MY THRU HIKE

Amazingly, a good wilderness survival kit doesn’t have to have a lot of stuff in it. Well over half the contents are selected from things my grandpa would have called the common knowledge. The rest is from experience of others or from my own experiences. But anyhow, here’s my list.

Matches: These are wooden “kitchen” matches, dipped at home in paraffin to render them water-proof. Before striking them, however, using a fingernail, remove all the paraffin from the head of the nail. Failure to do so will result in doused matches. Parafin melts to a liquid state and will extinguish the match before you get to use it. You can purchase water/wind proof matches, but at $3.99 for 20 I’ll just dip mine in a very short candle. I usually keep about 8 or 9 in my kit.

Fish Hooks: Yeah! I’m preparing for the worst here. I keep about 6, two of them are very tiny, tow medium and a couple that are larger even than that. I’s never used them for anything but fish, but under the worst of circumstances a fish hook will catch a bird or even a small mammal. Be sure to kill them quickly. A hook in the mouth is extremely painful to these higher order animals.

Cayenne Pepper: This even goes in my backpacking first aid kit. Cayenne pepper will halt profuse bleeding. It can be rubbed into a deep wound, or can be taken orally with about a cup of luke-warm water, orally. My grandmother has rendered aid to several injured farm hands in her time with a bucket of water and cayenne pepper. I’ve been told by an experienced herbalist that cayenne will stop severe chest pain in seconds and allow time for proper medical aid to arrive.

Iodine: This is tincture of iodine, that awful purple stuff that Mom used to put on scrapes when methyolate wasn’t in the medicine cabinet. It’s also useful for rendering water potable and sterilizing small objects.

Compass: A compass will keep you moving in a straight line until you can find the 4 essentials: shelter, warmth, food, water. On a Girl Scout trip, I was hopelessly lost and learned that for some reason I cannot explain, I tend to walk in a circle, always moving toward the left. With a compass, one can site a distant object and walk to it, then site another and so on.

Mirror and Whistle: My son found this one just toooo funny. No, it’s not about lipstick and eyeshadow. Use the mirror to reflect the sunlight and draw attention to yourself and again blow the whistle to do the same thing. It may be that you can see your rescuer, but cannot be seen. Make your self available to those who would save your butt.

Coffee or Tea: This is no time to be concerned about sleep loss. You can sleep when you are found. Drink the HighTest stuff, stay awake, keep the fire burning, yourself warm and fed. Caffeine is a cardiac stimulant and really helps to maintain body heat in cold weather.

Miscellaneous: Twelve or 15 inches of adhesive tape wrapped around a match stem, 6 aspirin or Alleve(TM) tablets in a moisture-proof container, a few adhesive bandages and a pair of tweezers about rounds it out. It fits in a plastic cigarette case ($1.99 at the truck stop).

A few survival tips: Before you leave hearth and home for the wilderness, tell someone exactly where you are going and approximately when you expect to return. If you are hopelessly lost, get to a high place, better yet, climb a tree during daylight hours. You can see much more from there than you can from the ground. (Yes, I am 57 years old and I would indeed climb a tree if I were once again hopelessly lost.) Look for smoke from a chimney or for a roof-top. Straight lines do not occur in nature. It’s probably a railroad track or a highway. If you don’t see any of these hopeful things, look for a stream or a lake. You’ll probably need water before you get yourself out or help arrives. Find a good campsite in a clearing (the helicopter will see you better if you are not under the trees) and stay there. Make a fire. Not a good Girl Scout fire, a smoky fire for day and a bright hot one for night. You’ll need to stay awake and keep it burning. You can sleep when you get home. Lots of books have been written on this subject. Ask your librarian for suggestions.