The older I get....

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

The more I am becoming aware that there is an increasingly greater number of people who cannot perform rudimentary home maintenance much less survive in the outdoors.

Alan

[Bill Mc]

The older I get, the better was.

[ncboman]

One swimmer is presumed dead and dozens of others have been rescued during a busy Memorial Day weekend on North Carolina's beaches.

Chief William Younginer of the Carolina Beach Police Department told the Star-News of Wilmington that the U.S. Coast Guard has stopped searching for 19-year-old Angel Gonzalez of Fayetteville. Younginer said officials believe he drowned while swimming in the water Saturday evening during a family outing.

Cpl. Simon Sanders, the ocean rescue director in Carolina Beach, said lifeguards had upward of 100 rescues between Friday morning and Sunday evening. Other rescue officials in the region also reported a high number of rescues because of crowded beaches and dangerous surf.

web page (http://www.witn.com/home/headlines/45982182.html)

:confused:

... it's the Atlantic Ocean folks. It's dangerous. The undercurrents are unlike anything you've ever seen. Think of the currents as Davey Jones' (http://dusk2.geo.orst.edu/djl/djl.html) lonely fingers. :rolleyes:

ncboman

[DancesWithKnives]

I agree. Many city dwellers just don't get any outdoors training and don't reinforce it with experience. Later this summer I hope to go on a horse-supported pack trip with some friends, their high school kids, and a couple friends of their kids. They are all brilliant people who have accomplished a tremendous amount in their lives and businesses. However, the younger folks have had very little exposure to the outdoors and will have to stay between leader and trail sweep adults when hiking. That will be tough because the kids are quite athletic and much faster. But without much training/experience, it just isn't safe to let them hike ahead of the adults.

DWK

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

There are no crosswalks in the wilds. There's no "Beware of Rattlesnakes" signs or cell phone service. If you have to have the Coast Guard or some type of rescue folks come and get you, the amount they charge you makes whatever you were doing when you became incapacitated (minor stuff, broken leg/ankle, got lost, etc.) seem really, really stupid. Even my boys, who have spent as much time in the brush as they have in the city still have to be reminded that a little screw up out on the bay or in the brush can mess up a fine weekend.

Alan

[ncboman]

Actually even the best survivalist would starve living off the land for an extended period of time here in the US if he stays within the law. The primary food source (buffalo) are gone and unless cows could be taken regularly, it would be a tuff go.

The skills are desirable to know but real world survival in todays world involves interaction with various people more than grubbing a meal up. In a modern survival situation, other people would likely be the most dangerous aspect.

ncboman

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

My biggest fear in a survival situation is there being other people that I would have to take care of.

Alan

[Greywolf]

Actually even the best survivalist would starve living off the land for an extended period of time here in the US if he stays within the law. The primary food source (buffalo) are gone and unless cows could be taken regularly, it would be a tuff go.

The skills are desirable to know but real world survival in todays world involves interaction with various people more than grubbing a meal up. In a modern survival situation, other people would likely be the most dangerous aspect.
ncboman

Allen
That is so true.
My wife once mention how she thought the show Survivor should hold an episode in the Allagash Wilderness region, up here.
I told her that it would be impossible to do as they would be breaking laws the minute they set up camp, but in a real survival situation, of coarse, laws be damnded.

Your point about the likelyhood of people being the biggest threat in a modern day survival situation is very real. I stress that point to my boy all the time.
The enemy will live amongst you. And will not come wearing a name tag.
Sounds harsh, but it is fact.

[Greywolf]

My biggest fear in a survival situation is there being other people that I would have to take care of.

Alan

This can be witnessd by taking a group of kids camping. (:D)

But all kidding aside, the incline just got very steep when you ad other people to take care of.
The hard truth is it puts everyone in a sort of a 'survival of the fittest' situation.

[Bill Gunn]

I once read a book by the Danish explorer/adventurer Peter Freuchen about life with the Eskimos in Greenland.
If you EVER want to read a book about survival, you must read this book. It’s out of print, but you can get it from Amazon.com, it’s called “Book of the Eskimos” .
The way they lived blows your mind. In poor times, kids, and older people, were set out on the ice to freeze. You could always have another kid, but adults that could hunt were in short supply !!
This is “BASIC SURVIVAL”, trust me.
We wonder if we’ll be able to retire at 65. They wonder how they will live tomorrow.
One guy had to kill another guy that was giving others in the village a bad time and threatened their well-being. There was no “law”, or police, as we know it, so he was picked to do the dirty deed because he was the best hunter of the group.
This was at the time that the Danish government started running the lives of the Eskimos. When they heard of this, they arrested the Hunter, tried him and put him in jail for 10 or more years. The concept of “Jail” was totally unknown to the Eskimos. The father of the hunter bragged to all the villagers how his son was so brave for killing the bad guy, that the Govt. gave him a warm place to live and GAVE him 3 meals a day for 10 years!!

EVERY page of this book blows you away, it is defiantly a “MUST READ” !!

There is defiantly no "Political Correctness" in this book, it tells it like it is...

[DancesWithKnives]

Sounds like my kind of book.

I've made that argument to people who refuse to carry a survival pack with them when the situation clearly demands it. I tell them that I have only a "personal" survival pack and that I'm not carrying enough for two or three guys in the Yukon or AK wilderness. I ask them "What am I supposed to do, threaten my own survival by helping you other guys or just let you expire? And what if you don't like the second option and try to take my supplies; do I have to shoot you to ensure my survival?"

Not very attractive choices but the Inuit had to face them regularly, as you astutely point out.

Thanks for the reference,

DWK

[DaveHawk]

I've done a few treks with a few F&I guys and all we carried were grul and flint locks. we had robin, squirrel a few other small game. Built lean too's, boiled water. Not much to it. But you need to be in the frame of mind for this kind of living.
Often thought about doing another one. There are a few guys out west who do week to a month in the wilderness.

NC what do you think would just the the bare minimum to carry.