Camp Hygiene: Tips for Keeping Clean Outdoors

James WerbCamping1 Comment

Camp Hygiene

Camp hygiene is an important consideration when spending any length of time outdoors. While not washing for a few days won’t kill you, a general lack of hygiene will increase your risk of getting a stomach bug, making your time outdoors far less pleasurable.

Camping and travelling outdoors is not an excuse to forego all personal hygiene. It’s equally if not more important to maintain high standards of hygiene when travelling in a group as bugs can be easily transferred from one person to the next.

There are some practices you can follow to keep clean and hygienic whether you are out for a few of days, weeks or even months.

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Buffalo Special 6 Shirt Review

James WerbOutdoor Equipment Reviews4 Comments

Buffalo Special Six Shirt

The Buffalo Special 6 Shirt is one of my absolute favourite items of outdoor clothing.

Being comfortable outdoors in all conditions requires you to keep warm and dry. The principle of layering is well known.

Rather than one thick layer, you wear many thin layers in order to regulate your temperature during the day and remove moisture from your body.

Also each layer has it’s unique place in the system. A base layer to wick sweat away quickly is donned first, followed by a thin form of insulation such as shirt or fleece. Depending on the conditions a light wind-shirt can be used followed by a waterproof jacket.

This layering system gives you a huge amount of flexibility to alter your clothing to match the changing conditions.

But what if one layer could do all that?

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How To Predict the Weather in the Wilderness

James WerbWilderness HazardsLeave a Comment

Rainbow Weather

The weather can have a huge influence on the success of a trip. Dealing with freezing temperatures, heat waves, wind, rain, snow or thunderstorms, all offer their own dangers.

With a little knowledge and some practice it’s possible to become reasonably successful at predicting the weather up to a few hours in advance.

But before you try and work out whether that cloud coming towards you is going to unleash a hailstorm or benignly pass you by, it pays to do some research beforehand on the likely weather you’ll encounter over the course of your trip.

Having an idea about the likely weather you’ll face on a trip allows you make informed equipment choices such as packing a warmer sleeping bag or bringing a sun hat.

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Walking High on the Roof of Dartmoor

James WerbHiking4 Comments

Walking High on the Roof of Dartmoor

The lure of the north moors had grown too much having passed by the snow covered hills on my way to work the day before. We grabbed our packs and donned various warm layers before heading back up the A30 towards the promise of a winter adventure.

Rising high above the Devon landscape, a wild and unspoiled sense of remoteness towered ahead of us. Only the curling waves of a windswept reservoir lay in front of the snow dusted peak as we began our wintry walk.

We left the car park behind and started towards Meldon Reservoir. The sun greeted us like an old friend as we made our way across the dam that spans the West Okement valley.

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STOP: A Story From Lost To Found

James WerbWilderness HazardsLeave a Comment

STOP - Map and Compass

Getting lost is something that can happen to anyone, even those that are experienced at wilderness navigation. It can begin with a slight sense of unease and quickly escalate into a full state of panic if you don’t keep a clear head when faced with some geographical confusion.

It’s a situation I was faced with last year when spending two weeks canoeing around Lake Saimaa in Finland. It had been a long and very hot day. We’d been paddling for eight hours solid to find our next camp site and I was getting thirsty and tired. A perfect recipe for a navigational mishap as I was about to find out.

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