There’s a lot you can do with a simple piece of rope if you know how to tie the right knots.  There are also a lot of good reasons that knot tying is considered an important bushcraft skill.

If you want to learn the important knots, I suggest you try Animated Knots by Grog.  Each knot has an animated visual that goes step by step with written instructions.  Also included is practical information about the uses of each knot.  I knew a few knots before finding this site, but with its help, I feel I easily mastered all the basic knots I might ever need to know.

In my constant quest for new bushcraft information, I recently came across the website of Eric Stoskopf, the Woodsdrummer. His outdoor philosophy and methods resonate with me: he prefers old fashioned, even privative equipment that can take lots of abuse. He is about function over form. For example, he uses a body bag as part of his sleeping system. In fact, a discussion about using body bags that way is how I found out about him. Apparently, body bags are very warm, lightweight, and robust. The downside seems to be that they don’t “breathe,” and so perspiration can be a problem.

But, I think what makes me a fan of his is the subtle sense of spirituality that pervades his posts. When moved by the feeling of being in a natural sacred place, he feels an impulse to make offerings to the local spirits. He is ambivalent about doing this, as he is “wary of putting on facades of nativeness,” but this impulse was shared by our European ancestors as well. I hope to have a conversation with him about this sometime soon.

I was also touched that he came to my home area, New Orleans, to help rescue animals after Katrina. The log of the trip was very moving. Reading it is what impelled me to write a post, and track Woodsdrummer’s “digital footprints.”

Woodsdrummer is a an advocate of Ron Hood’s survival methods, and from reading Woodsdrummer’s outdoor exploits, I plan to get my hands on some of Hood’s video’s ASAP. Hood also provides a very active forum, which is providing me hours of distraction from work.

I recently discovered an outdoor activity that is wonderful to share with a child, called “geocaching.” All it takes is a GPS receiver and a sense of adventure. It’s basically a world-wide treasure-hunting game where participants hide, or try to find, “caches” of small toys and knickknacks which have been posted to a website with their coordinates, a description, and maybe a hint or two.

When I first found out about it, it sounded neat, “but surely there aren’t any hidden caches anywhere near this little South Louisiana town.” Au contraire, I quickly learned. The sport’s website has a cache search feature which quickly turned up a dozen or so within ten miles of our house!

The sport also encourages environmental responsibility and awareness.  Geocachers should practice CITO, or “Cache In Trash Out,” and clean up any trash they see on their outing.  Also, I have seen many caches that exist primarily to teach people about environmental features and nice, scenic areas that are “off the beaten path.”  I’ve learned a lot about my own town just by playing the game.

Of course, with my five-year-old, we don’t call it “geocaching.” With him, it’s simply “treasure hunting,” and he loves it. He’s learning some map-reading and other outdoor skills as we go. Because the caches are usually hidden in some outdoor wooded area, it’s a great way to get a little outdoor time together without it being a huge production.

For more information, visit the official site and read the FAQ.

I’ve formed yet another set of forums. Yes, yet another thing to take time away from my blogging, unfortunately. This one is for those interested in “warrior” spirituality, and the closely related subject of pagan event security. It is found at www.paganstronghold.com. I invite anyone interested in emergency preparedness, martial arts, and security from a pagan point of view to come join us there.

There are actually a few pagan warrior groups out there, but they are all local in scale and are devoted to specific pagan faiths. This forum is intended to be common ground for all of them, and is not associated with any specific pagan religion, faith, or organization. My introduction to the forum reads:

We are modern pagans of various faiths who follow a “warrior path” of spirituality. We find it spiritually fulfilling to serve our communities by preparing ourselves, mentally and physically, to put ourselves in harm’s way should the need arise. This forum offers support to those who want to serve the Pagan community as protectors and where such people can coordinate with each other and with Pagan event organizers.

Modern paganism has reached a point of critical mass at which we have caught the attention of the mass media and the general population. Among many other issues this creates for us is a more evident need for security at our events — a task we still have good reason not to trust to third parties such as off-duty police who may not be sympathetic to our ways. Our public events and large gatherings are attracting more and more unwelcome attention and a wider variety of people in general. This means that altercations, confrontations, accidents and other minor emergencies are more and more likely.

In our member forums, you will find discussions and debates about the finer points of “warrior” pagan spirituality and philosophy, strategy, martial arts, tools and equipment, and event security coordination. If you would be interested in such discussions, or in talking to us about how members might be of assistance with your upcoming event, you are invited to join us.

This website, by a Swedish survival expert, has several free videos about wilderness survival, with English subtitles. Good information at a price you can’t beat.