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Thread: Winter Camporee

  1. #1
    Senior Member Alamosa's Avatar
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    Thumbs up Winter Camporee

    We had our Winter Camporee with the Scouts this last weekend. My troop hosted the event. There were about 100 scouts and 50 adults, so it was a great turnout. We ended up making snowshoes, pulks, covered snow trenches, quinzees, igloos, and greenhouse shelters for activities.

    I was the only hammock camper this trip. Weather was decent as it hit 25*F on Friday and 8*F on Saturday night. The wind was blowing terribly on Friday night with reported gusts up to 61 MPH. We had forecasts of snow, but we hadn’t expected that much wind so I had used a minimum number of stakes on my tarp. The wind was pushing the tarp to the point it was pushing my hammock giving me a nice swing.

    So after half of my tarp had pulled stakes and come loose, I was up about 1:30 in the morning to finish securing up my tarp. Did a real hack job at that point, but it held the rest of the night. I ended up staking it down really well during the day Saturday, but we didn’t have much wind that night.

    It was a great weekend. I still came home completely exhausted.

    Here are pictures of my hammock with tarp secured, my troops tents, building snowshoes, building pulks, forming an igloo, and in front of a greenhouse shelter.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    We must, indeed, all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately. - Ben Franklin
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  2. #2
    Senior Member questtrek's Avatar
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    Wow .. Hut city ... very cool report thanks ...
    Questtrek
    "In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks". John Muir.

  3. #3
    Senior Member Fronkey's Avatar
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    That's great Alamosa. Over 60 mph are insane winds for camping! But, I bet that rocking to sleep helped out with the sleep too. It's always good to see the scouts going strong and learning how to have some fun in the outdoors.

    Hooking your tarp up to plastic bags filled with snow can really help keep it in place. I sometimes had trouble with my stakes holding in the snow and that worked out for me.

    Thanks for the trip report. Cool pics.


    Fronkey

  4. #4
    Senior Member ShadowAlpha's Avatar
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    looks like a great weekend with the kids!
    teaching them some good skills too

    Love the pics

  5. #5
    Senior Member adkmcmahon's Avatar
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    Yeah for you and the Troop. Our Klondike is this upcoming weekend.
    "Better to be king for a night than schmuck for a lifetime” Rupert Pupkin

  6. #6
    Senior Member Buffalo Skipper's Avatar
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    Great report and great pics!

    Our camporees are not so white, but I hung at our last one in November.

    Good to give the scouts the opportunity to experience this and to learn about winter camping!
    “Indian builds small fire and stays warm, white man builds big fire and stays warm collecting firewood”—unknown

    “The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea”—Karen Blixen

  7. #7
    Senior Member sk8rs_dad's Avatar
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    Snow anchors are a good option for tying down a tarp securely.
    1. Dig a hole in the snow about a foot deep
    2. Drop in a stick
    3. Pass the guy line under stick and tie to itself using a tautline hitch
    4. Bury the stick with snow
    5. Wait an hour or so for the snow to sinter
    6. Tighten tautline hitch


    When you want to go, untie the tautline hitch and pull the guy line free.

  8. #8
    Senior Member Alamosa's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by sk8rs_dad View Post
    Snow anchors are a good option for tying down a tarp securely.
    1. Dig a hole in the snow about a foot deep
    2. Drop in a stick
    3. Pass the guy line under stick and tie to itself using a tautline hitch
    4. Bury the stick with snow
    5. Wait an hour or so for the snow to sinter
    6. Tighten tautline hitch


    When you want to go, untie the tautline hitch and pull the guy line free.
    Yep, that is exactly what I normally do. Unfortunately, at these types of scout events you don't always get to pick the most favorable spots. In this location (the only reasonable trees next to our troops campsite), it wasn't an option to use snow anchors. The real issue on Friday was not that I couldn't have properly staked the tarp to handle the winds that showed up, it was that I didn't. It just wasn't a proper challenge during the daylight.
    We must, indeed, all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately. - Ben Franklin
    (known as a win-win on this forum)

  9. #9
    gunner76's Avatar
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    Sounds like the scouts had a great time. I had to look up what a "quinzees"
    is. Learned something new, I always just called them a snow cave.
    I am still 18 but with 52 years of experience !

  10. #10
    Senior Member mountain_man_mike's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gunner76 View Post
    Sounds like the scouts had a great time. I had to look up what a "quinzees"
    is. Learned something new, I always just called them a snow cave.
    I understood snow caves to be dug into a hillside or area where snow had already dumped by mother nature and quinzees to be shoveled snow on top of gear. Maybe yes, maybe no but my travel agent says a two night minimum is required to build a quinzee. Warm, quiet (to an eerie point) but a lot of shoveling. We built one last year that stood up to the Scoutmaster and five scouts standing on it. It took a stomp job to break it down.

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