails so better to put in practice the trust for the compass.

I will add at this point that my Bike was kindly donated by Matt Hill and Cycle Recycle. Matt is a friend of myself and Shane's that as well as running Golden Glow Reiki, he's also doing an incredible job at getting people back on their bikes, getting outdoors, keeping fit and frankly doing everyone a favour alongside Shane by inspiring people to get out and making it possible for them to do so. 

This was the first of two trips I have done with Shane with the Map and Compass, but this one was particularly special as I was able to get out on the bike and that added a different element to the navigation too. 

The following week or so at scouts I touched on some of the elements used in map reading. My scout group have always struggled to understand maps so we stripped it back and in fact they were learning about them without even realising. A simple game of battle ships my way and now they fully understand 4 figure and 6 figure grid references. 

The game started by having a blank Grid with 2 figure digits on the x and y axis... this was all they knew at this point. They were then asked to position battle ships within the squares on the grid. 

The idea behind it was to start by giving your opponent a 4 figure grid ref, if a ship was in that square your opponent would have to tell you at that stage. From there you have to get a direct hit using next a 6 figure grid reference. A simple game that when the ''map'' element was removed the scouts had the chance to absorb the information. Now I can throw a map in front of them ask for a 6 figure grid reference to say, their house or where they are now and they can quickly check and fire the answer back at me with confidence. A good start to understanding the map and building confidence.

The next trip myself and Shane embarked on was to Ashdown Forest and on New Years Eve! A start to a fantastic new year I reckon!

About to settle down with some lunch and a GORGEOUS hot chocolate with a splash of spiced rum!

We embarked with a map of the area and our compass' we followed the bearing almost exactly which at times took us through dense patches with nothing but a small animal trail to walk along.

This was good experience as I had learnt that our minds can be our enemy when trying to follow the compass. What you think is the right way can sometimes take you in totally the wrong direction which led me to doubt the compass (or at least my ability to use it), It's easy to see why people often get lost on day trips and hikes when they leave unprepared. 

My thoughts on this were that the mind tends to follow a path laid out for you already, whereas the compass doesn't care if there is a brick wall in the way either way you have trust your own senses but remember to rely on the compass too. 

Some of the denser patches we pushed through. evidently it seems that the those two bracken branches were broken already so perhaps I wasn't the first to move through this patch. 

While we were headed to Ashdown Forest I had to show Shane the Hut that was built there to represent what a Mesolithic building may have looked like. 

Shane stood inspired in front of the Mesolithic hut

Personally if I could have right then and there I would have loved to spend the night in that hut, You could feel the temperature difference just standing inside it. Incredible. 

I intend to make a massive effort in documenting, for my own purpose and sharing all that I get up to as much as possible. So I will be following up on this small article soon. 

If you want to get to grips with map and compass but don't know which is the north end of your compass needle... Have a look at these brilliant videos from Steve Backshall that lays it all out in a simple easy to understand format. Click here for the videos.

Let's keep the woods looking beautiful.

We have a love of the outdoors, we enjoy seeing it's natural beauty right?

Well to go for a walk and see it is great but if like me that brings a desire to spend extended periods of time outdoors you may study some bushcraft skills, perhaps you know a bit as a former scout etc.

So we may come to the woods for a long camp to see it's beauty, we'll have a camp fire and may even have a few cans of beer (most will agree).
This leaves a noticeable amount of destruction though, no matter how careful we are, we WILL leave a trace.

Now your probably thinking what about the ''leave NO trace rule'' or some I've heard say ''Take only pictures, leave only footprints''.
Whichever way you phrase it it means leave nothing behind. Well anybody who has studied a bit of tracking knows this should be taken with a pinch of salt. We can't leave NO trace but we can tidy up and give a little back to the nature we enjoy so much.

So do we all know how to correctly clear up.
We can all take the trash home with us. I'm referring to the camp fire.

So we have our fire roaring to cook on and keep us warm, but how do we ''leave no trace''. 

How on earth do we clear it up?

It actually all starts before we attempt to put it out.

Here are the last few embers and wood burning through to leave as little as possible to clean up. 

I have arranged my fire just before I took down my tarp and packed my gear away so that it would smoulder away to leave less to clear.
Depending on what state the fire is in will obviously determine how long the process is, normally for me after breakfast and a cuppa I will leave it to look like the above.

So I move all the large chunks closer to the middle of the heat and then start to pack up.
once I got back to it my fire would look a bit like this:

You can see from the smoke this is still smouldering away and the left over coals are still burning away at this point. 

Here you can see I'm ready to put out the fire, the smoke has stopped now but be careful the ground is still hot.

So it's obvious I'm going to pour water over the fire. I actually used three times the amount you see above so that's three buckets full.

Now step by step. 

Hot ash filled steam rises from the first douse. Be Careful.

Be careful when pouring your first douse over. What seems like a fire that has no life to it surprisingly fights back when it is hit by some water. The steam that rises from the ashes is hot and a step back might be necessary.

The steam will calm down eventually

Eventually three buckets later it is out and steam is not appearing at all. 

So our fire is out and the heat is gone. Although we are still left with a damp pile of ash.

Only by touch can we truly tell if it is out properly. 

Now scoop up all the ashes and scatter them into the woods around you, Nature will clear the scattered ashes as plant life love all the ashes anyway. 

Once all that is done, we can use a pointed stick (I use the stick I would have likely already used for my pot hangers) and poke some holes into the ground as deep as you can, I then douse the area again with more water. It's better to be 100% sure as the fire can smoulder underground.

Poking a sharp stick as deep as you can will help heat escape that's trapped underground

If it is left to smoulder underground it may re-appear later. The chances of this happening also varies depending on the type of ground you have your fire. You may have heard not to start a fire on peat grounds. 

Now the fire is safe and the mass of it is cleared. Nature will do the rest but for cosmetic reasons I will try to cover it with the natural litter around. scattering the leaves with a makeshift broom or just your stick will help it look that little bit more untouched. 

When we start our fire, we clear the ground anyway. So why not clear the area into a pile to the side so we are left with material to cover the area back with.

You'll be amazed by the results once it is done this way. 

It takes a bit of time but it's what we give back to nature after it has given to us. 

A fair trade between us and the natural world and it leaves the area looking nice for the next person or even ourselves. 

After all we tend to visit these places for their beauty, so as the title of this post... Let's keep the woods looking beautiful. 

Before the clear up.

After the clean up, A big improvement, Nature will do the rest for me. 

Some of my experience's in one

I'm keeping this fairly short and sweet but I felt like sharing a few of my experiences before this blog.
Why I love the outdoors and what makes it special to me.

So let me start by explaining my initial love of the outdoors.

Here is a picture of my dad, a simple display of bushcraft to hide from the sun.

My family have had a great influence on my love of the outdoors in general this picture of my dad on holiday gets me every time... always reminds me of the acronym K.I.S.S (keep it simple stupid).

I can't remember the temperature my dad faced in this picture, but I do know it was very hot, and shade was welcomed with little excursion of energy, the idea of the holiday after all was to relax.

My mum had grown up on farm, just off from, at the time a small village, so inbred into me was a natural outdoor enthusiasm, but sadly this was only truly unlocked a few years ago, when I started to live with my cousin a wise man with a powerful druid lifestyle, I remember one time brewing nettle beer with him I loved the fact that the main ingredient was free, and right outside the front door (as such).

It was still only after I moved out that I started to grow my own beliefs.
There are lots of different views to my beliefs and like bushcraft itself has come to mean many a different thing, so I feel I must elaborate. My views are simple and not far than most other religions except one thing, when most turn to a god I turn to nature. God is described by stating he creates life, sustains it and when we pass we return to him... In my view this describes nature! Maybe there is a God that pulls the strings but in my view if that were true he'd respect me still for respecting Nature and it's beauty despite me not believing in one God.

My Uncle, the start of my Bushcraft experience

When I began to learn bushcraft and outdoor living skills the first man I turned to was my uncle, It was the picture above that made me do this. There he is teaching friction firelighting. I was amazed by his knowledge and how much he knew about the land, and I craved this knowledge and absorbed every word he told me like a sponge. All bar a few corrections later I think I learnt well and still continuing to do so.

So then it was I saved enough to participate in a course with a bushcraft school, I studied the web hard to find a teacher I could trust, and I wont go through the hours of research I did as this is something each person needs to do themselves as we are all built on different opinions.

I came across Paul Kirtley and his school Frontier Bushcraft and to get a taste for the outdoors I took up the chance to go on his taster course, exactly what I needed to discover I was on the right path.

Here I am after a weekend in front of the shelter I had slept in.

This was a fantastic experience for me and also opened up a new door, again possibly some would put this skill under the same umbrella of ''bushcraft''... Tracking. What a fantastic way to view the environment around you.

I practiced my new knowledge... non stop

I got out and enjoyed the simple ways of being out doors without needing to spend loads of money

I had help from my family and even the land to practice and enjoy. 

I studied what was around me and enjoyed wandering in the beauty of the outdoors, it's important not to forget these things. 

I also had some cracking sunny mornings!

I was hooked, you couldn't get me to shut up about outdoor living skills, bushcraft, tracking and everything else about the outdoors.

I soon got hooked on courses, and now I have done a fair few, I love to learn with Frontier Bushcraft, Paul, James, Henry, Stuart, Matt etc. I have also found friendships with the guys at Woodlife Trails, Pablo, Trooper, JP, Austin, Hannah, Luke I could go on naming individuals who have been a part of my experiences but it would seem to go on forever. instead know that if you have ever taught me anything I guarantee I remember it and appreciate it!

So I can and will obviously still learn new things and perfect skills I have not yet perfected (if you can ever ''Perfect'' a skill) but where do I go from here, what do I hope to achieve?

As fun as it is writing a blog, I don't know whether I could keep it as regular as I would like. One thing I really strive to become... A bushcraft instructor.

This love has taken me to become a scout leader, where my new scout peers are very excited to have me on board. I enjoy the chance to get the kids learning outdoor skills, this is very important not just if they want to spend time outdoors but as any outdoors (bushcraft) practitioner will know it takes determination and patience to be successful at what we do. A great skill to pass on to the children of today!

So some education and the reasons I love learning and teaching these skills!

A little about the story of tracking and for true elaboration of this you must read my first post about the Woodlife trails course I did. It's fantastic to go into an area most of us are so unfamiliar with these days and like a psychic detective understand what has happened in the area, what animals have been there, when they were there, what they were doing and eating and by knowing the animals you can understand why they were there. You can see a story unfolding before your eyes just by looking at the clues around you.

It is when you have a knowledge on this do you no longer feel alone in a place that may see no people often.

A Badger paw print, only the beginning of tracking is actual tracks!

 There is more to tracking than following footprints in the sand. We are all trackers in our own rights. If I was to break into your home, bedroom or office and move everything around... would you not notice?

The art of tracking is first familiarizing yourself with the environment so that you can better understand and see that which is out of place.

 Another Important skill of Bushcraft is Identification, This leaf here is that of a Hazel tree Corylus Avelana 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corylus_avellana

This link will tell you more should you wish, but for me the Hazel is important to learn, it is common and widespread. Hazel is a food source when the nuts are good to eat. It is also good for finding straight lengths of wood for various tasks, and also great for creating fire by friction.

This is an Alder tree if we look just at the leaves you can see they're similar to the Hazel you would be forgiven for making the mistake. Too much of identification is looking at leaves or flowers, well there available a big chunk of the year but we forget a lot of the time to think about the area it's in and the other things growing (or in some cases not growing) around it.

Anyway for those who wish Alnus Glutinosa

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alnus_glutinosa

Even the smallest things like this crampball Daldinia Concentrica have a purpose in the outdoors. It's just learning what they are, how to find them and positively identify them and also how to harvest them and use them.

The most important thing (sorry to be a bit contradictory here) is to actually go out, explore and experiment and not sit indoors learning too much from the web because we only have one of our senses to learn... our eyes! Much of learning these skills is practice, be comfortable in the outdoors, touching and feeling different things, smells are also important and I guarantee you'll also come up with new ideas yourself and you will of course gain your own opinions not just that of other peoples online. You'll experience different situations get fed up with the weather for example and find your own way to combat it, Trial and error.

Enjoy getting out and hopefully our paths will cross in... The Great Outdoors!

Wilderness Immersion Course with Woodlife Trails.

 So a little while ago I was advised to start writing a blog about my Bushcraft antics.
Well after much consideration I am, I thought I'd start with my most recent course with Woodlife Trails.

I was looking forward to catching up with friends and meeting some new ones too! I started by catching up with Pablo, JP, and Austin Lill, who has become a good friend since we met on Frontier Bushcraft's 3 day Taster course in May last year.

I as mentioned met some new friends too. Among them was Trooper who was also instructing on this course And a fantastic job he did too!

The course title rings true to the meaning of this instructional weekend, ''Wilderness Immersion''. Although we were not quite in the middle of ''Wilderness'' we were in a beautiful ancient Victorian hunting woodland, looked after by the National Trust. The woodland is 1000 acres of diverse species of plant life and wildlife and so is a great setting for it.

The course is the first of a set of three, structured to go into real depth of tracking.
This one is designed to teach basics and immerse yourself into your environment and really know your surroundings. Your advised to slow down, relax and take it all in.

Now how it started. I arrived very early but this was not a problem as All the guys helping to run the activities were there already and I was welcomed quickly around the fire for a brew, but before the brew I decided to set up.

Knots in my usual way ''Evenk slippery figure-of-eight hitch'' followed by a ''Taut tarp hitch'' and ''Slippery adjustable loops'' for the Guy Lines REF: Ray Mears Essential Bushcraft

All set, soon after I decided to raise the furthest corner with a length of Hazel to open up the view.  

 All set up now and catching up, We were soon accompanied by the remainder of the course participants who all quickly set up and we went through some health and safety and a brief introduction of us all.
We then went to see if we could spot some badger activity with Pablo as it started to get dark. Sadly we didn't see a peep, probably all the noise from us all setting up.
It likely did contribute towards us all slowing down a bit though.

Once we had all returned and were ready to move again, Trooper took us out for some night vision introduction. Some science behind how our eyes work, and the use of night vision equipment. We were also given the golden rule of: White light is for emergencies only! This is because it effects how the rods in our eyes adapt to the darkness.

The next day we did some more tracking activities including sit spots and zoning in and also met up with the participants of a day course. We then went through all the basics of tracking. Different sign, compression shapes and our senses. This was all whilst walking through the beauty of Hatfield Forest.

Possibly one of the most entertaining of all the studies was the study of poo.
The excrement of animals can tell us loads! what they have eaten, how long ago they were there, sex and age in some cases and of course we know which species left it.

Here a few examples...

 Scat left by a badger, they dig latrines and are often marking territory... often containing berries when their available for the badgers to eat.

A more recent specimen, this was still wet. 

Even Green woodpeckers scat can be identified.

Muntjac poo, Woodpecker poo, Rabbit poo... You name it Pablo had a box of it!

Well that is quite enough poo for now!

Part of us all slowing down and learning to be a part of the woodland we did a Bare foot drum stalk. This was a blindfolded, bare foot listening experiment that meant following a drum beat. interesting results but I wont spoil it!

After this Pablo's words were ''you can put your shoes on now, if you want to that is''

I took this as acceptance to walk bare foot for the rest of the day, I've done this before normally when it's hot and I don't fancy sweaty socks and boots. But this was longest bare foot period and also over some rough ground.

A magical end to the day course, we were discussing the 8 s' as we were a herd of deer came towards our position, they legged it pretty quick once they saw us... A perfect end to the course for the folk that joined us for the day. 

We said farewell to the day participants and moved back to be briefed on our next challenge, for the course was not yet finished for us. 

We were staying out in a lightweight camp set up, taking notes and observing what was happening around us. 

My set up and the view of my lightweight camp. I choose this point because I could hide myself away and the wind direction was travelling in the right direction for me to watch out at a field and the tree line beyond it. 

After the experience earlier with the deer, I really wanted to see them again this time I wanted the upper hand and be able to just watch them. 

I got comfortable and waited, I enjoyed watching the birds and the rabbits. The insects quickly moved back into where I had set up, the rabbits approached closely and the birds were calm, the woodland then went quiet... like someone just switched it all off. It was not long before I switched off also.

As part of the night away we also had a second set of eyes. We had to set up trail cam's.

I shaped a stick into a wedge shape to help get the angles right and this is the area I had it set to watch. 

There was a lot of tracks there previously and I thought I may get lucky... 

Sadly I didn't capture anything. I enjoyed my night out, but I wanted to see deer. This didn't mean I didn't learn a lot, or that it ruined anything for me. It was just a personal desire to really sit and watch them. But it wasn't over yet...

We still had the morning and it was then I got my wish... I had no equipment as I had just got up and well, nature called. I saw a few deer I sat and enjoyed it. I went to reach for my camera only to realise It was still with my tarp about 15m behind me I didn't want to risk startling them at first and after literally 10 minutes of watching them I decided to risk it. I had Pablo's 8 S' in mind I crept back and grabbed my camera I did the same back to where I was and I grabbed these images and watched for a further 5 minutes.

I got my wish after all and the lesson was to be patient and prepared. Keep your wits about you and observe always. 

A great story to tell when we all got back for a de-brief.

we packed up and went t walk down to the cafe to finish up on our way we looked out for more tracks and signs.

 I'll leave you this one we found on our way down, a very clear track. I should have used a size comparison but sadly I forgot to.

It's a squirrel front foot. Another great find which sums up the whole week end. It was fantastic and I recommend it to everyone whether your interested in tracking or bushcraft or not at all, it really teaches you a lot more than just that. It teaches you about yourself.

Happy bushcrafting all! 

Woodlife Trails