How to Find a Natural Shelter

Silver Fox Bushcraft featuring Sean the Silver Fox and Chris Grant www.silverfoxbushcraft.co.uk www.makemethischris.co.uk Improvised camp site on top of the Grampian Mountains in Scotland Chris: Hi this is Chris here, the temporary camera man for Silver Fox Bushcraft and what we are going to do for you today is to give you an idea of a possible shelter if you’re trapped up here and it’s pretty much a glorious stay up here in the Grampians and you know, what we decided to go through was you know, where could you go, where could you bed down and referring something here and you might tell from the Silver Fox hat that the mine himself is in the vicinity. Sean: Mind your little finger mate. Chris: Yeah, okay. Sean: Okay. Chris: Hopefully that work here, great. Where are you Sean? Sean: Well we found this small natural cave. It’s a very small cave. I am going to clear all the rocks out of here just for now but we can simply pull the rocks out. There is enough moss green around here and headers we can make it a nice comfy base and mattress in here. We can have the fire at the front there. So here up this rock, I just keep this warm and then down—how well you’re going to see but down to the side here. Chris: Not too bad, it’s dark; I can actually see that light coming through. Sean: Right but there is a window there and then right down in front—by my feet is another one at the back so— Chris: Yeah I kept going to actually felt one through so— Sean: So, you will not too much—probably smoke coming in here. Chris: Yeah. Sean: It can escape. Chris: And air—I suppose if you block up this end, you would still have a hair line in your foot to make this end cozier, block up some boulders. Sean: Definitely, yeah. Chris: To make it— Sean: Is that you close it up. If the winds are coming from that direction, you just need to close that up. Chris: And there is no danger that this fall because it’s absolutely enormous. Sean: A—it’s probably a 100 ton above me. Chris: Yeah totally. Is it damp in there at all? Is it— Sean: It’s a bit damp actually right on it; that is why you need to build the most space up. Chris: Yeah. Sean: Now if you lay these—a lot of these rocks are actually flat. They are in here, so if you can sort of rearrange and make yourself a flat base to get you off that damp soil and then put your—the moss on top, you’d be pretty cozy. Chris: Yeah. I thought. Sean: — Chris: And just above here was a sort of rock. So even though the stream isn’t immediate, that the rock is up here and it’s almost the rainwater, it has no algae next to it. Sean: That’s true. Chris: Is this—there is no—in it. Sean: We’ll I’ve got photo of the—. We’ll show you doing that. This is excellent. Chris: Yeah, well what I’ll do is I’ll cool it with the NLM. I will show the viewers the—where exactly where you are. I’ll try not to slap you and fall— Well here we are and you can see the size of this rock, so there is really not much chance that would fall and this was the area that I was going to suggest perhaps blocking up and over here is a—the air lengths, so there are plenty of air to come in through here and just about where my finger is, is where the rock kettle is. So in an emergency, fortunately we founded this shelter we’re showing you. Sean: Yes incredible. Chris: So, the Silver Fox is still alive with us. Sean: Still alive. Chris: After finding a shelter. Okay. Sean: Okay so just following on, so what we’ve done, we found a cave there, it’s a temporary—and looking around us, as you can see there’s an awful lot of grass. There is quite a lot moss. There is heather. I mean you may have to have a bit of a wonder about to collect all the bits you need but certainly isn’t a shortage of it up here and then just above us, see is the cave that leads just above, we found the kitchen and here is the kitchen. So what we found is—I get another large overhanging rock and we haven’t arrange these ourselves, this is as we found it. So, as a flat area in there and again it’s all lined with rock. So that’s where you would build your fire. And do your cooking. You could suspend any cooking pot you got over the top here. If you are struggling with—if you didn’t have a Para Cord but other than why to come here without some sort of materials. Then we would work in ways to make it actually improvise a way of watching you know, some sort of cooking implement up there but if nothing helps, there is always a flat rock. So you can always cook anything that you got on flat rock and then for fire wood that was everything because as you can see it’s pretty desert up there but heather burns extremely well and you found some of the oldest stuff and it’s incredible. I’d also had the roots over to get as well. So, there’s certainly enough up here to make fire but we’ve also found and it’s quite a few of these up there. Chris: Yeah it’s— Sean: Some big old—these are old fence posts from the old deer fences that used to be up here. So again in emergency situation you could split this down and build your fire over them. Chris: Just assure that they’re— Sean: Oh they go. Chris: Just assure that this is a—for the viewers, here is one that has turned over so that’s, we haven’t planted that, that’s the stuff as here to be—and for the most part, it’s pretty dry. Now if you want to—if you want to just walk and zoom over, you’ll see another one just lying there, this stuff is all over the place— Sean: Oh yeah. Now what we just done, we just walked in along and just looking for wood for our improvised shelter and there is one of the wood timbers that we said we found and you can see I see old fence post still standing. Then looking down this, this is the wire from the old deer fence. So if you need to improvise yourself, you got it here and there are enough sharp, hard stones up here to break it and if nothing else suspend it and it will heats up and it will snap. Chris: Before I am trying to see, my—a lot of this, it’s quite a high gauge of steel, probably about—but this is all, it does not really matter if I do this but there you go— Sean: Cuts of steel. Chris: —really, you bend that ruins and make an—and we can hang up onto— Sean: Onto out rock Chris: Our— Sean: Excellent. I know I’ve see—for a days hike and so we’re just going to talk about—I mean we’ve been camping out here for a couple of days now but just to the site just so you know, there is my M4 and I’ve done a review of the things I carry in there. So you know I got water. You know I’ve got crusader cup and I’ve also got my belt kits on which—I’ve also got—which all something I nearly always carry. So on there I’ve got a small knife. I’ve got my fire steel— Chris: —excellent— Sean: I have actually—I’ve got the one, the folding knife so, even the hills up here in Scotland, I’m still pro for the U.K. legal to carry it. Chris: —I find this incredible. So fantastical. Sean: And for a little knife, you know, as a last resort knife, you know it’s one that’s not going to fail you, something to let you down. Chris: You’ve been cutting this—everything has been cutting pine resin. Sean: Pine—yeah, pine resin—pine. Chris: Yeah you’ve been cutting things that—I believe you cut some bushes with it the other day. Sean: Yeah. Chris: And it’s still sharp. It’s really sharp, so you have given—gone through this stuff there where you cut your—if this I join this test, you want this. It’s great. Sean: It certainly held up. And as I said we’re completely U.K legal. That is the other thing say—excellent. Right. And most even this from this ethic hike because it turned out to be. Chris: And the—on to the pinnacle and— Sean: Yeah, a view from the top.