“What do you actually need? Food, clothing, shelter. Everything else is entertainment” (Aloe Blacc)
Aloe Blacc (in the quote above) seems to have neglected to include water – which I suspect he would find he needed sooner than the other items listed, but nevertheless I get his point.
In this video I look at how to repair a tarp that’s been ripped in two and, to make life a little more challenging, I am using a mylar space blanket (which is my survival kit shelter item) rather than a normal every day use tarp. However, this method can be done with any sort of tarp or any cloth material you need to joint together.
The method I’m using is also the way I attach the guy lines to the space blanket.
As with shelter building in general, there is a balance between what materials you have available, how long you have to build your shelter and how effective you need it to be. In the case of a field repair of a tarp there is no point in relying on a method that requires materials you don’t normally carry, nor is it helpful to only know a method that takes so long that night (and/or rain!) falls before you’ve finished the repair.
With that in mind the method I use is quick and requires nothing more than a stick, plastic bag, some thin cordage and a tiny bit of a knowledge (how to tie a constrictor knot on the bight).
“Backpacking: an extended form of hiking in which people carry double the amount of gear they need for half the distance they planned to go in twice the time it should take”
Recently I commissioned Ben from Garrison Packs to make a lumbar pack designed for the jungle and to own my particular specifications. Ben is producing packs to the same quality as the top backpack brands (some of which go for, frankly, ridiculously high prices) at a more affordable price and, best of all, he will customise packs to your own design – so, even though I already owned two lumbar packs, I couldn’t resist the chance to design one for myself.
For me lumbar packs are well suited to the jungle because:
The lowered centre of gravity makes you more balanced on your feet.
They snag less on overhead branches as you duck under them.
Your upper body is unencumbered making it easier to twist and turn and to use a parang.
Your back is left exposed so you don’t overheat as much.
Rather than doing a straightforward review of the pack I thought it would be more helpful to look at the key differences between the traditional (Orang Asal) jungle backpack and the modern equivalent and try and draw out some general themes that might be of use when trying to select your own gear.
I have a love-hate relationship with plastic bottles and bags – I love the many uses they have for the jungle trekker, I hate seeing them littering the trails and campsites.
The plastic bottles used for carbonated drinks are so well made that they can be reused thousands of times and last for years (hundreds of years!) and yet few people reuse them. Why can’t shops offer a refill option? You take your empty bottle in and they refill it for you on the spot and then charge you less than if you buy a new bottle off the shelf. No doubt the manufacturers would be against such an idea as they’d have to install some sort of refilling machine in all the shops and it would reduce their ability to brand what is essentially water with sugar in it – but so what? We should force them to do it and fine them if they don’t.
As for buying bottled water! Are we all nuts?!
Anyway, putting aside my environmental despair for a moment, and ignoring the floating island of bottles in our seas that is now half the size of Australia (!), plastic bottles and bags have numerous uses in the jungle and that’s what I cover in the video below. Some uses you may already know, others are less well known.
Plastic bags can be used to waterproof shelters, to collect water, to store water, to keep things dry (clothes, food, tinder), to keep wet things isolated from dry stuff, to weatherproof your camera, to light a fire, to make cordage, to make an air-core pillow, as groundsheets, or as a makeshift poncho…
“It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds for the opportunity to rain on a tent” (Dave Barry)
After my last trip to Taman Negara, I resolved to make some sort of water catcher attachment for my tarp so that I could collect rainwater and save myself the hassle of filtering water from the rivers.
As it usually rains in the jungle in the late afternoon, this is the time when you have already set up camp and changed into your dry clothes. As such, should a downpour begin, you probably won’t be inclined to go out from beneath the shelter of your tarp to collect water…it’s much nicer to lie back in your hammock and listen to the rain bouncing off your tarp instead.
The system I came up with is nothing new in concept but it has the advantage of being less bulky than the plastic funnel type attachments (usually an upturned plastic bottle that is cut in half), it is ultra lightweight, simplicity itself to make and costs virtually nothing. Also, as it doesn’t attach directly to the tarp there is less danger of damaging your tarp with the added weight of the water.
“Oh a storm is threat’ning, my very life today, if I don’t get some shelter, Oh yeah, I’m gonna fade away” (Gimme Shelter,Rolling Stones)
As any survival instructor will tell you, having the right state of mind in an emergency situation is critical to your chances of survival. But what determines someone’s state of mind in a survival situation and why do some people do better than others?
I think there are a number of factors at play – some people are simply mentally tougher than others; someone who has lived in the outdoors most of their life is less likely to be fazed by an outdoor survival situation than someone from the city; some people crave company, others are happy with solitude. There are also ways of encouraging positive thinking – setting realistic goals, accepting that not everything will go right (but patting yourself on the back when it does) will all help you to keep calm and positive.
However, a few years ago I read a study (and unfortunately I can’t remember the details) but the essence of it was that if soldiers where placed in a high stress situation (i.e. on the front line where they are being shot at) for over 8 months without a break they would start to mentally fall apart. What was interesting about the results was that this applied to all soldiers – no-one could handle that sort of on going stress without a break, no matter how tough their metal attitude was or how well they’d been trained.
In a survival situation, or if you’ve got lost in the jungle, things have, by definition, already started to go wrong. If more things start to go wrong – if your fire won’t catch, you get a soaking from the rain, the bugs bite you, you can’t find clean water, there’s no food – the accumulation of ‘things going wrong’ is going to stress out even the calmest individual and the problem with being stressed is that you’re less likely to make good decisions at the very moment when it is most necessary to be able to do so.
How does all this relate to a PSK shelter kit? You could argue that a shelter kit in the jungle is not a survival necessity – it’s warm enough that hypothermia isn’t a problem and you could always fashion a debris shelter or palm thatch roof.
However, this argument neglects to take into account a couple of factors: 1) building a natural shelter requires time, energy and for resources to be close at hand and 2) I imagine that in most emergency situations the first night at least would be unexpected and there may not be time to set up a shelter.
But, most importantly, having a shelter system with you that will give you a good night’s sleep is going to give a massive boost to your mental state in an emergency situation. Imagine you’ve got lost in the jungle and as the daylight fades you realise you’re going to spend an unplanned night there – instead of rushing around trying to put together a shelter you simply pull out a PSK hammock and rig up a tarp from your emergency blanket. After a reasonable night’s sleep you wake the next day with a clearer head and a better chance of making the right choices about what to do next.
In the video I show a few emergency blankets (which at the price and weight are something very well worth carrying) and also the EDC hammock which I bought from UKHammocks. The EDC hammock isn’t as comfortable as a full sized hammock (no big surprise there) but you can sleep in it (as long as you are under 85 kg). It also has the benefit of complementing your main kit as it can be used as cargo net, chair, and under quilt/mozzi blocker as well.
For anyone interested in buying one or reading more details here is the link to UK Hammocks.
If you can set up a camp like this then, should you get lost in the jungle, you are also more likely to stay put (rather then rushing to get out before nightfall and possibly getting even more lost) and the whole prospect of an unplanned night in the forest is far less alarming.
“Preserve substance; modify form; know the difference” (Dee Hock)
Many times I have bought camping gear over the internet and waited, with growing anticipation, for the arrival of a piece of kit that I am convinced is going to vastly improve my camping experience. More often than not, when the piece of equipment does arrive, I find that there are some draw backs, or failings, that I hadn’t foreseen and that initial pleasure is quickly dampened.
However, after really getting to know a particular piece of kit I usually spot a few simple modifications that will make it do what I, at least, want it to do. With rucksacks and bags I won’t hesitate to take out the scissors and remove unnecessary or overlong straps, if the knife I bought has a blade profile I don’t like I’ll mercilessly grind it into a shape I do, and the sewing machine is often called upon to add on extra pockets, sleeves or whatever it is that I decide a particular piece of gear is missing.
Not everyone is happy to take this approach (my friend Keong is, I know, horrified at the way I take the scissors to branded rucksacks!) and the obvious drawback is that, should you wish to sell-on that bit of kit, a potential buyer may not approve of your modifications!
In the case of the Mountainsmith lumbar pack in the video, the addition of shoulder straps turned out to be a very necessary modification as, without them, the pack is too uncomfortable to carry loads much above 3 kg. I’d bought the pack in Malaysia (on line) at a very decent price (RM 140 if I remember correctly) and the model is the older (and, in my view, better) version. However the shoulder straps aren’t sold here and are quite expensive as well. The solution was to adapt a yoke system used by the British Armey and the problem was solved (and without much expense).
As someone who is very skinny the other problem I had was getting the waist belt to fit comfortably under load (although this is a problem I have just as equally with most rucksacks) and I sewed in some padding to resolve this.
As the Mountainsmith has only a 14 litre capacity I wanted to get another, larger, lumber pack for longer trips. I was very tempted by the wildland packs used in the States but the only one available here was the Mystery Ranch pack (sold by Outdoor Gear Malaysia) which was both too heavy and too expensive for me. I also considered importing a True North pack but the Firefly pack was too heavy and the Fireball pack, although much lighter and with a nice 20 litre capacity, was quite an expensive option after the cost of importation. The one I ended up with is a non-branded (hand made) bag from Evil Bay and I am very pleased indeed with it. Ebay in the US has quite a range of these wildland style packs available and, obviously, you can save quite a bit of money if you’re prepared to buy second hand.
So, are these the best packs for the jungle? The truth is that it depends very much on where you are going and your own personal preference….if you are sticking to well used trails then there isn’t that much call for ducking and weaving through the undergrowth, nor will you have to do that much heavy clearing (so upper body mobility is less of an issue) and a rucksack will serve just as well and better distribute the weight on your back.
…but if you’re going off trail then the these packs really come into their own.
“Women and cats do as they please; men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea” (Robert Heinlein)
Ultralight purists might well baulk at the idea of even bothering with a camp chair – seeing it as unnecessary extra weight. Why not, they might ask, simply sit in the hammock if you want to sit back and relax for a while?
This was, for a time, my own view as well but I discovered a few problems with this approach. Firstly my hammock is a seductive seat – once I get in the temptation to lie back and snooze becomes almost irresistible and the camp chores I’m meant to be doing get neglected. The other problem I found is that I often wanted to sit somewhere other than where my hammock was strung up – for example, by the fire when cooking or, if camping with friends, over at their camp area.
Simply sitting on the ground also has problems: in the jungle, insects will take exception to your backside on top of their home and leaning against a tree for back support is generally not a good idea as ants and the like will take offence at your presence and either crawl all over you or bite you, or both.
This led to a search for an ultralight camp chair and I have experimented quite a bit with different designs of chair – from sack chairs, to hammock chairs and finally to the hyperlight version that you can see in the video. It cost almost nothing to make and took me about an hour to sew everything together – it’s light (170 grams), very compact, easy to move around and gives that back support that I find I crave at the end of a hard day’s trekking.
Ultralight camping, inevitably, involves some degree of compromise – if nothing else you will lose durability with most ultralight items relative to more sturdy (and heavier) alternatives. However, I don’t believe ultralight camping should require you to compromise too much on comfort: if I don’t take in a camp chair (to save weight) but end up with an aching back and a poor nights sleep, then it’s been a false economy. I feel the same way about shelter systems – they should allow you to get a good nights sleep as, if you are trekking hard, then you need to let your body recover so that you are ready for the next day. If you spend a bad night and wake up tired and irritable the next day then you are more likely to make poor decisions (and the jungle is always quick to punish poor decisions!) and certainly won’t enjoy the day as much.
The small square tarp that I use as a seat/groundsheet has another use as well: in the jungle it is easy to lose small items on the jungle floor and the groundsheet is useful in providing an area where things can be placed and not forgotten about.
Which chair of the ones shown is best? It depends on what you are doing – if you are setting up a semi permanent camp site (or one that you will return to often) then it might be worth setting op the tripod sack-chair system as you can leave the poles there for you to use the next time you visit. If you are travelling in a group then the hyperlite (ground sheet style) system has the benefit of no set up time and allows you to easily move it around. If you’re camping not far from your car…well then you’re spoilt for choice as weight/bulk is not an issue and you can simply use the standard aluminium framed chairs.
But is the hyperlight camp chair set up I designed as comfortable as the standard aluminium frame camp chairs? In a word ‘no’… but it’s good enough. This to me is the key with ultralight camping: it’s a bit like the 80:20 rule in that you can get 80% of the comfort with an item that is only 20% of the weight. In the case of the hyperlight camp chair (which weighs just 170 grams) I can get, say, 80% of the comfort that I’d get from an standard aluminium framed chair (which weighs about 3kg).
So ‘yes’ ultralight camping does involve some compromise but an item like the hyperlight camp chair (which is just 5% of the weight of a standard camp chair) allows me to enjoy sitting around the camp fire at night without significantly increasing my load-out weight.
“Water and air, the two essentials upon which all life depends, have become global garbage cans” (Jacques Yves Cousteau)
There is a bewildering array of water treatment gear out there – from steripens to life straws, chemicals to gravity filters – and prices range from cheap, DIY gravity kits to very expensive, top end, purifiers.
I’m not going to go into all the pros and cons of each system because there is a great article here from REI which does that it in some detail. The key thing, though, is to understand the difference between a filter and a purifier: filters get rid of bacteria and protozoa but not viruses, purifiers get rid of all three. To ensure the water you drink in the jungle is safe to drink you either need to use a purifier or, if you are using a filter, you need to first filter the water and then either boil or chemically treat it.
As you will get through a lot of water in the tropics, you want a system that is quick and easy to set up – my millbank bag now stays on my belt so I can get to it quickly for this very reason. After filtering with the millbank I chemically treat the water and move on.
Although chemically treating water is a very convenient method, the nasty after taste and the tendency of the pills to absorb water and disintegrate in transit (due to the high humidity) made it less than ideal for me. Part of the reason for this video is that I find that the Aquamira drops are much better in reducing the after taste of the chemicals than the purisafe pills I was using before and it was an option I hadn’t been aware of.
If you are in Malaysia and want to try some Aquamira for yourself you can buy it through the internet here. One set is good for around 110 litres of water.
The Stanley water bottle was another interesting product I came across and can be used for anything from making a brew to cooking dehydrated foods. The wide mouth of the stainless steel part of the bottle means that is is easy to clean (e.g. if you use it to boil rice). It is not the lightest piece of kit but, as it doubles as both a water container and something I can cook with, it removes the need to carry a pot. It is also very good value for money at about 10 USD. The bottle is only advertised as suitable for cold beverages but I’ve been using it for coffee and cooking without any problems.
Now if they’d made it out of titanium, got rid of the tapered bottom and put a handle on it … well, then it would probably cost a lot more than 10 bucks
Last week I was camping in Taman Negara National Park and playing around with some new hammock suspension ideas. The aim was to get a system that was 1) quick and convenient to use, 2) as lightweight as possible and 3) that incorporated tree protectors.
I had recently bought ‘The Ultimate Hang’ by Derek Hansen (a great book and one every ‘hanger’ should own) and was intrigued by the whoopie slings that seem so popular in the states. So, I made some up (and should you wish to do the same there is an excellent Youtube video by Mat from UKHammocks showing exactly how to make them) and took them along…
I did not get along with whoopie slings and have since removed them. To me whoopie slings are a neat, but over complicated solution: they are both bulkier and heavier than using a single line with a knot and, if the trees are too close together, they can create problems as you are restricted by how short you can make them.
However, the exercise was not a complete waste of time as it introduced me to toggles and the use of a Marlin Spike Hitch (basically a slip knot) which work well with the tree protectors.
In this video I cover some of the main ways to hang a hammock (but by no means all of them) and give some tips that might help you reduce the weight and bulk of the ropes you carry along. Sometimes this can be as simple as doubling up the use of a piece of equipment – thus my rope bag doubles up as a storage bag that I can hang from the ridgeline, my rucksack rain cover doubles up as a large, waterproof cargo pocket for kit kept outside the rain protection of the tarp.
I think the waterproof cover for the rucksack is a good item to carry along. Why? Because a sodden rucksack weighs a lot more than a dry one. My Karrimor Sabre weights in at about 1.7kg dry but, when dripping wet, the weight increases to 2.7kg! The cover also increases visibility (making it easy to find your camp) and can be used as a mat to sit on.
My advice for hammock suspension systems is to ‘keep it simple’ and ‘keep it light’ – you only need to learn a couple of hitches and you’re done and, frankly speaking, it is easier to learn the knots than learning how to make things like whoopie slings. Similarly rap rings (or descender rings) are an unnecessary extra weight to carry and can slip if the set up isn’t exactly right.
The other item I was testing out was the ‘soft shackle’ and, in the video below, I show you how to make one. I like soft shackles as they are both light and compact but, of course, they don’t have the durability of the metal shackle.
One last thing to mention when setting up a hammock in the jungle is make sure that you don’t leave any sharp points on the undergrowth that you clear below the hammock as, should something go wrong, you don’t want to get speared by sharp, pointed sticks beneath you! I simply bash any pointed ends with the side of my parang to blunt them off. Also, don’t forget to look up to check there aren’t any dead branches (widow makers) above you.
On the last night in Taman Negara I was in my hammock which was strung alongside a wide jungle river, with a 15 foot drop on one side where the embankment sloped down to the water. It had been a long day and, as night fell I retreated happily to my hammock. A thunderstorm began and the sky lit up every 30 secs or so, as if there were some massive flourscent tube high up in the clouds that was on the blink, and I could make out the details of the river below me…. it felt like I was floating above the jungle, completely warm, completely dry and utterly comfortable…
“Look for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities, forget about your troubles and your strife” – (Baloo)
Last week I went in to the jungle for a night’s camping and, as darkness fell, realised that I had forgotten to bring in any food (although I had, curiously, remembered the beer) – it was annoying and I went to bed hungry, but not really that big a deal.
Forgetting or losing an item of kit can send some people into a spin, but the truth is that for most 2-3 day trips into the jungle you could easily survive without any of your kit (apart from your parang and compass) – you could live without food (although it’s not pleasant to do), water is easily found, there’s little danger of dying from hypothermia (although nights would be chilly) etc.
I remember Les Stound making the distinction between ‘enduring’ and ‘surviving’ – the former means simply sitting out the discomfort in hungry misery, the latter means taking control of the situation and satisfying the basic needs of shelter, fire, food and water (and beer!).
So, when packing for a short trip, it’s good to remind yourself that all the stuff your are taking is really there just to make life easier and more comfortable (rather than being absolutely necessary) but that the more of these items you take the less comfortable the trekking is going to be as the load on your back gets heavier.
I’ve had a few requests from people (mainly here in Malaysia) who want to start camping out in jungle but don’t know where to start in terms of kit to take in – this video shows what I use and hopefully will be of some help.
My advice for those starting out is not to overstretch yourself at the beginning and to test your equipment first. Once you’ve got your kit sorted, take it for a walk – it doesn’t matter where, round the park a few times will do (but try some hills too!) – just to check whether the weight is bearable and the rucksack comfortable. Then do a test run into the jungle – there’s no need to go far (you could go a hundred yards off the road and into the jungle) and try setting up camp and sorting out food, water, fire etc. For those in Malaysia you could visit Raman (the Orang Asli who lives at Gombak) and camp at his kebun for a night. By checking your equipment first you will quickly discover any problems and become familiar with its use.
This is particularly important when it comes to hammocks – they are, by far, the best shelter system to use in the jungle but they do take a little bit of skill to set up in a way that maximizes the comfort they can offer. Keeping your body at the right temperature in a hammock can also be difficult at first as the evenings are often warm and humid and the early mornings can be surprisingly chilly.
And then there’s the rain – your hammock shelter system must be 100% waterproof – no water creeping down the ropes, no splashback from the ground, no rain getting in from the sides – and the only way to be sure is to try it first in heavy rain. You could do this anywhere – in your back garden would do – but test it (and adjust it) before you go on an extended expedition into the jungle.
The tortoise that I relocated ambled off into the jungle, seemingly happy with the new environment that didn’t have the concrete storm drains that tank-trapped him where I found him (or, for the time being at least, the looming threat of development).
About 30 miles from where I live is the Malaysian Elephant Sanctuary that relocates elephants displaced by the seemingly unstoppable spread of oil palm plantations. It is a commendable effort to help these animals but, to some extent, it has the side-effect of making us feel better about a situation we should really be feeling extremely bad about. Elephants need space, it’s as simple as that, and relocating them (into unfamiliar areas where other elephants have already staked out their territory) is a sub-optimal solution.
It reminds me of the line in Apocalypse Now:
“It’s a way we had of living with ourselves: we cut them in half with a machine gun and then give them a band aid. It was a lie. And the more I saw them, the more I hated lies”.
The politics of the rain forest here in Malaysia are both complex (in terms of finding workable solutions) and very simple (in terms of projecting the outcome) – what is needed is a system of fully protected, federal, nationals parks linked together with corridors of forest that the animals can use to go between them. Unfortunately the state (rather than federal) system of forest control in Malaysia makes this difficult to achieve and the growing consumer demands of a growing, urbanized population mean that there is an ever increasing demand to clear the forest for our own ends – be it farms or oil palm plantations or housing developments.
Here in Malaysia I see some cause for hope in the changing attitudes of the younger generation towards the environment – but will the situation change fast enough to save the forests? I don’t know, but one thing is for sure, future generations will curse us for the mess that they will inherit: the result of selfish exploitation of the worlds resources that has gone on over the last 50 years and the unchecked population explosion.
As a future Churchillian might say of our generation: “Never in the field of human conduct have so many been left with so little, and with so much blame lying with so few”
In this video I look at how to repair a tarp that’s been ripped in two and, to make life a little more challenging, I am using a mylar space blanket (which is my survival kit shelter item) rather than a normal every day use tarp. However, this method can be done with any sort of tarp or any cloth material you need to joint together.
