Trueways survival

[chris]

Has anyone come across these before, just cropped up on a google search - I've never heard of them and I've been going on courses since the eighties. Here's a link

http://www.survival-school.org/

Chris

[Padoc]

Has anyone come across these before, just cropped up on a google search - I've never heard of them and I've been going on courses since the eighties. Here's a link

http://www.survival-school.org/

Chris

This is my first post - so hello everyone.

I recently got into this whole bushcraft / survival thing and also found these guys on Yahoo. They seemed to have a lot of good info and resources so I booked on one of their courses last month with Chris Caine. They were much more about survival than bushcraft but to be honest that's more in line with what I was looking for anyway. It all seemed very organised and informative and the staff were always eager to please. Not really sure what to compare it too having only done this course but I have recommend it to friends.

Pat

[RAPPLEBY2000]

ther was an excellent article on this course in "survival weaponay and techniques" way back in the 90's and it seemed really good.

i have no personal experience in the course but they really have been around a long time and i have never heard anything bad about them!

[chris]

thanks for the response chaps, I'd honestly never come across them before and when I looked at their website it all looked quite new.

thanks

Chris

[JohnH]

I was fortunate enough to partake in the 3-day course last year. It was very well run, exceptionally informative and (largely because most of the instructors are ex-military) very much in-line with the Instructor course that I then attended a few weeks before my most recent overseas deployment. I highly recommend them.

[Bodge]

I did a 2 day course last year with Steven Stewart in the midlands. He is ex Special Forces
and a valuable member of the trueways team. I had a cracking time and would defo book another one with them.

HTH

[JohnH]

Not to pick on your post, bodge, but I see a lot of 'special forces' comments on all survival/bushcraft forums. I tend to just let them slide but I'm new to this forum. People should not think that 'special forces' do some kind of special survival course. They do a 2 or 3 week package (pilots do the 3 week) that includes only the same level of survival training as anything Trueways puts out. There is nothing 'special' about the survival package that they do apart from the escape, evasion and resistance phase. There are MUCH better survival operators out there than SF - nearly all are civilian.

[Sniper]

There is a few on here who also visit their site, they have a good shop which provides excellent service and really good kit at reasonable prices. The team recently brought out a survival video featuring Lofty Wiseman, one of the all time great survival gurus. Their courses are run in various places around the country so you are bound to find one running fairly close your area, but bear in mind these are mainly survival rather than bushcraft. The instructors are very knowledgable and highly approachable as you would expect, and their course prices are good value for money going by what people have said after being on one. Can't say I've ever heard a bad word about them.
No connection, just a satisfied customer yad yada yada.

[JohnH]

There is a few on here who also visit their site, they have a good shop which provides excellent service and really good kit at reasonable prices. The team recently brought out a survival video featuring Lofty Wiseman, one of the all time great survival gurus. Their courses are run in various places around the country so you are bound to find one running fairly close your area, but bear in mind these are mainly survival rather than bushcraft. The instructors are very knowledgable and highly approachable as you would expect, and their course prices are good value for money going by what people have said after being on one. Can't say I've ever heard a bad word about them.
No connection, just a satisfied customer yad yada yada.

Sniper?? I've seen this avatar before - you on Airgun forums?

[Sniper]

Nah mate, just hunted around some old stuff in my pictures folder for something that matched.

[Armleywhite]

There is a few on here who also visit their site, they have a good shop which provides excellent service and really good kit at reasonable prices. The team recently brought out a survival video featuring Lofty Wiseman, one of the all time great survival gurus. Their courses are run in various places around the country so you are bound to find one running fairly close your area, but bear in mind these are mainly survival rather than bushcraft. The instructors are very knowledgable and highly approachable as you would expect, and their course prices are good value for money going by what people have said after being on one. Can't say I've ever heard a bad word about them.
No connection, just a satisfied customer yad yada yada.

John H, take note, Lofty is ex SF..

[Nagual]

I have to say, I really don't care if my instructor is ex Special Forces, Ex girlfriend or ex anything as long as the instruction is done in a method and style I can relate to. Trueways certainly has a loyal following and thats always an indicator as to how well a company is set up and run.


Nag.

[JohnH]

John H, take note, Lofty is ex SF..

And your point is? .I would say that his Survival 'capability' has nothing to do with him being ex-anything. It's because he knows a hell of a lot (and is still very interested in) the theme of survival. SF units are not survival ninjas - most hate the idea of doing it. Everyone likes being comfortable. The point is that being SF does not make you a survival expert but having an obsessively keen interest in the theme does (like Lofty). The survival course that special forces operators go on is readily accessible to anyone in the military, sometimes even the TA.

Anyway, this is not about SF, I was just making a very small and quite moot point, I apologise.

[rik_uk3]

Well I won't buy the Loffty DVD now I know he only did three weeks training, rip off or what.

[JohnH]

I have to say, I really don't care if my instructor is ex Special Forces, Ex girlfriend or ex anything as long as the instruction is done in a method and style I can relate to. Trueways certainly has a loyal following and thats always an indicator as to how well a company is set up and run.


Nag.

Quite right. I had an outstanding time with Trueways. Glyn, my instructor, was right on the button. It was his tuition that gave me the boost-up that I needed to go and get my mil instructor qual.

[JohnH]

Well I won't buy the Loffty DVD now I know he only did three weeks training, rip off or what.

Someone has to teach the instructors and run the Survival school

[rik_uk3]

A lifelong friend of mine was in the Para's, did his survival training with them, and when he left the army full time joined a TA regiment, but he seemed to go off on survival training in places like Norway, the middle east and south America? bit more than three weeks I think, he's an honest guy, don't think he would BS me.

[crazydave]

chris's dad was military so thats how he got interested. the fact that guys from sf go into that sort of thing is often just down to the gap in the market or a suitable job off. they also run paintball sites and activity days because they like being their own boss. I know one ex member of 'them' who is happy spending his retirement making templates for granite worktops.

the key thing that sets 'special forces' or most military types apart is the way they are taught to teach. schools that offer instructor training also offer an military style methods of instruction weekend which teaches you to strip it down to simple points and return questioning.

special forces doesnt particularly make you good at something a lot of 'them' and paras think that being in the services automatically would make you good at close protection but the skillset is totally different. same goes for survival training. st mawgan run an awesome course which is incredibly effective and by excellent instructors who are allways supplimenting their knowledge by employing civilians like rm to see if there is anything new or recent they can learn. many troops when posted get local survival lessons so in norway its dragging yourself out of a frozen lake and igloo/quinzy building and in belize its snakes/bugs/leeches/nasties, platform or swamp beds, wet/dry routine and so on. sf guys do tend to get posted to such areas more frequently though being part of rrf or amf units. sf units also work in smaller units and work on the principles of knowledge is something to be shared so they cross train each other inorder to make each member more usefull but also to cut down on barrack boredom.

trueways main bodies are a civvy and an ex-raf helicopter pilot, they use ex military and also some home grown instructors. they work with everyone from the princes trust to the military so can teach just about anything. chris's homegrown learning probably makes him more of a bushcraft founder than anyone else in the country and more UK specific unlike most of the stuff you see and read out there which is scandanavian in origin, the only difference is he founded a survival school. mind you so did rm and about the same time too. they have similar teaching styles as well by all accounts.

no airs, no graces just simple structured chatty training over a comprehensive curriculum which enables you to carry on learning at your own pace. the main thing you learn from the military training style is to adapt your mindset to the situation so enable you to adapt to it and go with the flow rather than panic.

not connected to them other than being a forum member along with a few of the others on here and frindly with the staff. I've done military courses and civvy ones and would happily do a trueways course over a woodlore one as the saved cash would pay for all new kit and I'm not that desperate for a new spoon

just like on here members get together when they can find someone near to meet up with but if anything make less mess as contrary to biased opinion we'd rather save the woods for when they are really needed.

incidentally chefs make good instructors as well, their training is generally physically based with trading of knowledge and skills to juniors and seniors alike. plus they allready have the ccutlery for the job

[JohnH]

I don't want to get off on a bad footing here as I've only just joined the forum and I want to be part of it for a long time as I think it's a fantastic site.

If units want to go and do 'continuation training' as all good units should then they go away and practice their skills on ex in Norway/Jungle, etc. I would suggest, however, that it is exceptionally rare for any unit to go away purely on a survival ex. The budgeteers at the top of the tree do not fund such exercises, believe me. Survival will often play just a separate part, especially as very few units have any survival instructors.

The bottom line is that there are few official survival courses in the MOD. Good units always do continuation training. My original point, which has been completely lost but which was highlighted above, is that being SF does not qualify you as a survival ninja. All decent units (as mentioned about Paras above) go on exercises that involve some form of survival and many units will be better than SF at this particular skill. It is worth noting that at the military's survival school there are very few, if any, ex-SF instructors. Currently, there are quite a few from the Scottish and other line regiments.