First off, boy, if you being on high ground magically keeps you dry, how come your tent was wet? Oh, wait, becuase it doesn't!

Second, it takes more than a few minutes to get the framework of a 20'x20' shelter up, and a lot more than four knots. What you've described sounds like a lean to. Without supporting cross pieces, what youv'e described won't work, so maybe you left out your "secret step". No, it's going to take more than a few minutes to gather your frame poles and ready them. And a lot more than a few minutes to put a skin on it.

I've got to see a picture of this. A 20' wide lean to is such a waste of resources and time, it should be immortalized.

As for using pine, wow... How many pine trees do you strip for this? Pines suck for waterproofing- too skinny, too much space for drips to get through. If you had said ceder or spruce or certain firs, I'd belive you. If you had said you were stripping bark in sheets, I'd belive you, but at least I wouldn't think too much less of you. But PINE BOUGHS! Don't make me laugh.

By the way, I grew up camping in woods, in all seasons. I've been soloing since Regan was in office, and usually without a tent. I've built my own bow, and javelins with atl atl, and thrusting spears. I've made and used fire bows (with and without flywheels), spindles and troughs, and with flint and steel. (Hell, I carry a piece of pyrite and a piece of jasper with me when I'm flying, and list them as "gifts".) I've built lean tos like you're describing, brush shelters, proper long houses, yerts and teepees from the raw materials, and even a hay bale house. I've brain tanned and smoked hides. And I've played the "without even a knife" game before. I know how primative techniques fail- I like something with a lower failure rate.

As for water flowing up hill, let's just say that I probably know more about water than you do. I have watched if flow up hill, pushed by a 60 mile per hour wind gust. And I've watched it soak the ground, wicked uphill by the soil. And if you knew anything at all about lean tos, you'd know that keeping one dry is a bad joke becuase *gasp* the wind shifts. And you'd also know that aren't worth squat except as a break for the prevailing wind, they can't keep you warm. I've built several scores of them.

I can stay warm and dry in pretty much any weather conditions, and I leave no traces behind. You failed with a tent and sleeping bags, something which I would consider so fundamentally basic that if I failed I would consider suicide or at least sterilization. When I go out, I use a tarp (a faster lean to- I need one piece of paracord crosswise, a line in each corner, and four anchors or stakes, in about five minutes if it's blowing and I have to fight with the tarp), a hammock, paracord, and a sleeping bag. I stuff the sleeping bag a bivy bag if it's raining or blowing hard, becuase of wind shifts. I've done that in bone dry weather, driving rain, and blizzards, with winds up to 40mph, and in tempuratures ranging from 100 above to around 0- at zero, I build a snow cave, and usually before. And other than holes in the snow and ashes, you can't tell I was there a month later.

So I AM sticking to what I know. Are you? Becuase you've made some statements that start at outlandish, and range down from there.