My first night in the woods, in my HH ...

Well, let's say I did everything wrong, but the hammock was fine !

First of all, I was not that well prepared for that trip in the woods : I decided to do it friday evening and had many shopping to do saturday morning before leaving.
But the weather forecast (at least the one I heard friday morning !) was for a nice week-end.... and it was too stupid to let it pass .... So I took my monday off, to make it a long nice week-end ...

Instead of leaving Paris at midday, I finally left at about 5 am !
Arriving at the village where I wanted to leave the car, a bare half hour before sunset ! <img src="/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

I just had time to walk a mile or so inside the forest and light was out !
I had no time to correctly choose my spot ; I had trouble to find correctly spaced out trees ... I finally found trees, without too much brambles in between, checked with my SureFire G2 that no menacing dead limbs were overhead, and attached the HH to two sound, not too big, trees, a Photon III between my lips (yes .... I had forgotten my head light in the other backpack !! <img src="/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />)

At first it was quite hot inside the HH and I was satisfied with the silk liner and the light foam mattress I had taken along (did I mentioned I also had forgotten to pack a heavier blanket ?!?)
But with the night, the temp. dropped rapidly and more so, when it's started raining ... around midnight I had to put some clothes on. I was not shivering but I got cold enough to catch one (I mean I catched a cold that night..)

For my first night in the dark woods, I didn't sleep a lot : strange noises, some a bit further, some real close.... I guess those grunts I heard must have been a boar. Other sounds remained unindentified.

At dawn, I was already awaked and broke camp quite quickly...
HH is really easy to set up and to put back into its snake skins.
And except for the temperature problem, I was quite comfy inside : didn't need to sleep on my side, as I usually do in my bed. The natural curve my body adopted when lying on my back was relaxing.
And no problem with the (light) rain. I had apparently correctly positioned the rain fly.

With the returned light, I could also see that I had set the HH up, right above a small (game?) path .....
And had I gone a mile further the previous evening, I would have found a place with NO brambles at all between correctly spaced, perfectly sized trees ... <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

As for the fine predicted weather, it rained all morning long ! So, after a few humid miles, I set the hammock up again and now slept a bit, until the sun came back, at the beginning of the afternoon.
Seeing I was not properly equipped for the weather, I declined to spend another night outside and headed back home, where my cat was keeping the bed warm ....

Another thing bothered me : in the morning, I encountered a forest guard, who told me there was a lot of poaching in these woods .....
And I don't know if poachers obey Jeff Cooper's 4 laws of safe gun handling (especially the one about "know what's behind your target") - how could they in the dark ? ....
Which lead to the following question :
- what would (or do) you do : leave a red 360? Krill light (for instance) hanging outside the hammock, all night long to signal its position ?
- or prefer stealth .... not to attract harmful two-legged critters ...
?????? <img src="/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />
Do you have that kind of problem over the pound ? Or in GB or Germany ?
How do you deal with it ?
[edit] I started another thread on this "poaching" subject. Please use it to give your opinions. [/edit]
Or do you think I could ask Hennessy for a replacement, if a slug goes thru the noseeum netting - pretending that was a really BIG mosquito ? <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />


Next time, I will have my head light, a good blanket or sleeping bag, arrive with daylight, choose a place without brambles and NOT above a game path ..... <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

Did I say the Hennessy Hammock was fine ? <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />