Have you ever showed up to your campsite and realized you forgot the cooler? The guilt of buying plastic and foam coolers can spoil all the fun. Well, here’s a really easy fix. Go to the back of any convenience store and grab a cardboard box or three. Get two that nest inside each other loosely. Take your Contributor newspapers and shred and crumple. Then stuff some in between the cavity of the two boxes. Dry leaves or moss also works, although dry leaves actually put out a bit of heat, so that’s a last resort. Damp leaves would be better. Then take several papers or cardboard and set those on top of your food. That’ll keep it cool for quite a while especially if you put ice bags in the bottom. Or you can put them in the bottom and the top, then layer the newspaper over it. If you put it behind and under some rocks on the north side of your campsite, this will help even more. You can also find or dig a hole. At about one foot down, the earth is 52 degrees. Lacking a nearby convenience store, use blankets or towels and place them in a hole or in between some rocks. How to avoid ants? Well, hopefully you brought Tupperware! If not, wrap it all in newspaper as tightly as you can.
Cook any meat you have right away. It will keep a bit longer if it is cooked. If you brought marinade, then it is fine to leave raw meat in the marinade if you’ve got it sealed off properly. If you brought fish and it’s not in the can, just eat it right away. That’s true anyway, isn’t it?!
Be sure to move your box back away from animals at night. If you are not in bear country, just flop your sleeping bag over it and you’ll be fine. Bobcats and foxes do like meat, but they are very shy of humans. Keep a flashlight handy. Lacking that, keep your lighter or your box of matches close so you can scare them off with fire if they get too interested. Raccoons on the other hand, I like to call them the North American monkey. They tend to run around in gangs and are a bit fearless. If this happens, throw some scraps into the woods and let them run after it. If that’s not working, you may have to give up a significant amount of your food, grab the box and find another spot. Ideally, you have a car! Lacking that, a campground bathroom with a door that doesn’t have any openings would be helpful.
If you forgot your can opener, just walk out to the asphalt and start rubbing the top round in circles on either cement or asphalt. Do this for quite a while. The top will wear off. Flip the can back over, fish out any potential metal particles, and you can heat it right in the can if you’re desperate.
When you cook your food, you can save fuel, or if the fire is burning low, remove the pot and set it in a hole, surrounded by newspapers to keep the dirt out. Throw dirt over it to keep the paper from catching on fire.Throw a bunch of newspapers on top, and then dirt if you like, or just a rock. After about 30 minutes, your food will be done cooking. It will also be just the right temperature to eat! Note: do not do this in dry arid areas! Only in the southeast or northeast when it’s rainy or the soil is damp. If you are in true desert, and there are no underground roots, you could be all right. But if you are in a dry forest, forget it!
Have you ever wondered how you could stay dry if you didn’t have a tarp? Well, gather as many long sticks as you can, and lean them across a bough (that is a tree that has branches all the way to the ground). Then lay sticks across the lengthwise sticks. Then cover it with grass or leaves or whatever you can find that is fairly thick, dry material. Then throw dirt up on top of that. The dirt seems counterintuitive, but it will absorb rain. If it’s a downpour, this will not help quite so much. I suggest finding a cave, or an overhang!
One of the things that we tend to have trouble producing enough of when we’re camping is greens. Make sure you are acquainted with some of the more common Tennessee pioneer plants, meaning plants the pioneers brought over here, such as lambs quarter, violets, or wild oats, or native wild plants. Really easy ones to identify are violet leaves, lambs quarter, and miners lettuce. These are all quite edible. Just a small handful will do you. They are much more potent than your store-bought vegetables, so don’t eat too many at one time. You really don’t want to find out why. Suffice it to say that you will use up all your toilet paper.
If anyone in your group is getting overheated, wet down their clothes. If water is not handy, bring them around to the north side of a rock or a tree. Have them lay flat on bare ground or moss if possible. Yes, there are insects and things but the cool of the earth will help tremendously. Also, make sure they’re getting enough water, of course. If you’re low on electrolytes, do pick anything that doesn’t taste bitter and terrible. Any leaf or small green herb will help a lot. If the person has lost too much salt — I know this sounds horrible — they can lick their arms to get more salt in them!
If you keep your ankles, backs of knees, inside of your thighs, wrists, elbows, and head spritzed down with water as you are walking, you will stay much cooler. If you are wearing a hat, which hopefully you are, take it off and wave it over your head at intervals, so that the sweat doesn’t get trapped in there and you can cool off, but put the hat back on. Note: the easiest way to avoid this kind of overheating is just to stay nice and quiet and take a nap in the heat of the day. Doh!
Finally, if you get lost, walk downhill. You will end up at a stream or a road I promise. If you end up at a stream, just follow it downhill. Eventually, you’ll get to civilization. If you wind up on the road, well, I can’t help you quite as much but you’re more likely to run into someone that you could flag down for help.
Wait! Finally, really finally, if you see a wild animal, just hold still and calm, and don’t approach it! They look so cute, but they’re five times stronger than you and easily startled. Even deer, or God forbid giant things like elk are very dangerous to humans. Let them continue about their business. If you need to, turn slightly to the side and walk slowly away. If this bothers them, just stop and wait. If it’s a bear, all bets are off. You might need to make lots of loud noise and confront it if it wants to approach. Finally, do not wear perfume or aftershave; they are filled with either synthetic or real animal musk! Animals will think you are yummy. This is bad … but fun to watch. Just kidding!
Finally well not finally, to keep mosquitoes and noseeums off you: rub crushed tree leaves all over your skin. If you smell like a plant, they won’t be nearly as interested. Be sure and do your ears and neck and face and scalp if you can.
Oh, and everybody hates this one: do not eat sugar! Eat fruit. Sugar metabolizes too quickly and makes you much more vulnerable to both heat exhaustion and hypothermia.
Those are the tips of the day.