The Fiery Pants of Shame - Norwegian holiday/Arctic course report.

[Imagedude]

I've had a few requests to publish my thoughts on the recent Arctic Survival Course. I'll be posting my write-up here and will hopefully finish by Easter Monday.

[johnboy]

Sounds good....

The course will have almost as many written accounts as 'Bravo Two Zero'.....

I may head over to interview the Norwegian Locals is a few years and then publish another account called the "Real BCUK Arctic course 2012".

[Imagedude]

Sounds good....



I may head over to interview the Norwegian Locals is a few years and then publish another account called the "Real BCUK Arctic course 2012".

I'd leave it for a few years yet, feelings may be running high...

[johnboy]

I'd leave it for a few years yet, feelings may be running high...

Ok point taken.....I may wait until the current media interest dies down and start with the local fishermen... You cannot have upset them that much.....

[Imagedude]

Ok point taken.....I may wait until the current media interest dies down and start with the local fishermen... You cannot have upset them that much.....

Wouldn't be to sure about that; if someone half filled my new 'longdrop' and used all the bog roll I wouldn't be best pleased...

[johnboy]

Ha, I knew there had to be more to that trip than the northern lights and worn pulk runners.....

With a deed a henious as filling another mans long drop I'm surprised you boys are planning a return trip...

[Chris the Cat]

No one has questioned the title of this post yet!!
da C.

[decorum]

No one has questioned the title of this post yet!!
da C.

I'd assumed it an homage to Pete

[Chris the Cat]

Pre -Pete!!

da C.

[Shewie]

I'd assumed it an homage to Pete

I don't think Pete was alone from what he told me

[bikething]

I don't think Pete was alone from what he told me

It must have been cosy in there!

[tedw]

At night, as I fall to sleep, I am haunted by the memory of those dreadful flames..........

[Imagedude]

At night, as I fall to sleep, I am haunted by the memory of those dreadful flames..........

You'll soon be able to relive those memories, I'll be posting the story before the morning.

[Wayland]

The truth, like other things, cannot wait to get out.

[Teepee]

It must have been cosy in there!

With snow and 'new to science' lifeforms blowing out of the toilet, the ol' nether regions didn't think so!

[Imagedude]

So where to start? Best to start at the beginning I suppose. As soon as I saw the course dates published I booked my leave at work. I then started to review my kit, as a winter mountaineer I had most of the kit needed but that didn't stop me from buying more kit.
As soon as I had my final kit choice sorted I learnt that the first week's course was cancelled. I needed to fill the time with suitable activities so I asked other attendees about their plans in the hope that something could be planned. This was like herding cats so I booked a week's skiing instead. This meant that I had to take kit that would be suitable for skiing and the advanced course. This is the kit I ended up taking:-
Sleeping kit - I replaced my RidgeRest kipmat with an Expedown 7 mat. The downmats had proved popular on previous courses. My dual sleeping bag system comprised of a PHD Baltoro 800 and a PHD Minim 500 bag. A 3/4 length inflatable mat plus a sheet of 3mm kipmat foam was also packed. Bivibag was a 15 year old Army MVP bag.

Initial sleep system


Updated system with downmat inside bivi. A tight fit.


Sleeping kit in stuffsacks


My boots were Chippewa Arctic boots however I tended to use the Sorel Cariboo as the snow was wet.


Socks were mainly Bridgedale, thin socks were various makes of merino wool.
Some socks were a size larger than normal as they were to be worn over thick socks.


Cooking kit was a Primus Omnifuel and an Evernew meths stove as backup. Food was 3x compo meals per day plus dried food as a backup.


My pot was a Primus Etapower 1.2L.


Main knife was a Mora, penknife didn't get used and the folding saw was replaced with a Bahco 21" saw. The UCO candle holder was a pleasant surprise and now a trusted bit of kit.


The small axe was replaced with a 2lb/18" splitting axe that I made. It was an effective splitter but a trifle unweildly


From my selection of trousers I took my Paramo Aspira salopettes and Brenig fleece/pile salopettes. It wasn't cold enough for the Brenigs so I lived in the Aspira for 2 weeks.


Merino tops were used for the course, synthetic tops for skiing.


Can't have too many pairs of glasses.


Buffalo mitts were great, the only gloves I took were leather Soldier 95 gloves.


The final selection of upper body kit included the Buffalo shirt and the Buffalo Arctic Parka, a 600gm Woolpower jacket and a merino/possum pullover. Waterproof top was a Paramo smock.


The kit was fitted into a Pod Xpod sack (80L) and a 70L holdall. Handluggage was a 40L Pod Alpine sack.


The rucksack was carried in a large tote sack as some airlines don't like rucksacks.


I wore a lot of kit too, but not the Buffalo Superbag which got left behind.



More later...

[Imagedude]

I arrived in Oslo on Thursday 1st March. I was booked into the Raddison hotel for 2 nights. Due to the high prices of food I had a duty-free supper.

Drambuie, Haribo and chocolate for supper, the food of kings.


On the Friday I purchased an Oslo Pass which permits free or discounted entrance to museums and allows travel on public transport. First I went to the Viking Ship Museum.

The museum houses 3 ofthe best preserved longboats.







Viking knife and plate


Wayland's next pulk



Next door to the boat museum is the Norwegian Folk Museum which has a large open air site with traditional buildings













Birch bark is used for weatherproofing


Don't think they've got the hang of the wheel yet!


Old petrol station


Farmhouse interior




Inside the museum is a nice selection of axes











A couple of old knives

[Imagedude]

Inside the museum was a load of old clothes, much like those that Wayland wears:

Felt hat


Thermals




Carving features heavily in Norway



Views from inside a Norwegian house of the 1950's (reminds me of Wales in the 1980s)





Village gunsmith display

[Imagedude]

On Saturday I travelled to a X-country skiing area north of Lillehammer:

The start of a day's skiing


The end of a day's skiing


A summer house


Skiing in the woods


On the Thursday the weather turned nasty so we went snowshoeing. Nuturally somebody went **** over tit


We shoed out to this waterfall


At the end of the day I was knackered, snowshoes are what you use to wear when you need to fetch your skis from the garden shed.


So after a weeks skiing I returned to the hotel in Oslo via Lillehammer

Lillehammer


I had a few hours to kill so I sorted my kit to suit the next week's relatively warm weather conditions i.e. I substituted cold weather gear for waterproofs.

One last kit sort-out, from this


to this. The yellow holdall was left in storage at the airport for the week.







Later that night I met C da C at the airport. After dropping his bags off in the room we went back to the airport looking for food. We also went looking for more course members. We eventually found Ted, or more accurately, he found us. We had spotted him earlier but he was sitting next to a dude in jeans and a leather jacket (not course clothing) and we thought that they were a 'pair' so decided that he probably wasn't a BCUKer. Ted obviously realised that Chris and I were dressed for the course so he came over and asked if we were on the course. We set off together looking for (cheap) food but realised that this was a fruitless task so we bought some crisps and went back to the hotel, 3 of us in a double room.

We feasted on crisps and Drambuie.


The 3 of us Chris, Bob, Ted; Chris and I were ming monged

[Imagedude]

After 4 hours kip we arose, had breakfast the went back to the airport for our flight to Bardufoss.

Bardufoss Airport, a military base.


We arrived in Bardufoss before midday on a flight that was full of soldiers. Apparently there was a military exercise happening. The course members got together for the first time at the arrivals lounge, our kit was placed in a van and we boarded a bus for the training area. 40 minutes later we debused in the training area at Odd Knut's farm.

The Firehouse


Adam gets a brew on


Dumping gear in the firehouse


Pete having a brew and sorting his kit


The fire in the firehouse


Once we got together we realised that there were only 10 of us, Greg was not there and he has not posted on the forum since late last year.
We were all expecting to have an easy day sorting our kit and having a chin wag and numerous cups of tea however things turned out differently. After having a brew we went across the farm to an area with 3 pointy tents. We made the flooring for the tents out of fir branches and twigs from beech trees. It took forever.



Chris and Gary strip the branches off a pine tree


Ian prepares some beech twigs for his frosty tent


Me in the pointy tent


Here you see the thickness of the twiggy flooring, it was about half this thick in the bit of the tent I was 'allocated'.


Chris Da Cat strikes a pose outside the tent


Chris sitting by the fire near the pointy tents, Ted is standing, Fun Boy Three in the background.


A somewhat pensive C Da C


We went back to the firehouse were we had lectures on kit, rucksack packing and a few other subjects too. After being briefed on what to pack and what to leave behind we made our final kit selection. All our selected kit had to be hauled up the road to the final training area so we were quite ruthless in leaving kit behind to save on weight. We then had our evening meal.

Me looking really happy having my first of 20 rat packs that week. Though expensive, rat packs are still cheaper than shopping in Norway.


After tea, Woody took us shopping to the local supermarket. As Norway is a Catholic country we found the shops closed bar one small corner shop which sold meths and moose sausage. We returned to the camp with our meagre haul.

That's the end of my night shift, I'm going home (via the gym). More later including the Fiery Pants of Shame...

[treadlightly]

I enjoyed digesting that along with my breakfast. Thanks for taking the time and trouble. Off now to plan my slightly less demanding trip out in the Home Counties.

[Wayland]

Good stuff, carry on.

[southey]

Brilliant! cheers Image Dude, brewing some coffee ready for the next instalment

[Imagedude]

Sunday night; After finally sorting my kit into 2 bags, 1 for the course and 1 to be left behind at the farm, I retired to our pointy tent. C Da C, Ted, Wayland and I in one, Pete, Lennart and Shane in another and James, Ian and Matt in t'other. We didn't light the stove in the tent which was fortunate as I ended up wrapped around the stove as the decent spots in the tent had already been claimed. The next morning we got up early and went back to the fire house to get ready to depart to the training area.

C Da C ready to depart. That's a Munro 35 with PLCE water bottle pouches on the side. Chris is only 4' 2" tall.


The group ready to depart


Pulkmeister Wayland




The weather was very 'Scottish' this morning which delayed our short walk to the training area but we got there soon enough. Today's main task was to build our shelters for the week.

I built a simple frame for the back of bivi, I made snow walls for 3 of the sides.


This simple A-frame tarp arrangement works well in a warm/wet environment but it doesn't shed wet snow easily so I had to use braces to support the roof. Shelves carved into the snow walls proved to be very useful. The snow walls were reinforced with the small branches cut from the boughs used to create the roof. The main lesson learnt is that making snow walls is hard work and requires a lot of snow. It is easier to dig a bivi into snow than make one out of snow, well I think so, YMMV. I left a UCO candle burning at night as I hate waking up in the dark tangled in my bivi and busting for a ****.

Once the bivi was constructed I had a brew. Notice that the fragile air mats are moved out of harms way during the day and an expanded foam mat is used. The shovel was used to store clean snow ready for melting. It was also used for 'toilet duties' later in the week.


Chris thought that we were going to build a new shelter every night. He built a robust shelter with it's closed end facing into the direction of the wind. Sadly we were missinformed about the wind direction which was more variable than expected. Chris didn't think his bivi was too good for personal admin but given the weather conditions (snow, wind, rain,
spindrift) I think it was just about the best design.

And this is the point where 500 images dissapeared from my host site as I tried to rotate one of the files, more piccies once the provider sorts their mess out.

[Chris the Cat]

Brilliant mate!
It is all coming back to me!!
I can taste the 'smoked water!

Coming soon! 'The un-burnable, un-mentionables!!
da C.

[southey]

Really enjoying this matey. Many thanks for taking the time to post,

[Imagedude]

Here's Chris outside his basha, he loves his Trangia does Chris (not).


Ted built a lean-to. He built it twice because the weather changed.


Ted, like just about everyone else had a basha full of spindrift and frozen rain as the wind came from an 'unusual' and unexpected direction. Lesson learnt.

Ducky (Lennart) built a log cabin with built in fireplace, he was a regular Duracell bunny. Occasionally he'd drop by bearing gifts of cognac or cigars.


Pete and Shane built a lean-to smoke house. They also had an A-frame basha to fall back on. As Gary was using his basha tent thing in preference to building a new shelter he had time to help Pete and Shane build a log fire. Smoke was a real issue in these shelters.


Pete and Wayland abandon ship due to the smoke


Fun Boy Three (James, Ian and Matt) built a shared luxury hotel out of 4 tarps and half a forest. They also built a chimney which, after half a dozen modifications, was a partial success. Here's James titting about with the fire.


Due to the issues with smoke, Ted, Chris and I built a shared fire away from our bashas in a location that was convenient for all of us.



One other task that we had on the Monday was to nominate a urine tree for each of the groups. This was a clearly defined area for 'number ones', the idea being that we didn't contaminate the snow which we needed for drinking. By the end of the week just about every tree in the forest was a pi55 tree but at least we tried.

This is how Pete and Shane marked their tree, Pete's urine, Shane's handwriting.


During the day we also made a quick trip to the local village. I bought Jarlesberg cheese, caramel cheese, polar bread, biscuits, fruit and veg, dried fruit and other goodies. From the local hardware shop I bought a gallon of Aspen4, half a litre of meths and a ball of string, that'll be £40 thanks, ker-ching. Gotta love those Norway prices.

[mrcairney]

Blimey, not much water being drunk eh?

[Imagedude]

Double post...

[Imagedude]

Monday night was quite damp/snowy but I still managed a comfortable 8 hours sleep. I usually sleep for 5 hours but being outside in the cold and damp is hard work. After breakfast we were due to walk up to the local lake at 9AM but we had a late start as some people were cooking on wood fires and their drills/personal admin were not yet up to scratch.

Once at the lake we had a lecture on safety drills, use of ice spikes, warming a frozen person etc. We then cleared the snow off 4 different locations on the lake and drilled 4 holes through over a metre of ice.

Pete liked to strip off to avoid overheating on the way up to the lake.


Ian on the way up to the lake, note that we all carried daypacks incase we were benighted by a blizzard/whiteout.


Shane, Chris and Pete bore a hole.


Shane has a go


We all bore a hole


The fishing shelter near the lake


We also learnt about chopping a basin into the ice to make collecting lake water easier

Lennart chops a basin, can't be too precious with our axes here!


The finished basin with borehole


The basin fills with water, think I'll stick with melting snow thanks!



The holes that we drilled were later (in the week?) baited with fishing lines and various lures and traps. Gary had half of a tackle shop in his bag!!!

Gary (Wayland) lowers in one of his lines into the dark depths


Once the line is in place the hole is sealed with branches and covered in snow to delay re-freezing.


Later we returned to camp for tea and medals.

Pete prepares his tea, Chris cadges a fag


I prepared yet another rat-pack meal. My daily menu consisted of rat-pack bacon/beans or sausage/beans breakfast. For lunch I'd have polar bread, cheese, sausage and dried fruit. Tea would be rat-pack main meal followed by rat-pack pudding. I'd often put the pudding in a food flask with boiling water in an effot to get it to cook through. I think compo puddings are made from asbestos as they are impossible to heat through. I've been trying for nigh on 30 years without success!

A typical lunch


After tea I collected my shovel and broke trail across the field to the distant 'number twos' toilet area. I droped my trollies and straddled a fallen tree but could only muster a few steamy pressure relief farts (PRFs). I returned dejected and informed Ted of my failure, sharing details of our toilet habits was a recurring theme of the week. A few hours later my guts started bubbling again so I picked up my shovel and informed Ted that I'd be taking the walk of shame again, and then it happened!....