Day 4: Surviving

By Cam:

Today in Surviving the Apocalypse we started the day by making the hunting tool that sparked the invention of the bow, an atlatl. It's a hard word to pronounce, but I assure you that it is an actual thing. An atlatl is a spear-throwing device that has a very similar design to a pot hook. To make the atlatl, you first cut down a sapling and find a branch the is growing at an angle. Once you have your sapling and your branch, cut off a part around the branch that is about the size of your forearm. Trim off the end of the branch so that it is about an inch long, and then you have your atlatl. These devices can double as pot hooks if you want them too.

The atlatl was used to hunt large creatures like wooly mammoths when it was first made. Once those animals went extinct, the bow was created to hunt smaller animals for food. So after we finished making our atlatls, we moved on to making our bows and arrows. Word to the wise, do not attempt to make these tools unless you have a razor sharp knife or a chainsaw, and an infinite amount of patience.

To make a bow, first find another sapling and cut it so that it's about the size of you. Then determine where the handle is going to be, what part is going to be the front of the bow, and then start to carve the bow. This is the time where you'll want that chainsaw. Start to remove material from the back of the bow, but don't remove any material from the handle. This process takes a long time to finish, but once you are done removing material, then you carve "shoulders" into the ends of the bow. This is where you will tie the strings to your bow. Now no bow is ever complete without arrows. To make those find any live branches, make a divot in the end of the stick for the string, make the other end a sharp point, and straighten out the arrow. To straighten the arrow, I'm not kidding, put the stick in your mouth and bend it with your hands until it's straight.

After we finished making our bows and atlatls, we hiked back up to Burleigh Hill for the real challenge. When we got back to our campsite, we were divided up into two groups of three. The challenge was to brew any type of tea that we wanted. To do that we had to make and sustain a fire, build a tripod, melt snow then bring it to a boil, then find the material that we needed to make tea. Now I don't want to say who won (*cough* it was my team *cough*), but the difference was very pronounced. Now we are one step closer to surviving the apocalypse.

Day 3: Surviving

Day 3 by Becca S.

            Walking almost grudgingly up the mountain to our spot, you probably would have guessed that yesterday’s excitement was not there this morning. Arriving at the site our guide sent us out to gather the wood we would need to restart our fire from the day before. While restarting our fire from yesterday was done with excitement, the cold quickly became to much for many people.

We soon climbed further up the mountain to gather wood for building possible housing. Fighting to get the saplings to cut and break, we eventually go enough to start building. Setting up the first part of the structure seemed to be one of the easiest parts. Taking the saplings and bending them to twist together to create a dome like structure. Doing two of these seemed to be easy, only for us to find the next part of give the structure sidings was far more easier. Our struggle was putting the tarps up onto the structure. Some people got cold and walked away, this caused setting it up to take longer than wanted. When those of us who walked away realized that the longer it took to finish the housing the more we wouldn’t be moving on. Once we all started to work on it, it was quickly finished. After, of course, fighting with the wind multiple times.

While we were finishing putting tarps up on the housing structure our guide had started to make coffee. He had planned for us to make tea from the plants around us that he knew would make some nice tea. Since the coffee had been made earlier than the tea it was fun to watch out guide swing the metal pot ,holding the coffee, around quickly to force the coffee ground to settle at the bottom. We sat around out fire waiting for the water to boil for the tea. Having to carefully and tactically toss the plants, for the tea, into the water. We began the slow wait for it to be ready.

While waiting for the tea, our guide had us move onto making spoons. Having had people cut thick pieces of tree branches while waiting for tea, he had us cut our piece to the size we wanted. He then showed us what and how we were going to do it. Carefully grabbing the burning coals that would help us make the dip of the spoon, we got started. Blowing on the coals that help give the spoon its dip.

With people being to cold, we headed how early. However our day wasn’t over. We went up to art to finish making our spoons. We spent the next hour or so whittling the spoons would to our desired shape. We ended our day talking about our highs and lows of the day.

Day 2: Survival

  Day 2 by Emmett S:
Today was the second day of surviving the apocalypse. We started off with a preview of the day and learned about the safety precautions of fires. We took a bus up to Burleigh Mt. where we spent our day learning how to make fires and what type of wood lights best. 

     When we got to the end of the road everyone got a pair of snow shoes and we made our way to the top. When we reached the final destination we stared compacting the snow with our snowshoes as a group called cintering. 

Chris instructed us to gather dry firewood to practice lighting fires with matches. It went well for some people and worse for others.

     Next we worked together to build a big fire for the food we were going to cook later in the day. So everyone gathered together branches and wood for the fire. In the beginning we had trouble starting it so we got some birch bark to speed up the process. 

     After coming back from lunch we began getting the fire going again from the leftover coals, and we managed to get it going. In order to cook bread we needed to hang the pot over the fire with something. So with the knots we learned from the day before we put together a triangle structure and a hang bar for to melt snow for water.

 It went well and we cooked bread and made s’mores. Then it was time to put the fire out and clean up. All the things we have learned will lead up to the final project sleeping over on the mountain using the information and skills we learned from Chris.

Monday: Surviving the Apocalypse

By James Nally: 

Today we learned many new talents as a group. We started off the morning by getting breakfast in the cafeteria so we would have energy for the rest of the day. After we ate some food we went to the basement of Pilalas to play a get to know you game called Skittles. Then we started talking about what we were going to during the day. We went into the woods with just a knife and had to make a pot holder so in order to be able to do this we were taught by Chris how to chop down a small tree with just a knife. Once we learned this we cut down tree and picked a good spot on the tree to make are pot holders. 

Here are drawings of what we learned by Ines.

After we did that it was time for lunch. Right after lunch we meet again in the basement of Pilalas and learned how to tie a couple types of knots. 

Once we knew how to tie the knot we went back into the woods and had to uses the knots we learned to make cover under a tarp. 

After we accomplished that task the day was over and we reflected and talked about what we liked about the project today.