Hi all. I just came back from 3 weeks camping. I loaded up the SUV with about 90% of my gear! (Sheesh!) My thoughts were that I would get to practice and try out a bunch of new stuff and combinations of gear. I didn't actually use all my gear that I brought, I simply didn't get around to it all. Luckily I had the room for it all. Unfortunately, I didn't take a whole lot of pictures or video to share my trip experiences. Most of time I was car camping in National Parks (Jasper/Banff) with a lot of day-hiking and kayaking and other activities like geocaching. Later in the year I will have to do some backpacking too. The first few days were extreme fire hazard and they didn't allow any type of stoves, even canisters in the back country so that put a damper on the overnight trip plans and confined me to base camping in a campground.

The weather was mild and sunny at first and then mostly cool and in the second half of my stay, for several days it rained, snow-showered and snowed at higher altitudes. It seems winter has lingered on and on for far too long this year.

One of the first things I did was take a couple of navigation courses from Boreal Wilderness Institute (Bruce Zawalsky, another ETS poster). That was 3 days of excellent instruction and as it turns out I replaced my Suunto MCA with a Brunton 15TDCL (previously marketed as the Silva Ranger CL) compass which is overall a more useful tool. The price was reasonable $59CDN but added to my overall vacation budget. I am much more confident in the use of my compass and the use of pace beads for navigating and fine-tuned the use of my GPS.

I've also used a couple of wood stoves (Bush Buddy and Firebox), my alcohol stove and backup which happened to be a mico-rocket canister stove! I think the BB is going to be my companion from now on, I liked it that much! At only 6 oz, it fits into my Primus pot perfectly and then I also nest my .5 oz alcohol stove , folding spork, a couple oz. of alcohol in a small bottle, MicroPur water purification tablets, some tinder and mini-Bic. Having it all nest together is a big plus. The Firebox is OK but better suited for kayak or car camping due to its weight. It can use larger thumb sized wood than the BB but it literally uses 2x the fuel. The BB requires smaller twigs or pencil sized wood chopped down to suit. Both stoves burn so completely and quickly that they leave little ash.

I literally brought my entire fire kit and experimented with various tinders, lighters, ferro rods, matches, etc. I was checking to see the burning behaviour of different types of tinders (everything from pre-made stuff to natural tinders to more household items).

Most of the time I split duty between my Mora Robust knife and Spyderco Tenacious for all my camp duties, although I did use my hatchet to split the largest logs and my multi-tool to do some zipper repairs. I just never got around to using my saws and shovels.

As usual, I lost yet another pair of sunglasses that for some reason I put on my Tilley hat when they are not needed and then it disappears when I walk into the bush! I seem to loose one pair every year to this habit! Actually, I lost 2 pair on my Yellowstone/Rushmore vacation! So I switched to using eyeglass croakies. Maybe, just maybe I will keep from losing another pair?

I did get time to practice my knots and had several types of cordage with me (paracord, fishing line, string, tarred seine line, etc. During the rain it was easier to just hunker down and play/practice with these types of things.

Sounds like a fabulous trip, Roar. I am officially jealous!

Did you gain any I sights while doing your fire experiments? My son and I have been exploring the various natural tinder and fuel options here and it's quite interesting.

I'd love to see pics if you have any and the time to share. :-)

Pictures are being uploaded to Flickr right now - it takes forever when I include the videos!

Some tinders glow rather than flame, ex. char cloth or tree fungus or almond nuts which means that you need to pay a bit more attention to blocking the excessive wind when starting the fire or using small secondary tinder like shavings. Other tinders like fresh corn chips or Vaseline coated cotton burn furiously when lit. Steel wool also burns very quickly when exposed to a flame but glows when lit by electricity. Human hair is almost useless as it tends to flair quickly and then melt instead of burning. Magnesium scrapings burn very quick and only serve to start other tinders otherwise it is useless by itself. Fresh birch bark is the bomb! Unfortunately I was using older dried out bark. Candles are great as the starter under existing fuel but if withdrawn early enough can be reused. The pre-made Coughlan's or TinderQuik tinders are relatively expensive but are really compact and convenient. Hexamine and trioxane stink like crazy and I hate being downwind of them - but they work!

Top left and clockwise:
Coughlan's tinder match, Vaseline/cotton, char cloth, trioxane, hexamine, Pro-Force matches, wax coated strike anywhere, birch bark, steel wool, more hexamine?, tea candles, birthday candles, Coughlan's matches, Fire-steel, magnesium bar, corn chips, almonds, human hair, tree fungus, various paper matches, $1 store matches, Coughlan's tinder, TinderQuik, REI matches.

Weirdly enough, the easiest matches to light were the $1 store stuff! Next up were the REI matches because they had so much burning fuel coated on them. My own waterproofed strike-anywhere matches were a miserable failure. Mini-bics are mostly reliable but I needed several flicks to get a flame. My Solo butane lighter works great IF you adjust the screw for the right size flame - at altitude it doesn't work as well and the piezo ignition needs to be dry to work properly. I have a bunch of various fire steels that all work once I scrapped the outer surface off. If I get time I will transcribe my notes and post them.

I was burning lodge pole pine that was split into quarters and dried. I further split the logs with the hatchet and using my knife to baton. I found a wet and very dense and hard stick that I carved to fit my hand - I don't think it was pine. One quarter of a log would provide enough split wood for 10 BB fires! The pine was nice because it didn't crackle or spark much and yet still had enough resin to burn. Some of the residue from the burning ended up on the pots but that wipes off easy after the trip.

The Bush Buddy needed very small pieces - basically pencil thickness and snapped into 2-3" lengths but the Firebox could use thumb sized pieces to 4" long. But you know what they same about wood -- "it heats you 2x. The first time when you split and process it and secondly when you burn it!"

Kitchen kit spread out

Kitchen kit assembled


The Firebox in action. I choose to set the pot IN the stove at this height but could have used move the "firesticks" to the top and put the pot on top if I wished and fed the fuel through the side.

Wow! Just wow! :-) :-)

Wow, looks like you had a great time! Can't wait to get some dirt time in myself this summer.

Very interesting account and great pictures. I was there once, but not for nearly long enough. The Canadian Rockies are astoundingly beautiful. Living at pretty close to sea level, I have some equipment that I have not used at altitude, and I'm heading toward the US Rockies in two weeks. Looking forward to seeing your notes.

Inspiring! Thanks for posting. I recognize the Jasper pics. Gotta steal a few days and get out to the Rocks.