On the day that I went out into the woods to create a shelter I had a simple plan. I would create a lean-to style shelter with a raised bed and an area for a fire. Simple enough.
After walking the woods trying to find a suitable spot, I found a rather large log that was laying on the ground. With a little work, this would provide a good base on which to build my raised bed. I set to work creating the base of my shelter by using logs, large and small, which I found laying around. The easiest way to describe what I ended up with was wood stacked in what would look very close to a tic-tac-toe board. By weighting each of these four “legs” down, I could have a suitable place to lay branches to create my bed. The bed would be on one of the outer sides of the tic-tac-toe board.
After about 2 or so hours into the build, I started to get tired. I didn’t really think that the process would be so labor intensive.
Of course, being a few pounds lighter and working out more would probably have helped. Anyway, I carried on with my task. Once the base was totally complete,
I began to lay down long, straight, and strong branches for the bed. Unfortunately, the stuff on the ground was mostly rotting (I had used all the good stuff), so I had to sacrifice some trees in order to get the materials that I needed. About 7 to 10 long pieces of wood completed the bed frame.
Normally, you would want to create a mattress for your bed out of pine boughs. I was, however, in a deciduous forest and had to make due with ground vegetation. I stripped the soft leaves from the woody stalks and created a nice mattress for myself. It could have been thicker, but it would do.
I was tired.
It was then, that I realized my major mistake. Although I had a good spot for the base of the shelter (or so I thought), there were no close trees to which I could tie a ridge pole for my lean-to. I could have tried to create something myself with a lot of wood, cordage, and frustration – but I didn’t think this would be the suitable way to do things in the wild. I made a mistake, and I would live with it. There would be no lean-to over my bed.
This exercise taught me a few things about going into the woods. They were simple things. The biggest thing I learned from this was: Do not under estimate the time and energy things will take in order to get your camp set up. Be sure to give yourself enough time to complete your projects or it will be dark and you will still be working on your bed that still doesn’t have a roof on it! You can find out more about additional skills relating to wilderness survival.
Related Wilderness – Survival Articles